The World's Greatest Books - Volume 9 Part 20

My attention had been turned to the story of Christine and the murder of Monaldeschi by an exquisite little bas-relief in the Salon; and reading up the history in the biographical dictionary, I saw that it held the possibility of a tremendous drama. The subject haunted my mind continually, and soon my "Christine" came into life and was written. But Talma was dead; I had now no friend at the theatre; and I cast about me in vain for the means of getting my play produced.

Baron Taylor was at this time the official charged with the acceptance or rejection of plays, and Charles Nodier, so La.s.sagne informed me, was on intimate terms with him. La.s.sagne suggested that I should write to Nodier, reminding him of our chat on the night of "The Vampire," and asking for an introduction to the Baron. I did so, and the reply came from Baron Taylor himself, offering me an interview at seven in the morning.

At the appointed time, my heart beating fast, I rang the bell of his flat, and as I waited for someone to come, I wondered at a strange noise that was going on within--a deep, monotonous recitation, interrupted by occasional explosions of rage in a higher voice. I rang for the third time, and as a door opened within, the mysterious sounds doubled in volume. Then the outer door opened, and the Baron's old servant hurried me in. "Come in, sir," she said, "come in; the Baron is longing for you to come!" I found Baron Taylor in his bath, and beside him a playwright reading a tragedy. The fellow had insisted on entering, had caught the examiner of plays in his bath, and was inflicting on him a play of over two thousand lines! Undaunted by the Baron's rage, and unmoved by my arrival, he proceeded with his reading, while I waited in the bedroom.

When Baron Taylor at last came in and got into bed, he was s.h.i.+vering with cold, and I proposed to put off my reading; but he would not hear of it, and trembling, I began my play. At the end of each act the Baron himself asked for the next, and when it was finished he leapt from bed and called for his clothes that he might go and arrange for an immediate hearing before the committee at the Francais.

And so a special meeting was called, and I read "Christine" to a gathering of the greatest actors and actresses of the time, all fully dressed as if for a dance. I have rarely seen a play meet with so great a success at this ordeal; I was off my head with pleasure; the play was accepted by acclamation. I ran home to our rooms to tell my mother the great news of this great day, April 30, 1828, and then back to the office to copy out a heap of papers.

"Christine" was not, however, produced at this time. Another play on the same subject, written by a M. Brault, had also been accepted by the committee, and its author was suffering from an illness from which it was impossible that he should recover. Under these circ.u.mstances it was felt right to present the dying man's play while he was able to see it, and I willingly acceded to the requests, made by his son and friends, that my work should stand aside.

_IV.--Dumas Arrives_

But now, by a happy chance, in a book that lay open on a table in the office, I came across the suggestions for my "Henry III."; and as soon as the plot had grown clear in my mind, I wrote the play in a couple of months. I was only twenty-five, and this was only my second play; yet it is as well constructed as any of the fifty which I have since written.

Beranger, the great poet of democracy, and a man at that time of unrivalled influence, was present at a private reading of "Henry III.,"

and foretold its great success. The official reading was on September 17, 1828, when the play was accepted by acclamation, and the parts were cast. But my good fortune had not got into the papers, and this, as well as my frequent absences at the theatre, had done me no good at the office. So I was sent for one morning by M. de Broval, the director-general, and was given, in set terms, my choice between my situation as a clerk and my literary career. Only one choice was now possible, and from that very day my salary ceased.

The year 1829 was that in which my position was made and my future a.s.sured. But it opened with a great sorrow. I was one day at the theatre when a messenger ran in to tell me that my mother had fallen ill. I sent for a doctor, hurried to her side, and found that she was unable to speak, and that one side of her body was totally paralysed. My sister was soon with us, having come up to town for the first night of the play. My state of mind during the following days may be imagined, under the dreadful affliction of seeing my mother dying, and under the enormous burden of producing my first play.

On the day before the presentation of "Henry III.," I went to the palace, sent in my name to the Duke of Orleans, and boldly asked him the favour, or, rather, the act of justice, that he would be present at the theatre on the first night. I pointed out to him that he had given ear to those who had charged me with vanity and willfulness, and begged him to come and hear the verdict of the public. When his Highness told me that he could not come, because he had over a score of princes and princesses dining with him on that night, I suggested that he should bring them too. And so it was arranged.

February 11, so long awaited, dawned at last, and I spent the whole day until evening with my mother. I had given an order for the play to every one of my old colleagues at the office; I had a tiny stage-box; my sister had a box in which she entertained Boulanger, De Vigny, and Victor Hugo; every other place in the theatre was sold. The circle was gorgeous with princes decorated with their orders, and the boxes with the n.o.bility, the ladies all glittering with diamonds.

The curtain went up. I have never felt anything to compare with the cool breath of air from the stage, which fanned my heated brow. The first act was received sympathetically, and was followed by applause, and I seized the interval to run and see my mother. The second act pa.s.sed without disapproval. The third, I knew, would mean success or disaster. It called forth cries of fear, but also thunders of applause; never before had they seen a dramatic situation so realistically, I had almost said so brutally, presented. Again I visited my mother; how I wished she could have been there! Then came the fourth and fifth acts, which were received by a tumultuous frenzy of delight; and when the author's name was called, the Duke of Orleans himself stood up to honour it.

The days of struggle were over, the triumph had come. Utterly unknown that evening, I was next morning the talk of Paris. They little knew that I had spent the night on the floor, by the bed of my dying mother.

JOHN EVELYN

Diary

John Evelyn, English country gentleman, courtier, diarist, and miscellaneous author, was born at Wotton, in Surrey, on October 31, 1620, and was educated at Lewes, and then at Balliol College, Oxford. He then lived at the Middle Temple, London; but after the death of Strafford, disliking the unsettled state of England, he spent three months in the Low Countries. Returning for a short time to England, he followed the Royalist army for three days; but his prudence overcame his loyalty, and, crossing the Channel again, he wandered for four years in France and Italy. His observations abroad are minutely recorded in the "Diary," which in its earlier part too often resembles a guide-book. Having married, in Paris, the British amba.s.sador's daughter, Evelyn made his home, in 1652, at Sayes Court, Deptford, until he moved, in 1694; to Wotton, where he died on February 27, 1706. He was honourably employed, after the Restoration, on many public commissions, and was one of the founders of the Royal Society. Like his friend Samuel Pepys, Evelyn was a man of very catholic tastes, and wrote on a mult.i.tude of subjects, including history, politics, education, the fine arts, gardening, and especially forestry, his "Sylva, or a Discourse of Forest Trees," 1664, being, after the "Diary," his most famous work. Evelyn's character is very engaging in its richness, uprightness, and lively interests. His "Diary," like that of Pepys, lay long unpublished, and first saw the light in 1818.

_I.--Early Years_

I was born at Wotton, in the county of Surrey, October 31, 1620, after my father had been married about seven years, and my mother had borne him two daughters and one son.

My father's countenance was clear and fresh-coloured, his eyes quick and piercing, an ample forehead and manly aspect. He was ascetic and sparing; his wisdom was great, his judgement acute; affable, humble, and in nothing affected; of a thriving, silent, and methodical genius. He was distinctly severe, yet liberal on all just occasions to his children, strangers, and servants, a lover of hospitality; of a singular and Christian moderation in all his actions. He was justice of the peace, and served his country as high sheriff for Surrey and Suss.e.x together, and was a person of rare conversation. His estate was esteemed about 4,000 per annum, well wooded, and full of timber.

My mother was of an ancient and honourable family in Shrops.h.i.+re. She was of proper personage, of a brown complexion, her eyes and hair of a lovely black, of const.i.tution inclined to a religious melancholy or pious sadness, of a rare memory and most exemplary life, for economy and prudence esteemed one of the most conspicuous in her country.

Wotton, the mansion house of my father, is in the southern part of the s.h.i.+re, three miles from Dorking, and is upon part of Leith Hill, one of the most eminent in England for the prodigious prospect to be seen from its summit.

From it may be discerned twelve or thirteen counties, with part of the sea on the coast of Suss.e.x on a serene day. The house large and ancient, suitable to those hospitable times, and sweetly environed with delicious streams and venerable woods.

_November_ 3, 1640. A day never to be mentioned without a curse, began that long, foolish, and fatal Parliament, the beginning of all our sorrows for twenty years after.

_January_ 2, 1641. We at night followed the hea.r.s.e to the church at Wotton, where my father was interred, and mingled with the ashes of our mother, his dear wife. Thus we were bereft of both our parents in a period when we most of all stood in need of their counsel and a.s.sistance, especially myself, of a raw and unwary inclination.

_II.--Travels Abroad_

_May_ 12, 1641. I beheld on Tower Hill the fatal stroke which severed the wisest head in England from the shoulders of the Earl of Strafford, whose crime coming under the cognisance of no human law, a new one was made to his destruction--to such exorbitancy were things arrived.

_July_ 21. Having procured a pa.s.s at the custom-house, embarked in a Dutch frigate bound for Flus.h.i.+ng, convoyed by five other stout vessels, whereof one was a man-of-war.

_April_ 19, 1644. Set out from Paris for Orleans. The way, as indeed most of the roads in France, is paved with a small square freestone, so that there is little dirt and bad roads, as in England, only it is somewhat hard to the poor horses' feet.

_October_ 7. We had a most delicious journey to Ma.r.s.eilles, through a country full of vineyards, oliveyards, orange-trees, and the like sweet plantations, to which belong pleasantly situated villas built all of freestone.

We went to visit the galleys; the captain of the galley-royal gave us most courteous entertainment in his cabin, the slaves playing loud and soft music. Then he showed us how he commanded their motions with a nod and his whistle, making them row out. The spectacle was to me new and strange, to see so many hundreds of miserably naked persons, having their heads shaven close, and having only high red bonnets, a pair of coa.r.s.e canvas drawers, their whole backs and legs naked, doubly chained about their middles and legs in couples, and made fast to their seats, and all commanded by a cruel seaman. Their rising forward and falling back at their oar is a miserable spectacle, and the noise of their chains with the roaring of the beaten waters has something of the strange and fearful to one unaccustomed to it. They are chastised on the least disorder, and without the least humanity; yet are they cheerful and full of knavery.

_January_ 31, 1645. Climbing a steep hill in Naples, we came to the monastery of the Carthusians, from whence is a most goodly prospect towards the sea and city, the one full of galleys and s.h.i.+ps, the other of stately palaces, churches, castles, gardens, delicious fields and meadows, Mount Vesuvius smoking, doubtless one of the most considerable vistas in the world.

The inhabitants greatly affect the Spanish gravity in their habit, delight in good horses; the streets are full of gallants on horseback, in coaches, and sedans. The country people are so jovial and addicted to music that the very husbandmen almost universally play on the guitar, singing and composing songs in praise of their sweethearts, and will commonly go to the field with their fiddle; they are merry, witty, and genial, all which I much attribute to the excellent quality of the air.

They have a deadly hatred to the French, so that some of our company were flouted at for wearing red cloaks, as the mode then was.

This I made the end of my travels, sufficiently sated with rolling up and down, since, from the report of divers experienced and curious persons, I had been a.s.sured there was little more to be seen in the rest of the civil world, after Italy, France, Flanders, and the Low Country, but plain and prodigious barbarism.

Thus, about February 7, we set out on our return to Rome by the same way we came, not daring to adventure by sea, as some of our company were inclined, for fear of Turkish pirates hovering on that coast.

_III.--Evelyn in England_

_May_ 22, 1647. I had contracted a great friends.h.i.+p with Sir Richard Browne, his majesty's Resident at the Court of France, his lady and family, and particularly set my affections on a daughter.

_June_ 10. We concluded about my marriage, and on Thursday 27, Dr. Earle married us in Sir Richard Browne's chapel, betwixt the hours of eleven and twelve some few select friends being present; and this being Corpus Christi, feast was solemnly observed in this country; the streets were sumptuously hung with tapestry and strewn with flowers.

_July_ 8, 1656. At Ipswich--one of the sweetest, most pleasant, well-built towns in England. I had the curiosity to visit some Quakers here in prison--a new fanatic sect, of dangerous principles, who show no respect to any man, magistrate or other, and seem a melancholy, proud sort of people, and exceedingly ignorant.

_November_ 2. There was now nothing practical preached in the pulpits, or that pressed reformation of life, but high and speculative points that few understood, which left people very ignorant and of no steady principles, the source of all our sects and divisions, for there was much envy and uncharity in the world--G.o.d of His mercy amend it!

_January_ 27, 1658. After six fits of an ague died my dear son Richard, to our inexpressible grief and affliction, five years and three days only, but at that tender age a prodigy for wit and understanding, and for beauty of body a very angel. At two years and a half old he could perfectly read any of the English, Latin, French, or Gothic letters, p.r.o.nouncing the three first languages perfectly. He had before the fifth year, or in that year, not only skill to read most written hands, but to decline all the nouns, conjugate the verbs regular, and most of the irregular; got by heart almost the entire vocabulary of Latin and French primitives and words, could make congruous syntax, turn English into Latin and _vice versa_, construe and prove what he read, began himself to write legibly, and had a strong pa.s.sion for Greek. The number of verses he could recite was prodigious, and he had a wonderful disposition to mathematics. As to his piety, astonis.h.i.+ng were his applications of Scripture upon occasion, and his sense of G.o.d. He was all life, all prettiness, far from morose, sullen or childish in anything he said or did. Such a child I never saw; for such a child I bless G.o.d, in whose bosom he is!

_November_ 22. Saw the superb funeral of the Protector. He was carried from Somerset House in a velvet bed of state, drawn by six horses housed with the same, the pall held up by his new lords; Oliver lying in effigy in royal robes, and with a crown, sceptre and globe, like a king; pendants carried by officers, imperial banners by the heralds; a rich caparisoned horse, embroidered all over with gold, a knight of honour armed _cap-a-pie_, guards, soldiers, and innumerable mourners. In this equipage they proceeded to Westminster; but it was the joyfullest funeral I ever saw, for there were none that cried but dogs, which the soldiers hooted away with a barbarous noise, drinking and taking tobacco in the streets as they went.