Part 2 (2/2)

The Right generally was very much opposed to having the Chambers back in Paris. I never could understand why. I suppose they were afraid that a stormy sitting might lead to disturbances. In the streets of a big city there is always a floating population ready to espouse violently any cause. At Versailles one was away from any such danger, and, except immediately around the palace, there was n.o.body in the long, deserted avenues. They often cited the United States, how no statesman after the signing of the Declaration of Independence (in Philadelphia) would have ventured to propose that the Parliament should sit in New York or Philadelphia, but the reason there was very different; they were obliged to make a neutral zone, something between the North and the South. The District of Columbia is a thing apart, belonging to neither side. It has certainly worked very well in America. Was.h.i.+ngton is a fine city, with its splendid old trees and broad avenues. It has a cachet of its own, is unlike any other city I know in the world.

The marshal received at the Elysee every Thursday evening--he and his staff in uniform, also all the officers who came, which made a brilliant gathering. Their big dinners and receptions were always extremely well done. Except a few of their personal friends, not many people of society were present--the diplomatic corps usually very well represented, the Government and their wives, and a certain number of liberal deputies--a great many officers. We received every fifteen days, beginning with a big dinner. It was an open reception, announced in the papers. The diplomats always mustered very strong, also the Parliament--not many women. Many of the deputies remained in the country, taking rooms merely while the Chambers were sitting, and their wives never appeared in Paris. ”Society” didn't come to us much either, except on certain occasions when we had a royal prince or some very distinguished foreigners. Besides the big official receptions, we often had small dinners up-stairs during the week. Some of these I look back to with much pleasure. I was generally the only lady with eight or ten men, and the talk was often brilliant. Some of our habitues were the late Lord Houghton, a delightful talker; Lord Dufferin, then amba.s.sador in St.

Petersburg; Sir Henry Layard, British amba.s.sador in Spain, an interesting man who had been everywhere and seen and known everybody worth knowing in the world; Count Schouvaloff, Russian amba.s.sador in London, a polished courtier, extremely intelligent; he and W. were colleagues afterward at the Congres de Berlin, and W. has often told me how brilliantly he defended his cause; General Ignatieff, Prince Orloff, the nunzio Monsignor Czascki, quite charming, the type of the prelat mondain, very large (though very Catholic) in his ideas, but never aggressive or disagreeable about the Republic, as so many of the clergy were. He was very fond of music, and went with me sometimes to the Conservatoire on Sunday; he had a great admiration for the way they played cla.s.sical music; used to lean back in his chair in a corner (would never sit in front of the box) and drink in every sound.

We sometimes had informal music in my little blue salon. Baron de Zuylen, Dutch minister, was an excellent musician, also Comte de Beust, the Austrian amba.s.sador. He was a composer. I remember his playing me one day a wedding march he had composed for the marriage of one of the archdukes. It was very descriptive, with bells, cannon, hurrahs, and a nuptial hymn--rather difficult to render on a piano--but there was a certain amount of imagination in the composition. The two came often with me to the Conservatoire. Comte de Beust brought Liszt to me one day. I wanted so much to see that complex character, made up of enthusiasms of all kinds, patriotic, religious, musical. He was dressed in the ordinary black priestly garb, looked like an ascetic with pale, thin face, which lighted up very much when discussing any subject that interested him. He didn't say a word about music, either then or on a subsequent occasion when I lunched with him at the house of a great friend and admirer, who was a beautiful musician. I hoped he would play after luncheon. He was a very old man, and played rarely in those days, but one would have liked to hear him. Madame M. thought he would perhaps for her, if the party were not too large, and the guests ”sympathetic”

to him. I have heard so many artists say it made all the difference to them when they felt the public was with them--if there were one unsympathetic or criticising face in the ma.s.s of people, it was the only face they could distinguish, and it affected them very much. The piano was engagingly open and music littered about, but he apparently didn't see it. He talked politics, and a good deal about pictures with some artists who were present.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Franz Liszt.]

I did hear him play many years later in London. We were again lunching together, at the house of a mutual friend, who was not at all musical.

There wasn't even a piano in the house, but she had one brought in for the occasion. When I arrived rather early, the day of the party, I found the mistress of the house, aided by Count Hatzfeldt, then German amba.s.sador to England, busily engaged in transforming her drawing-room.

The grand piano, which had been standing well out toward the middle of the room, open, with music on it (I dare say some of Liszt's own--but I didn't have time to examine), was being pushed back into a corner, all the music hidden away, and the instrument covered with photographs, vases of flowers, statuettes, heavy books, all the things one doesn't habitually put on pianos. I was quite puzzled, but Hatzfeldt, who was a great friend of Liszt's and knew all his peculiarities, when consulted by Madame A. as to what she could do to induce Liszt to play, had answered: ”Begin by putting the piano in the furthest, darkest corner of the room, and put all sorts of heavy things on it. Then he won't think you have asked him in the hope of hearing him play, and perhaps we can persuade him.” The arrangements were just finished as the rest of the company arrived. We were not a large party, and the talk was pleasant enough. Liszt looked much older, so colourless, his skin like ivory, but he seemed just as animated and interested in everything. After luncheon, when they were smoking (all of us together, no one went into the smoking-room), he and Hatzfeldt began talking about the Empire and the beautiful fetes at Compiegne, where anybody of any distinction in any branch of art or literature was invited. Hatzfeldt led the conversation to some evenings when Strauss played his waltzes with an entrain, a sentiment that no one else has ever attained, and to Offenbach and his melodies--one evening particularly when he had improvised a song for the Empress--he couldn't quite remember it. If there were a piano--he looked about. There was none apparently. ”Oh, yes, in a corner, but so many things upon it, it was evidently never meant to be opened.” He moved toward it, Liszt following, asking Comtesse A. if it could be opened. The things were quickly removed.

Hatzfeldt sat down and played a few bars in rather a halting fas.h.i.+on.

After a moment Liszt said: ”No, no, it is not quite that.” Hatzfeldt got up. Liszt seated himself at the piano, played two or three bits of songs, or waltzes, then, always talking to Hatzfeldt, let his fingers wander over the keys and by degrees broke into a nocturne and a wild Hungarian march. It was very curious; his fingers looked as if they were made of yellow ivory, so thin and long, and of course there wasn't any strength or execution in his playing--it was the touch of an old man, but a master--quite unlike anything I have ever heard. When he got up, he said: ”Oh, well, I didn't think the old fingers had any music left in them.” We tried to thank him, but he wouldn't listen to us, immediately talked about something else. When he had gone we complimented the amba.s.sador on the way in which he had managed the thing. Hatzfeldt was a charming colleague, very clever, very musical, a thorough man of the world. I was always pleased when he was next to me at dinner--I was sure of a pleasant hour. He had been many years in Paris during the brilliant days of the Empire, knew everybody there worth knowing. He had the reputation, notwithstanding his long stay in Paris, of being very anti-French. I could hardly judge of that, as he never talked politics to me. It may very likely have been true, but not more marked with him than with the generality of Anglo-Saxons and Northern races, who rather look down upon the Latins, hardly giving them credit for their splendid dash and pluck--to say nothing of their brains. I have lived in a great many countries, and always think that as a people, I mean the uneducated ma.s.s, the French are the most intelligent nation in the world. I have never been thrown with the j.a.panese--am told they are extraordinarily intelligent.

We had a dinner one night for Mr. Gladstone, his wife, and a daughter.

Mr. Gladstone made himself quite charming, spoke French fairly well, and knew more about every subject discussed than any one else in the room.

He was certainly a wonderful man, such extraordinary versatility and such a memory. It was rather pretty to see Mrs. Gladstone when her husband was talking. She was quite absorbed by him, couldn't talk to her neighbours. They wanted very much to go to the Conciergerie to see the prison where the unfortunate Marie Antoinette pa.s.sed the last days of her unhappy life, and Mr. Gladstone, inspired by the subject, made us a sort of conference on the French Revolution and the causes which led up to it, culminating in the Terror and the execution of the King and Queen. He spoke in English (we were a little group standing at the door--they were just going), in beautiful academic language, and it was most interesting, graphic, and exact. Even W., who knew him well and admired him immensely, was struck by his brilliant improvisation.

[Ill.u.s.tration: William E. Gladstone. From a photograph by Samuel A.

Walker, London.]

We were often asked for permits by our English and American friends to see all the places of historical interest in Paris, and the two places which all wanted to see were the Conciergerie and Napoleon's tomb at the Invalides. When we first came to Paris in 1866, just after the end of the long struggle between the North and South in America, our first visits too were for the Conciergerie, Invalides, and Notre Dame, where my father had not been since he had gone as a very young man with all Paris to see the flags that had been brought back from Austerlitz. They were interesting days, those first ones in Paris, so full of memories for father, who had been there a great deal in his young days, first as an eleve in the Ecole Polytechnique, later when the Allies were in Paris. He took us one day to the Luxembourg Gardens, to see if he could find any trace of the spot where in 1815 during the Restoration Marshal Ney had been shot. He was in Paris at the time, and was in the garden a few hours after the execution--remembered quite well the wall against which the marshal stood--and the comments of the crowd, not very flattering for the Government in executing one of France's bravest and most brilliant soldiers.

All the Americans who came to see us at the Quai d'Orsay were much interested in everything relating to General Marquis de Lafayette, who left an undying memory in America, and many pilgrimages were made to the Chateau de la Grange, where the Marquis de Lafayette spent the last years of his life and extended a large and gracious hospitality to all his friends. It is an interesting old place, with a moat all around it and high solid stone walls, where one still sees the hole that was made in the wall by a cannon-ball sent by Marechal de Turenne as he was pa.s.sing with his troops, as a friendly souvenir to the owner, with whom he was not on good terms. So many Americans and English too are imbued with the idea that there are no chateaux, no country life in France, that I am delighted when they can see that there are just as many as in any other country. A very clever American writer, whose books have been much read and admired, says that when travelling in France in the country, he never saw any signs of wealth or gentlemen's property. I think he didn't want to admire anything French, but I wonder in what part of France he has travelled. Besides the well-known historic chateaux of Chaumont, Chenonceaux, Azay-le-Rideau, Maintenon, Dampierre, Josselin, Valencay, and scores of others, there are quant.i.ties of small Louis XV chateaux and manoirs, half hidden in a corner of a forest, which the stranger never sees. They are quite charming, built of red brick with white copings, with stiff old-fas.h.i.+oned gardens, and trees cut into all sorts of fantastic shapes. Sometimes the parish church touches the castle on one side, and there is a private entrance for the seigneurs. The interior arrangements in some of the old ones leave much to be desired in the way of comfort and modern improvements,--lighting very bad, neither gas nor electricity, and I should think no baths anywhere, hardly a tub. On the banks of the Seine and the Loire, near the great forests, in all the departments near Paris there are quant.i.ties of chateaux--some just on the border of the highroad, separated from it by high iron gates, through which one sees long winding alleys with stone benches and vases with red geraniums planted in them, a sun-dial and stiff formal rows of trees--some less pretentious with merely an ordinary wooden gate, generally open, and always flowers of the simplest kind, geraniums, sunflowers, pinks, dahlias, and chrysanthemums--what we call a jardin de cure, (curate's garden)--but in great abundance. With very rare exceptions the lawns are not well kept--one never sees in this country the smooth green turf that one does in England.

Some of the old chateaux are very stately--sometimes one enters by a large quadrangle, quite surrounded by low arcades covered with ivy, a fountain and good-sized basin in the middle of the courtyard, and a big clock over the door--sometimes they stand in a moat, one goes over a drawbridge with ma.s.sive doors, studded with iron nails and strong iron bolts and chains which defend the entrance, making one think of old feudal days, when might was right, and if a man wanted his neighbours property, he simply took it. Even some of the smaller chateaux have moats. I think they are more picturesque than comfortable--an ivy-covered house with a moat around it is a nest for mosquitoes and insects of all kinds, and I fancy the damp from the water must finish by pervading the house. French people of all cla.s.ses love the country and a garden with bright flowers, and if the poorer ones can combine a rabbit hutch with the flowers they are quite happy.

I have heard W. speak sometimes of a fine old chateau in our department--(Aisne) belonging to a deputy, who invited his friends to shoot and breakfast. The cuisine and shooting were excellent, but the accommodations fantastic. The neighbours said nothing had been renewed or cleaned since the chateau was occupied by the Cossacks under the first Napoleon.

We got very little country life during those years at the Foreign Office. Twice a year, in April and August, W. went to Laon for his Conseil-General, over which he presided, but he was rarely able to stay all through the session. He was always present on the opening day, and at the prefet's dinner, and took that opportunity to make a short speech, explaining the foreign policy of the Government. I don't think it interested his colleagues as much as all the local questions--roads, schools, etc. It is astonis.h.i.+ng how much time is wasted and how much letter-writing is necessitated by the simplest change in a road or railway crossing in France. We had rather a short narrow turning to get into our gate at Bourneville, and W. wanted to have the road enlarged just a little, so as to avoid the sharp angle. It didn't interfere with any one, as we were several yards from the highroad, but it was months, more than a year, before the thing was done. Any one of the workmen on the farm would have finished it in a day's work.

At one of our small dinners I had such a characteristic answer from an English diplomatist, who had been amba.s.sador at St. Petersburg. He was really a charming talker, but wouldn't speak French. That was of no consequence as long as he only talked to me, but naturally all the people at the table wanted to talk to him, and when the general conversation languished, at last, I said to him: ”I wish you would speak French; none of these gentlemen speak any other language.” (It was quite true, the men of my husband's age spoke very rarely any other language but their own; now almost all the younger generation speak German or English or both. Almost all my son's friends speak English perfectly.) ”Oh no, I can't,” he said; ”I haven't enough the habit of speaking French. I don't say the things I want to say, only the things I can say, which is very different.” ”But what did you do in Russia?” ”All the women speak English.” ”But for affairs, diplomatic negotiations?” ”All the women speak English.” I have often heard it said that the Russian women were much more clever than the men. He evidently had found it true.

VI

THE EXPOSITION YEAR

The big political dinners were always interesting. On one occasion we had a banquet on the 2d of December. My left-hand neighbour, a senator, said to me casually: ”This room looks very different from what it did the last time I was in it.” ”Does it? I should have thought a big official dinner at the Foreign Office would have been precisely the same under any regime.” ”A dinner perhaps, but on that occasion we were not precisely dining. I and a number of my friends had just been arrested, and we were waiting here in this room strictly guarded, until it was decided what should be done with us.” Then I remembered that it was the 2d of December, the anniversary of Louis Napoleon's coup d'etat. He said they were quite unprepared for it, in spite of warnings. He was sent out of the country for a little while, but I don't think his exile was a very terrible one.

I got my first lesson in diplomatic politeness from Lord Lyons, then British amba.s.sador in Paris. He was in Paris during the Franco-German War, knew everybody, and had a great position. He gave very handsome dinners, liked his guests to be punctual, was very punctual himself, always arrived on the stroke of eight when he dined with us. We had an Annamite mission to dine one night and had invited almost all the amba.s.sadors and ministers to meet them. There had been a stormy sitting at the Chamber and W. was late. As soon as I was ready I went to his library and waited for him; I couldn't go down and receive a foreign mission without him. We were quite seven or eight minutes late and found all the company a.s.sembled (except the Annamites, who were waiting with their interpreter in another room to make their entry in proper style).

As I shook hands with Lord Lyons (who was doyen of the diplomatic corps) he said to me: ”Ah, Madame Waddington, I see the Republic is becoming very royal; you don't receive your guests any more, merely come into the room when all the company is a.s.sembled.” He said it quite smilingly, but I understood very well, and of course we ought to have been there when the first guests arrived. He was very amiable all the same and told me a great many useful things--for instance, that I must never invite a cardinal and an amba.s.sador together, as neither of them would yield the precedence and I would find myself in a very awkward position.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Lord Lyons.]

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