Volume Ii Part 29 (2/2)

MY DEAREST MACREADY,

I have just come back from Paris, where the readings--”Copperfield,”

”Dombey” and ”Trial,” and ”Carol” and ”Trial”--have made a sensation which modesty (my natural modesty) renders it impossible for me to describe. You know what a n.o.ble audience the Paris audience is! They were at their very n.o.blest with me.

I was very much concerned by hearing hurriedly from Georgy that you were ill. But when I came home at night, she showed me Katie's letter, and that set me up again. Ah, you have the best of companions and nurses, and can afford to be ill now and then for the happiness of being so brought through it. But don't do it again yet awhile for all that.

Legouve (whom you remember in Paris as writing for the Ristori) was anxious that I should bring you the enclosed. A manly and generous effort, I think? Regnier desired to be warmly remembered to you. He looks just as of yore.

Paris generally is about as wicked and extravagant as in the days of the Regency. Madame Viardot in the ”Orphee,” most splendid. An opera of ”Faust,” a very sad and n.o.ble rendering of that sad and n.o.ble story.

Stage management remarkable for some admirable, and really poetical, effects of light. In the more striking situations, Mephistopheles surrounded by an infernal red atmosphere of his own. Marguerite by a pale blue mournful light. The two never blending. After Marguerite has taken the jewels placed in her way in the garden, a weird evening draws on, and the bloom fades from the flowers, and the leaves of the trees droop and lose their fresh green, and mournful shadows overhang her chamber window, which was innocently bright and gay at first. I couldn't bear it, and gave in completely.

Fechter doing wonders over the way here, with a picturesque French drama. Miss Kate Terry, in a small part in it, perfectly charming. You may remember her making a noise, years ago, doing a boy at an inn, in ”The Courier of Lyons”? She has a tender love-scene in this piece, which is a really beautiful and artistic thing. I saw her do it at about three in the morning of the day when the theatre opened, surrounded by shavings and carpenters, and (of course) with that inevitable hammer going; and I told Fechter: ”That is the very best piece of womanly tenderness I have ever seen on the stage, and you'll find that no audience can miss it.” It is a comfort to add that it was instantly seized upon, and is much talked of.

Stanfield was very ill for some months, then suddenly picked up, and is really rosy and jovial again. Going to see him when he was very despondent, I told him the story of Fechter's piece (then in rehearsal) with appropriate action; fighting a duel with the was.h.i.+ng-stand, defying the bedstead, and saving the life of the sofa-cus.h.i.+on. This so kindled his old theatrical ardour, that I think he turned the corner on the spot.

With love to Mrs. Macready and Katie, and (be still my heart!) Benvenuta, and the exiled Johnny (not too attentive at school, I hope?), and the personally-unknown young Parr,

Ever, my dearest Macready, your most affectionate.

[Sidenote: Miss Power.]

OFFICE OF ”ALL THE YEAR ROUND,”

_Thursday, Feb. 26th, 1863._

MY DEAR MARGUERITE,

I think I have found a first-rate t.i.tle for your book, with an early and a delightful a.s.sociation in most people's minds, and a strong suggestion of Oriental pictures:

”ARABIAN DAYS AND NIGHTS.”

I have sent it to Low's. If they have the wit to see it, do you in your first chapter touch that string, so as to bring a fanciful explanation in aid of the t.i.tle, and sound it afterwards, now and again, when you come to anything where Haroun al Raschid, and the Grand Vizier, and Mesrour, the chief of the guard, and any of that wonderful _dramatis personae_ are vividly brought to mind.

Ever affectionately.

[Sidenote: Mr. Charles Knight.]

OFFICE OF ”ALL THE YEAR ROUND,”

_Wednesday, March 4th, 1863._

MY DEAR CHARLES KNIGHT,

At a quarter to seven on Monday, the 16th, a stately form will be descried breathing birthday cordialities and affectionate amenities, as it descends the broken and gently dipping ground by which the level country of the Clifton Road is attained. A practised eye will be able to discern two humble figures in attendance, which from their flowing crinolines may, without exposing the prophet to the imputation of rashness, be predicted to be women. Though certes their importance, absorbed and as it were swallowed up in the ill.u.s.trious bearing and determined purpose of the maturer stranger, will not enthrall the gaze that wanders over the forest of San Giovanni as the night gathers in.

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