The House of Rothschild, Volume 1

by Niall Ferguson

  The successful suitor proved to be the artist and architect Sir Coutts Lindsay, a prosperous but Bohemian figure twice her age with a Scottish estate, ten thousand a year, a suspiciously close friendship with Lady Virginia Somers and a shady retinue of plebeian mistresses and bastards. When Charlotte paid one of her numerous half-patronising, half-prurient visits to her sister-in-law’s house in Upper Grosvenor Square—ostensibly to offer her congratulations—she:

  found her very ill and completely overcome by her conflicting feelings; she had been crying and sobbing almost shrieking, and is indeed so much to be pitied that the congratulations died on my lips. The marriage itself, ceci entre nous, does not satisfy her completely, for the bridegroom elect is forty, and has grey locks, and perhaps her ambition would have soared higher, and selected a nobleman with a grand title for her daughter.

  With poetic justice, Blanche had followed Hannah Mayer’s own example, set twenty-five years before, by choosing a husband for love and in spite of her mother’s wishes. Though the latter sought to make the best of a bad job—Sir Coutts, she insisted, was “the most fascinating person I ever met”—Charlotte omitted no defect in her back-handed descriptions of the bridegroom (he was “picturesque,” “one-sided,” his gifts to his fiancée were miserly, and so on).

  Nor was this the end of Hannah Mayer’s “punishment.” From the moment of her engagement, Blanche appeared to distance herself from her ailing mother, and cut herself off almost completely from the Rothschilds. According to Charlotte—who poured pity over her sister-in-law while simultaneously kindling antipathy towards the new “Lady Lindsay”—she visited her mother’s bedside as infrequently as possible. She was (variously) “utterly heartless,” “the heartless bride,” “a heartless serpent,” “quite affected and namby pamby,” “an icicle,” “a horrible humbug and heartless hypocrite,” “that heartless, incomprehensible woman,” “the unnatural daughter” and “that horrible Blanche.” The object of this torrent of vituperation was “immensely happy at being Lady Lindsay, and far too much so, to feel deep anxiety for her suffering and perhaps dying mother.” When Charlotte paid a call on her, she found “the heartless staring creature giggling and grinning and simpering while she asked after her dying mother as if the poor sufferer had had a mere cold.”

  By mid-November the end was in sight. “Poor Aunt H.M.’s married life and widowed existence have become one chain of such uninterrupted sorrow and suffering,” she told her son, “that, for her sake, one can hardly wish to see her days prolonged. As for Blanche—no one need waste a moment’s pity upon her.—She is either a monster or an enigma. It is less disagreeable to look upon her in the light of the latter, and not to un-riddle her character.” “I feel very sad,” she added the next day, “when I think of such a life of torture, and of a deathbed so lonely. Blanche arrives at 5 o’clock in the evening, stays five minutes, and then departs. Do not mention this heartless behaviour as it is a perfect disgrace to our family, and must shock the domestics from whom constant fidelity is expected.” And so it went on. “Upon the plea that the invalid is too weak to bear even her adored presence beyond five or six minutes in the course of the day, [she] never puts her foot into the house before 5 o’clock in the evening, viz not before the shades of evening put an end to her drawing, in Sir C. Lindsay’s studio; then she arrives novel in hand, while her unfortunate mother carries on the unequal battle with disease and death.”

  On the night of December 1, 1864, Hannah Mayer finally expired. Her life had been, Charlotte reflected, using carefully chosen words, “a long martyrdom”; indeed, in her last weeks she had sometimes looked “like one of the lovely martyrs so much admired in Italian picture-galleries and churches.” But Charlotte, like her uncle James, did not interpret Hannah Mayer’s downfall in purely religious terms: it irked her that her sister-in-law’s will had omitted to dispose of £7,000 in a savings account, money which passed by default to the Lindsays. The idea of Rothschild money passing into other hands still rankled, a quarter of a century after Hannah Mayer’s initial lapse from grace. Retribution even followed her to the grave and beyond, for Charlotte missed no transgression on the part of Blanche Lindsay, notably her absence from her mother’s funeral (where “the Duke of Grafton, Lord Charles Fitzroy and Lord Southampton, who had known and seen the deceased so little . . . never alluded to her but talked of railroads, horses etc.”) and her attempt to sell the portraits she had inherited of her Rothschild grandparents (“To sell her grandmother and her grandfather; it is not to be believed”). Everything—her louche Pre-Raphaelite dresses, her widening girth, her deteriorating eyesight—could be construed as a consequence of her mother’s peculiar form of original sin. And when her marriage foundered on the rocks of Lindsay’s habitual infidelity, Anselm’s son Ferdinand could not resist predicting that she would “repent . . . in the long run” her decision to “leave the conjugal room.” Even as late as 1882, it seems, Hannah Mayer’s crime, though punished, had not been forgiven.

  City and Country

  Nothing tells us more about the nineteenth-century Rothschilds’ exceptionally acute sense of kinship than their treatment of Hannah Mayer. The paradox is that her persecution coincided with an acceleration in the pace of the family’s social and cultural assimilation. By not only marrying a Christian but converting to Christianity, she had crossed one of the few barriers which remained between the Rothschilds and the European social elite, and perhaps the only one which the Rothschilds themselves wished to preserve.

  In his satirical “Book of Snobs,” published in Punch in 1846-7, Thackeray cited “the Scharlachschild family at Paris, Naples, Frankfort &c.” as the archetypes of the “Banking Snob,” who “receives all the world into his circle,” dispensing “princely hospitalities” and “entertain[ing] all the world, even the poor, at their fêtes.” This was not far wide of the mark. In the decade after Nathan’s death, the Rothschilds greatly increased the amount of time and energy they devoted to social and cultural pursuits, with James in the vanguard. To begin with, their residences grew grander and more numerous in both town and country. In 1836 James commissioned the architect, designer and theatre producer Charles-Edmond Duponchel to reconstruct and redecorate his rue Laffitte hôtel, with money no object. The result was the quintessential millionaire’s palace, combining extravagant historicist decoration with the latest modern comforts. Among Duponchel’s more spectacular touches was a wood-panelled salon in the Renaissance style which was dominated by Joseph-Nicholas Robert-Fleury’s series of Renaissance scenes (including Charles V in Spain, Luther preaching and Henry VIII hunting), but which also subtly juxtaposed the Rothschild arms with those of the Medici. (There was also a billiard room with a Pom peii-style mural by François-Edouard Picot.) But this was historicism with all mod cons. Central heating was provided for the ground floor salons and dining room by four brick ovens in the cellars, and all floors had running water from tanks on the top floor. There were also four large closed tanks for waste in the cellar, to say nothing of gas lighting in the form of moustached statuettes holding mock torches. Salomon’s house next door was given similar treatment, as was the new hôtel Talleyrand which James acquired in 1838 in the more fashionable rue Saint-Florentin in the 8th arrondissement.

  The effect was evidently imposing. In 1836, after a post-theatre ball given by James to show off the redecorated rue Laffitte house, Heine admiringly described what he called “the Versailles of the absolute reign of money”:

  Here everything comes together which the spirit of the sixteenth century could invent and the money of the nineteenth century could pay for; here the genius of the visual arts competes with the genius of Rothschild. The palace and its decorations have been continuously worked on for two years and the sums expended on them are said to be enormous. M. de Rothschild smiles when someone questions him about this . . . One must, however, admire the flair with which everything has been done, as much as the costliness.

  A Parisian journal, the Bon Ton, wa
s even more impressed: the two adjacent houses “appeared to realise the tales of the thousand and one nights. Such luxury is awesome to those who do not have at their command the bourses of Naples, Paris and London.” “The mantels are covered in gold-fringed velvet,” observed the vicomte de Launay admiringly. “The armchairs have lace antimacassars; the walls are concealed under marvellous embroidered, brocaded, spangled fabrics of such thickness and strength they could stand alone and, if needed, actually support what they cover, should the walls give way. The curtains are fabulously beautiful; they are hung double, triple, and all over the place . . . Every piece of furniture is gilded; the walls too are gilded.” The Austrian diplomat Apponyi, who attended the same ball as Heine, was less easily impressed: he found the Renaissance style of the new interiors “unsuitable for a hôtel in Paris; I would prefer it in a château.” But even he had to admit that it was “impossible to see a better imitation:”

  The paintings are on a gold base, executed by excellent artists, the fireplaces are admirably carved. The chairs are of ormolu bronze, with very high backs, surmounted by figures holding the arms of the house of Rothschild in enamel. The carpets, the candelabras, the chandeliers, the material of the draperies with heavy tassels of gold and silver—in short, everything is in the same style; there are clocks inlaid and enamelled on azure base, solid gold vases encrusted with precious stones and fine pearls. In a word, it is a luxury which surpasses all imagination.

  This was what became known as le style Rothschild—a style, in the words of a later critic, “which combined all the richest elements of those which had preceded it . . . The heavy golden cornices, the damask hung walls, the fringed and tasselled curtains of Genoese velvet, the marble and the parquet . . . Nothing in [it] . . . was new save the gasoliers.”

  To a twentieth-century eye, all that gas-lit gilt is oppressive; at the time it was all the rage. “It is infinitely superior to the house of his daughter-in-law [sic],” reported the duchesse de Dino, after seeing Salomon’s “temple,” “because the proportions are more elevated and larger; the luxury of it beggars belief, but it is tasteful, pure Renaissance, without any admixture of other styles . . . In the main salon, the armchairs instead of being made of gilt wood are of gilt bronze and cost a thousand francs apiece.” The young Disraeli concurred. “Above all spectacles,” he reported to his sister Sarah from Paris in 1843, “was the ball at B[aron] Salomon de Rothschild [’s]—an hotel in decoration surpassing all the palaces of Munich—a greater retinue of servants & liveries more gorgeous than the Thuilleries [sic]—& pineapples plentiful as blackberries. The taste of this unrivalled palace is equal to the splendour and richness of its decorations.” He later paid a fictionalised tribute to the Rothschild hôtels in Coningsby, in a passage describing Sidonia’s Paris residence, which

  had received at his hands such extensive alterations, that nothing of the original decoration . . . remained . . . A flight of marble steps, ascending from a vast court, led into a hall of great dimensions, which was at the same time an orangery and a gallery of sculpture. It was illumined by a distinct, yet soft and subdued light, which harmonised with the beautiful repose of the surrounding forms, and with the exotic perfume that was wafted about. A gallery led from this hall to an inner hall of quite different character; fantastic, glittering, variegated; full of strange shapes and dazzling objects.

  The roof was carved and gilt in the honeycomb style prevalent in the Saracenic buildings; the walls were hung with leather stamped in rich and vivid patterns; the floor was a flood of mosaic; about were statues of negroes of human size with faces of wild expression, and holding in their outstretched hands silver torches that blazed with an almost painful brilliancy.

  From this inner hall a double staircase of white marble led to the grand suite of apartments.

  These saloons, lofty, spacious, and numerous, had been decorated principally in encaustic by the most celebrated artists of Munich. The three principal rooms were only separated from each other by columns, covered with rich hangings, on this night drawn aside. The decoration of each chamber was appropriate to its purpose. On the walls of the ball room nymphs and heroes move in measure in Sicilian landscapes, or on the azure shores of the Aegean waters. From the ceiling beautiful divinities threw garlands on the guests . . . A large saloon abounded in ottomans and easy chairs . . .

  James also spent substantial sums on his château house outside Paris at Ferrières, turning it into a state-of-the art gentleman’s country retreat. Here the theme was English. A laundry was built by the architect Joseph-Antoine Froelicher in the mock-Tudor style and in 1840 James added a model farm, sending the estate manager to England to pick up tips. He later added an English-style dairy as well as a brick-kiln and British-made machinery to make water pipes for the estate. There were also stables, a riding school and riding track, not to mention an orangerie and a new garden laid out by Placide Massey. When his sister-in-law Hannah visited Ferrières in 1842 she found it “most imposing.” Once again, aristocratic guests like Apponyi and Princess Lieven, who came to stay two years later, were less easy to impress. According to Apponyi—though a hint of aristocratic irony is detectable here—the Princess was much impressed by “the superb laundry” James and Betty had built in the grounds, “a veritable chef-d’oeuvre of the genre, picturesque and very convenient.” However, when shown to her room—once reserved for the late duc d’Orléans—the Princess complained that the mattresses were “hard and damp,” so that they had to be “changed, dried, beaten, placed and replaced.” Apponyi himself ridiculed the stables James had built, “a superb and totally pompous construction in the style of Louis XIII.” “Perhaps it is a little too beautiful,” he mused, “as this palace somewhat overwhelms the château itself.” The supercilious diplomat also found fault with the pond, which he thought “too near the house,” and the absence of formal gardens and flowerbeds. “Park and garden are not separated,” he observed disapprovingly, “so that the game can come right into the court of the château.” Yet even this most discerning of guests had to concede that the interiors “left nothing to be desired”:

  Everything is in good taste and is very magnificent. There are some beautiful pictures and an infinity of beautiful things of all descriptions, suits of armour, statuettes, ewers in silver gilt, ivory or gold, enriched by pearls and precious stones, consoles in bronze, iron, silver, in old lacquer, then vases of every kind, decorated with precious stones, then antique cabinets encrusted with ivory and silver, and Florentine mosaics. The guests’ rooms are comfortably furnished, without excessive luxury, but with good carpets, good settees, armchairs, mirrors, excellent beds, wash-hand basins with plenty of towels . . .

  Guests could also be taken to see the gardens at the Rothschilds’ other châteaux at Boulogne and Suresnes. At the former, the gardens were steadily enlarged and the dining room combined with an orangerie for summer dining. James also added a mock farm with cows, chickens and exotic breeds of sheep. Despite the fact that he spent little time there, Salomon lavished money on Suresnes. The château was enlarged and redecorated, acquiring elaborate glass galleries round its sides. Like his younger brother, Salomon also played at farming, building a dairy and accumulating a large stock of wildfowl; but his real love was the garden, which he extended throughout his life, later adding greenhouses and a system of irrigation. As Lord William Russell reported when he visited Suresnes in 1843, “nature is made to yield to money, & produce the fruits & flowers of summer in the spring.” Two years later James was said to be “transplanting a great number of very large full-grown yew-trees” from Melun to Suresnes, presumably as a gift to Salomon. “Each tree,” marvelled The Times, “is a sufficient load to require 11 horses to draw it. It was thus that Louis XIV planted the grounds at Versailles.” The parallel, as we have seen, had already occurred to Heine, and was one to which he and others would return.

  The English Rothschilds also invested in their residences in both country and town, though on a less Bourbon
scale. When Disraeli attended a fête given by Nathan’s widow Hannah at Gunnersbury in 1843, it impressed him as “a most beautiful park and a villa worthy of an Italian Prince, though decorated with a taste and splendour which a French financier in the olden times could alone have rivalled . . . [with] beautiful grounds, temples and illuminated walks.” If the interior of Sidonia’s country house in Tancred (1847) was partly modelled on Gunnersbury, as seems likely, there were nevertheless points of contrast with the French Rothschilds’ residences:

  Passing through a marble antechamber, Tancred was ushered into an apartment half saloon and half library; the choicely-bound volumes, which were not too numerous, were ranged on shelves inlaid in the walls, so that they ornamented, without diminishing, the apartment. These walls were painted in encaustic, corresponding with the coved ceiling, which was richly adorned in the same fashion. A curtain of violet velvet covering if necessary the large window, which looked upon a balcony full of flowers, and the umbrageous Park; an Axminster carpet, manufactured both in colour and design with the rest of the chamber; a profusion of luxurious seats; a large table of ivory marquetry, bearing a carved silver bell which once belonged to a pope; a Naiad, whose golden urn served as an inkstand; some daggers that acted as paper cutters, and some French books just arrived; a group of beautiful vases recently released from an Egyptian tomb and ranged on a tripod of malachite; the portrait of a statesman, and the bust of an emperor, and a sparkling fire, were all circumstances which made the room both interesting and comfortable . . .