by Ouida
A man early married, moreover, is prematurely aged. While he is yet young his wife is old; while he is in the fullest vigour of his manhood, she is grey, and faded, and ageing; youth has long gone from her, while in him it is still fresh; and while away from her he is young, by her side he feels old. Married — in youth he takes upon himself burdens that should never weigh save upon middle age; in middle age he plays the part that should be reserved for age alone.
And, to take it in a more practical sense, scarcely the less inevitably from every point is “a young man married a man that’s marred.” If to men of fortune, with every opiate of pleasure and excitement to drown the gall and fret of uncongenial or unhappy union, early marriage blots and mars life as it does, how much more bitter still to those who are poor and struggling with the burden of work, hardly done and scantily paid, upon their shoulders, is its fatal error! A young fellow starts in life with no capital, but a good education and a profession, which, like all professions, cannot be lucrative to him till time has mellowed his reputation, and experience made him, more or less, a name in it. It brings him quite enough for his bachelor wants; he lives comfortably enough in his chambers or his lodgings, with no weightier daily outlay than his pipe and his chop; study comes easy to him, with a brain that has no care gnawing on it; society is cheap, for his comrades come contentedly for punch, or beer, and think none the worse of him because he does not give them turtle and Comet wines. He can live for little if he like; if he want change and travel, he can take his knapsack and a walking tour; nobody is dependent on him; if he be straitened by poverty, the strain is on him alone; he is not tortured by the cry of those who look to him for daily bread, the world is before him to choose at least where he will work in it; in a word, he is free! But, if he marry, his up-hill career is fettered by a clog which draws him backward every step he sets; his profession is inadequate to meet the expenses that crowd in on him; if he keep manfully and honestly out of debt, economy and privation eat his very life away, as, say what romancists may, they ever must; if he live beyond his income, as too many professional men are almost driven to do in our day, there is a pressure on him like the weights they laid upon offenders in the old Newgate press-yards. He toils, he struggles, he works, as brain-workers must, feverishly and at express speed to keep in the van at all; he is old, while by right of years he should yet be young, in the constant harassing rack and strain to “keep up appearances,” and seem well off while every shilling is of consequence; he writes for his bread with the bray of brawling children above his head; he goes to his office turning over and over in wretched arithmetic the sums he owes to the baker and the butcher; he smiles courteously upon his patients or his clients with the iron in his soul and county-court summonses hanging over his head. He returns from his rounds or his office, or comes out of his study after a long day, jaded, fagged, worn out; comes, not to quiet, to peace, to solitude, with a cigar and a book, to anything that would soothe the fagged nerves and ease the strain for an hour at least: but only for some miserable petty worry, some fresh small care; to hear his wife going into mortal agonies because her youngest son has the measles, or bear the leer of the servants when they say “the tax-gatherer’s called again, and, please, must he go away?”
Wise are the old words of Walter Raleigh: “Thou bindest thyself for life, for that which will perchance never last nor please thee one year: for the desire dieth when it is obtained, and the affection perisheth when it is satisfied!”
Corregio literally dying in the heat and burden of the day, of the weary weight, the torturing rack of homecares; his family and his poverty dragging him downward and clogging his genius as the drenching rains upon its wings clog the flight of a bird; is but sample of the death-in-life, the age-in-youth, the self-begotten curse, the self-elected doom, that almost inevitably dogs the steps of a man who has married early, be his station what it may, be his choice what it will.
This Spring of Love resembleth
The uncertain glory of an April day,
Which shows now all the beauty of the sun,
And by-and-by a cloud takes all away!
Such is love, rarely anything better, scarcely ever anything more durable. Such are all early loves, invariably, inevitably. God help, then, though we may count them by the myriad, those who in, and for, that one brief “April day,” which, warm and shadowless at morning, sees the frost down long before night, pay with headstrong thoughtlessness, in madman’s haste, the one priceless birthright upon earth — Freedom!
THE END
Under Two Flags
Subtitled A Story of the Household and the Desert and published in 1867 by Chapman and Hall, this is Ouida’s most popular novel and the one that has been most consistently in print since its release. It follows a similar format to Granville de Vigne, narrating the fortunes of a group of military men in their romantic and warlike exploits. The background is quintessential Ouida, with wealthy characters, a mixture of high class, high born and virtuous women and at the other end of the social scale, female guttersnipes that stop at nothing for material advantage; however, the romance takes a back seat in this story, with honour and adventure taking priority. Scholars have suggested that the story was inspired by Ouida’s fascination with the Brigade of Guards at the time of writing. The Pall Mall Gazette, in its primary and typically acerbic review of the novel on 26 December 1867 states that it is “full of absurdities” but a definite improvement on her previous novels, although the reviewer is scathing about the calibre of the male heroes. However, the Imperial Review claimed that the novel had attracted much praise within military circles, for its authentic portrayal of army life. Another reviewer in The Examiner questioned the author’s moral stance in the story – or rather, a lack of morality, stating that Ouida’s “Views of propriety are not in harmony with our estimate of what they should be.” The characters of Cigarette and Princess Venetia are thought to be part self-portrait.
In 1869, Ouida was indignant to discover that an unauthorised stage adaptation had been written of the novel, which she publicly distanced herself from; it was performed at the Surrey Theatre. Following this, there were no more stage adaptations until 1901 when a popular stage version at the Garden Theatre on Broadway ran for 135 performances. There were film adaptations in 1912, 1915, 1916 (starring Theda Bara), 1922 and 1936 (starring Ronald Colman, Claudette Colbert, Victor McLaglen and Rosalind Russell). A short introduction at the beginning of the book claims that the story was originally written for a military periodical, but this has yet to be sourced and it is more likely that this was an affectation by Ouida to give the novel veracity.
The novel centres on The Hon. Bertie Cecil, nicknamed “Beauty” as a schoolboy at Eton; the name went with him to the Brigades. Like his male “forebears” in Granville de Vigne, he is a somewhat effeminate dandy and libertine, the sort of beautiful man that found favour in Oscar Wilde’s circle of wealthy and androgynous friends and Wilde’s novel The Picture of Dorian Grey; Cecil’s good looks are largely due to his almost womanly beauty. He seems to live his life in great luxury, funded by bottomless wealth and his rooms reflect not just his effeminate taste, but that of the admiring women that send him many gifts; his exquisite accessories, made from silver, ivory and tortoise shell, are set against a backdrop of pink silk hangings and elegant furniture. However, this is all a façade and Cecil has fallen into debt and has been estranged from his father, the Viscount Royallieu (himself financially challenged); now, Cecil has no family to fall back on. In his relationships, he seduces only married women and avoids their single cousins and friends, so that he can indulge in fun and romance without any commitment, but he does have one special amour, Lady Guenevere, with whom he is conducting an elaborate affair.
Despite his precarious financial position, Cecil is not averse to gambling – betting on horse races in particular – but his younger brother, Berkeley, has a very serious gambling habit, so much so that he is prepared to forge not just Cecil’s name, but Cecil’
s friend, Seraph, in order to obtain a loan from some Jewish moneylenders (be prepared for some stereotypical characters here) and then guilelessly admits all to Cecil. To add to the misery, Cecil’s horse is drugged and loses a race that he has betted heavily on and false accusations of wrongdoing lead to Cecil’s arrest. He can only extricate himself from the situation by exposing his brother and, worse still, Lady Guenevere to shame and ridicule. Cecil cannot do this, so drastic action must be taken to resolve the situation. Perhaps everybody would be better off if Cecil simply “disappeared”… but where should he go? In the nineteenth century, many men escaped public shame by joining the French Foreign Legion, or as it is known in the novel, the Chasseurs d’Afrique.
There are some vivid touches in Ouida’s descriptions of military life, even on a mundane level, such as the everyday trials of a mounted soldier in the milling crowds of London; it has been suggested that some of these insights into masculine life were gleaned by Ouida at dinner parties, where she took the unprecedented step of staying with the men for tobacco and port, when the other female guests withdrew to another room (as was the custom of the day), so that she could observe their behaviour and note down what they discussed. Equestrians may also be interested in the bracing descriptions of horse racing and hunts, which are described at length in the narrative.
The first edition’s title page
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XII.
CHAPTER XIII.
CHAPTER XIV.
CHAPTER XV.
CHAPTER XVI.
CHAPTER XVII.
CHAPTER XVIII.
CHAPTER XIX.
CHAPTER XX.
CHAPTER XXI.
CHAPTER XXII.
CHAPTER XXIII.
CHAPTER XXIV.
CHAPTER XXV.
CHAPTER XXVI.
CHAPTER XXVII.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
CHAPTER XXIX.
CHAPTER XXX.
CHAPTER XXXI.
CHAPTER XXXII.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
CHAPTER XXXV.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
CHAPTER THE LAST.
Blanche Bates as Cigarette in David Belasco’s Broadway production of ‘Under Two Flags’, 1901
AVIS AU LECTEUR.
This Story was originally written for a military periodical. It has been fortunate enough to receive much commendation from military men, and for them it is now specially issued in its present form. For the general public it may be as well to add that, where translations are appended to the French phrases, those translations usually follow the idiomatic and particular meaning attached to these expressions in the argot of the Army of Algeria, and not the correct or literal one given to such words or sentences in ordinary grammatical parlance.
OUIDA.
CHAPTER I.
“BEAUTY OF THE BRIGADES.”
“I don’t say but what he’s difficult to please with his Tops,” said Mr. Rake, factotum to the Hon. Bertie Cecil, of the 1st Life Guards, with that article of hunting toggery suspended in his right hand as he paused, before going upstairs, to deliver his opinions with characteristic weight and vivacity to the stud-groom, “he is uncommon particular about ’em; and if his leathers aint as white as snow he’ll never touch ’em, tho’ as soon as the pack come nigh him at Royallieu, the leathers might just as well never have been cleaned, them hounds jump about him so; old Champion’s at his saddle before you can say Davy Jones. Tops are trials, I aint denying that, specially when you’ve jacks, and moccasins, and moor boots, and Russia-leather crickets, and turf backs, and Hythe boots, and waterproofs, and all manner of varnish things for dress, that none of the boys will do right unless you look after ’em yourself. But is it likely that he should know what a worry a Top’s complexion is, and how hard it is to come right with all the Fast Brown polishing in the world? How should he guess what a piece of work it is to get ’em all of a color, and how like they are to come mottled, and how a’most sure they’ll ten to one go off dark just as they’re growing yellow, and put you to shame, let you do what you will to make ’em cut a shine over the country? How should he know? I don’t complain of that; bless you, he never thinks. It’s ‘do this, Rake,’ ‘do that’; and he never remembers ’tisn’t done by magic. But he’s a true gentleman, Mr. Cecil; never grudge a guinea, or a fiver to you; never out of temper either, always have a kind word for you if you want, thoro’bred every inch of him; see him bring down a rocketer, or lift his horse over the Broad Water! He’s a gentleman — not like your snobs that have nothing sound about ’em but their cash, and swept out their shops before they bought their fine feathers! — and I’ll be d —— d if I care what I do for him.”
With which peroration to his born enemy the stud-groom, with whom he waged a perpetual and most lively feud, Rake flourished the tops that had been under discussion, and triumphant, as he invariably was, ran up the back stairs of his master’s lodgings in Piccadilly, opposite the Green Park, and with a rap on the panels entered his master’s bedroom.
A Guardsman at home is always, if anything, rather more luxuriously accommodated than a young Duchess, and Bertie Cecil was never behind his fellows in anything; besides, he was one of the cracks of the Household, and women sent him pretty things enough to fill the Palais Royal. The dressing-table was littered with Bohemian glass and gold-stoppered bottles, and all the perfumes of Araby represented by Breidenback and Rimmel. The dressing-case was of silver, with the name studded on the lid in turquoises; the brushes, bootjack, boot-trees, whip-stands, were of ivory and tortoiseshell; a couple of tiger skins were on the hearth with a retriever and blue greyhound in possession; above the mantel-piece were crossed swords in all the varieties of gilt, gold, silver, ivory, aluminum, chiseled and embossed hilts; and on the walls were a few perfect French pictures, with the portraits of a greyhound drawn by Landseer, of a steeple-chaser by Harry Hall, one or two of Herring’s hunters, and two or three fair women in crayons. The hangings of the room were silken and rose-colored, and a delicious confusion prevailed through it pell-mell; box-spurs, hunting-stirrups, cartridge cases, curb-chains, muzzle-loaders, hunting flasks, and white gauntlets, being mixed up with Paris novels, pink notes, point-lace ties, bracelets, and bouquets to be dispatched to various destinations, and velvet and silk bags for banknotes, cigars, or vesuvians, embroidered by feminine fingers and as useless as those pretty fingers themselves. On the softest of sofas, half dressed, and having half an hour before splashed like a waterdog out of the bath, as big as a small pond, in the dressing-chamber beyond was the Hon. Bertie himself, second son of Viscount Royallieu, known generally in the Brigades as “Beauty.” The appellative, gained at Eton, was in no way undeserved; when the smoke cleared away that was circling round him out of a great meerschaum bowl, it showed a face of as much delicacy and brilliancy as a woman’s; handsome, thoroughbred, languid, nonchalant, with a certain latent recklessness under the impressive calm of habit, and a singular softness given to the large, dark hazel eyes by the unusual length of the lashes over them. His features were exceedingly fair — fair as the fairest girl’s; his hair was of the softest, silkiest, brightest chestnut; his mouth very beautifully shaped; on the whole, with a certain gentle, mournful love-me look that his eyes had with them, it was no wonder that great ladies and gay lionnes alike gave him the palm as the handsomest man in all the Household Regiments — not even excepting that splendid golden-haired Colossus, his oldest friend and closest comrade, known as “the Seraph.”