Collected Works of Frances Trollope

by Frances Milton Trollope

  How exceedingly disagreeable, for instance, must it be for the artists — who, I believe, not unfrequently indulge themselves by hovering under the incognito of apparent indifference near their favourite works — to overhear such remarks as those to which I listened yesterday in that part of the gallery where Le Sueur’s St. Brunos hang!— “Certainly, the bows on that lady’s dress are of a delicate blue,” said the critic; “and so is the drapery of Le Sueur, which, for my sins, I happen to know is hid just under it.... Would one wish a better contrast to what it hides, than that unmeaning smile — that cold, smooth, varnished skin, — those lifeless limbs, and the whole unspeakable tameness of this thing, called portrait d’une dame?”

  He spoke truly; yet was there but little point in what he said, for it might have referred with equal justice to many a pretty lady doomed to simper for ever in her gilded frame.

  On the whole, however, portraits are much less oppressively predominating than with us; and among them are many whose size, composition, and exquisite style of finishing redeem them altogether from the odium of being de trop in the collection. I cannot but wish that this style of portrait-painting may find favour and imitation in England.

  Lawrence is gone; and though Gérard on this side of the water, and indeed too many to rehearse on both, are left, whose portraitures of the human face are admirable; true to nature; true to art; true to expression, — true, even to the want of it; I am greatly inclined to believe that the enormous sums annually expended on these clever portraits contribute more to lower than to raise the art in popularity and in the genuine estimation of the public. The sums thus lavished may be termed patronage, certainly; but it is patronage that bribes the artist to the restraint, and often to the destruction, of his genius.

  Is there, in fact, any one who can honestly deny that a splendid exhibition-room, crowded with ladies and gentlemen on canvass, as large as life, is a lounge of great tediousness and inanity?

  We may feel some satisfaction in recognising at a glance the eyes, nose, mouth, and chin of many of our friends and acquaintance, — nay, our most critical judgment may often acknowledge that these familiar features are registered with equal truth and skill; but this will not prevent the exhibition from being very dull. Nor is the thing much mended when each portrait, or pair of portraits, has been withdrawn from the gaudy throng, and hung up for ever and for ever before the eyes of their family and friends. The fair lady, sweetly smiling in one division of the apartment, and the well-dressed gentleman looking distingué in another, contribute as little at home as they did when suspended on the walls of the academy to the real pleasure and amusement of the beholder.

  At the exhibition this year at the Louvre are many exquisite full-length portraits in oil, of which the canvass measures from eighteen inches to a foot in height, and from a foot to ten inches in width. The composition and style of these beautiful little pictures are often such as to detain one long before them, even though one does not recognise in them the features of an acquaintance. Their unobtrusive size must prevent their ever being disagreeably predominant in the decoration of a room; while their delicate and elaborate finish, and the richness of their highly-studied composition, will well reward attention; and even the closest examination, when directed to them, either by politeness, affection, or connoisseurship, can never be disappointed.

  The Catalogue of the exhibition notices all the pictures which have been either ordered or purchased by the king or any of the royal family; and the number is so considerable as to show plainly that the most liberal and widely-extended patronage of art is a systematic object with the government.

  The gold medal of the year has been courteously bestowed upon Mr. Martin for his picture of the Deluge. Had I been the judge, I should have awarded it to Stuben’s Battle of Waterloo. That the faculty of imagination is one of the highest requisites for a painter is most certain; and that Mr. Martin pre-eminently possesses it, not less so. But imagination, though it can do much, cannot do all; and common sense is at least equally important in the formation of a finished artist. The painter of the great day of Waterloo has both. His imagination has enabled him to dive into the very hearts and souls of the persons he has depicted. Passion speaks in every line; and common sense has taught him, that, however powerful — nay, vehement, might be the expression he sought to produce, it must be obtained rather by the patient and faithful imitation of Nature than by a bold defiance of her.

  The Assassination of the Duc de Guise, by M. Delaroche, is an admirable and highly popular work. It requires some patient perseverance to contest inch by inch the slow approach to the place where this exquisite piece of finishing is hung — but it well rewards the time and labour. One or two lovely little pictures by Franquelin made me envy those who have power to purchase, and sigh to think that they will probably go into private collections, where I shall never see them more. There are, indeed, many pictures so very good, that I think it possible the judges may have relieved themselves from the embarrassment of declaring which was best, by politely awarding the palm to the stranger.

  I could indulge myself, did I not fear to weary you, by dwelling much longer upon my agreeable recollections of this extensive exhibition — containing, by the way, 2,174 pictures, — and might particularise many very admirable works. Nevertheless, I must repeat, that thus hiding the precious labours of all schools, and of all ages of painting, by the promiscuous productions of the living artists of France during the last year, is a most injudicious device for winning for them the golden opinions of those who throng from all quarters of the world to visit the Louvre.

  This exhibition reaches to about three-fourths of the gallery; and where it ceases, a grim curtain, suspended across it, conceals the precious labours of the Spanish and Italian schools, which occupy the farther end. Can anything be imagined more tantalising than this? And where is the living artist who could stand his ground against such cruel odds?

  To render the effect more striking still, this dismal curtain is permitted so to hang as to leave a few inches between its envious amplitude and the rich wall — suffering the mellow browns of a well-known Murillo to meet and mock the eye. Certainly not all the lecturers of all the academies extant could point out a more effectual manner of showing the modern French artist wherein he chiefly fails: let us hope he will profit by it.

  As I am writing of Paris, it must be almost superfluous to say that the admission to this collection is gratis.

  I cannot quit the subject without adding a few words respecting the company, or at least a part of it, whose appearance, I thought, gave very unequivocal marks of the march of mind and of indecorum; — for a considerable sprinkling of very particularly greasy citizens and citizenesses made itself felt and seen at every point where the critical crowd was thickest. But —

  “Sweetest nut hath sourest rind;”

  and it were treason here, I suppose, to doubt that such a proportion of intellect and refinement lies hid under the soiled blouse and time-worn petticoat, as is at least equal to any that we may hope to find enveloped in lawn, and lace, and broadcloth.

  It is an incontrovertible fact, I think, that when the immortals of Paris raised the barricades in the streets, they pulled them down, more or less, in society. But this is an evil which those who look beyond the present hour for their sources of joy and sorrow need not deeply lament. Nature herself — at least such as she shows herself, when man, forsaking the forest, agrees with his fellows to congregate in cities — Nature herself will take care to set this right again.

  “Strength will be lord of imbecility;”

  and were all men equal in the morning, they would not go to rest till some amongst them had been thoroughly made to understand that it was their lot to strew the couches of the rest. Such is the law of nature; and mere brute numerical strength will no more enable a mob to set it aside, than it will enable the ox or the elephant to send us to plough, or draw out our teeth to make their young one’s toys.

  For the
present moment, however, some of the rubbish that the commotion of “the Ordonnances” stirred up may still be seen floating about on the surface; and it is difficult to observe without a smile in what chiefly consists the liberty which these immortals have so valiantly bled to acquire. We may truly say of the philosophical population of Paris, that “they are thankful for small matters;” one of the most remarkable of their newly-acquired rights being certainly the privilege of presenting themselves dirty, instead of clean, before the eyes of their magnates.

  I am sure you must remember in days of yore, — that is to say, before the last revolution, — how very agreeable a part of the spectacle at the Louvre and in the Tuileries Gardens was constituted by the people, — not the ladies and gentlemen — they look pretty much the same everywhere; but by the careful coquetry of the pretty costumes, now a cauchoise, and now a toque, — the spruce neatness of the men who attended them, — nay, even by the tight and tidy trimness of the “wee things” that in long waist, silk apron, snow-white cap, and faultless chaussure, trotted beside them. All these added greatly to the pleasantness and gaiety of the scene. But now, till the fresh dirt (not the fresh gloss) of the Three Days’ labour be worn off, dingy jackets, uncomely casquettes, ragged blouses, and ill-favoured round-eared caps, that look as if they did duty night and day, must all be tolerated; and in this toleration appears to consist at present the principal external proof of the increased liberty of the Parisian mob.

  LETTER VI.

  Society. — Morality. — False Impressions and False Reports. — Observations from a Frenchman on a recent publication.

  Much as I love the sights of Paris, — including as we must under this term all that is great and enduring, as well as all that is for ever changing and for ever new, — I am more earnestly bent, as you will readily believe, upon availing myself of all my opportunities for listening to the conversation within the houses, than on contemplating all the marvels that may be seen without.

  Joyfully, therefore, have I welcomed the attention and kindness that have been offered me in various quarters; and I have already the satisfaction of finding myself on terms of most pleasant and familiar intercourse with a variety of very delightful people, many of them highly distinguished, and, happily for me, varying in their opinions of all things both in heaven and earth, from the loftiest elevation of the rococo, to the lowest profundity of the décousu school.

  And here let me pause, to assure you, and any other of my countrymen and countrywomen whose ears I can reach, that excursions to Paris, be they undertaken with what spirit of enterprise they may, and though they may be carried through with all the unrestrained expense that English wealth can permit, yet without the power by some means or other of entering into good French society, they are nothing worth.

  It is true, that there is something most exceedingly exhilarating to the spirits in the mere external novelty and cheerfulness of the objects which surround a stranger on first entering Paris. That indescribable air of gaiety which makes every sunshiny day look like a fête; the light hilarity of spirit that seems to pervade all ranks; the cheerful tone of voice, the sparkling glances of the numberless bright eyes; the gardens, the flowers, the statues of Paris, — all together produce an effect very like enchantment.

  But “use lessens marvel;” and when the first delightful excitement is over, and we begin to feel weary from its very intensity, the next step is backward into rationality, low spirits, and grumbling.

  From that moment the English tourist talks of nothing but wide rivers, magnificent bridges, prodigious trottoirs, unrivalled drains, and genuine port. It is at this stage that the traveller, in order to continue his enjoyment and bring it to perfection, should remit his examination of the exterior of noble hôtels, and endeavour to be admitted to the much more enduring enchantment which prevails within them.

  So much has already been said and written on the grace and charm of the French language in conversation, that it is quite needless to dwell upon it. That good things can be said in no other idiom with equal grace, is a fact that can neither be controverted nor more firmly established than it is already. Happily, the art of expressing a clever thought in the best possible words did not die with Madame de Sévigné; nor has it yet been destroyed by revolution of any kind.

  It is not only for the amusement of an hour, however, that I would recommend the assiduous cultivation of good French society to the English. Great and important improvements in our national manners have already arisen from the intercourse which long peace has permitted. Our dinner-tables are no longer disgraced by inebriety; nor are our men and women, when they form a party expressly for the purpose of enjoying each other’s society, separated by the law of the land during half the period for which the social meeting has been convened.

  But we have much to learn still; and the general tone of our daily associations might be yet farther improved, did the best specimens of Parisian habits and manners furnish the examples.

  It is not from the large and brilliant parties which recur in every fashionable mansion, perhaps, three or four times in each season, that I think we could draw much improvement. A fine party at Lady A — — ‘s in Grosvenor Square, is not more like a fine party at Lady B — — ‘s in Berkeley Square, than a fine party in Paris is to one in London. There are abundance of pretty women, handsome men, satin, gauze, velvet, diamonds, chains, stars, moustaches, and imperials at both, with perhaps very little deserving the name of rational enjoyment in either.

  I suspect, indeed, that we have rather the advantage on these crowded occasions, for we more frequently change the air by passing from one room to another when we eat our ices; and as the tulip-tinctured throng enjoy this respite from suffocation by detachments, they have often not only opportunity to breathe, but occasionally to converse also, for several minutes together, without danger of being dislodged from their standing-ground.

  It is not, therefore, at the crowded roll-calls of all their acquaintance that I would look for anything rational or peculiar in the salons of Paris, but in the daily and constant intercourse of familiar companionship. This is enjoyed with a degree of pleasant ease — an absence of all pomp, pride, and circumstance, of which unhappily we have no idea. Alas! we must know by special printed announcement a month beforehand that our friend is “at home,” — that liveried servants will be in attendance, and her mansion blazing with light, — before we can dare venture to pass an evening hour in her drawing-room. How would a London lady stare, if some half-dozen — though perhaps among the most chosen favourites of her visiting-list — were to walk unbidden into her presence, in bonnets and shawls, between the hours of eight and eleven! And how strangely new would it seem, were the pleasantest and most coveted engagements of the week, formed without ceremony and kept without ostentation, to arise from a casual meeting at the beginning of it!

  It is this ease, this habitual absence of ceremony and parade, this national enmity to constraint and tediousness of all kinds, which renders the tone of French manners so infinitely more agreeable than our own. And the degree in which this is the case can only be guessed at by those who, by some happy accident or other, possess a real and effective “open sesame!” for the doors of Paris.

  With all the superabundance of vanity ascribed to the French, they certainly show infinitely less of it in their intercourse with their fellow-creatures than we do. I have seen a countess, whose title was of a dozen fair descents, open the external door of her apartment, and welcome the guests who appeared at it with as much grace and elegance as if a triple relay of tall fellows who wore her colours had handed their names from hall to drawing-room. Yet in this case there was no want of wealth. Coachman, footman, abigail, and doubtless all fitting etceteras, owned her as their sovereign lady and mistress. But they happened to have been sent hither and thither, and it never entered her imagination that her dignity could be compromised by her appearing without them. In short, the vanity of the French does not show itself in little things; and i
t is exactly for this reason that their enjoyment of society is stripped of so much of the anxious, sensitive, ostentatious, self-seeking etiquette which so heavily encumbers our own.

  There are some among us, my friend, who might say of this testimony to the charm of French society, that there was danger in praising, and pointing out as an example to be followed, the manners of a people whose morality is considered as so much less strict than our own. Could I think that, by thus approving what is agreeable, I could lessen by a single hair’s-breadth the interval which we believe exists between us in this respect, I would turn my approval to reproof, and my superficial praise to deep-dyed reprobation: but to any who should express such a fear, I would reply by assuring them that it would require a very different species of intimacy from any to which I had the honour of being admitted, in order to authorise, from personal observation, any attack upon the morals of Parisian society. More scrupulous and delicate refinement in the tone of manners can neither be found nor wished for anywhere; and I do very strongly suspect, that many of the pictures of French depravity which have been brought home to us by our travellers, have been made after sketches taken in scenes and circles to which the introductions I so strongly recommend to my countrywomen could by no possibility lead them. It is not of such that I can be supposed to speak.

  Apropos of false impressions and false reports, I may repeat to you an anecdote which I heard yesterday evening. The little committee in which it was related consisted of at least a dozen persons, and it appeared that I was myself the only one to whom it was new.

  “It is rather more than two years ago,” said the speaker, “that we had amongst us an English gentleman, who avowed that it was his purpose to write on France, not as other men write — superficially, respecting truths that lie obvious to ordinary eyes — but with a research that should make him acquainted with all things above, about, and underneath. He professed this intention to more than one dear friend; and more than one dear friend took the trouble of tracing him in his chase after hidden truths. Not long after his arrival among us, this gentleman became intimately acquainted with a lady more celebrated for the variety of her friendships with men of letters than for the endurance of them. This lady received the attentions of the stranger with distinguished kindness, and, among other proofs of regard, undertook to purvey for him all sorts of private anecdotes, great and little, that from the mass he might form an average estimate of the people; assuring him at the same time, that no one in Paris was more au fait of its secret histories than herself. This,” continued my informant, “might be, and I believe was, very particularly true; and the English traveller might have been justified in giving to his countrymen and countrywomen as much insight into such mysteries as he thought good for them: but when he published the venomous slanders of this female respecting persons not only of the highest honour, but of the most unspotted reputation, he did what will blast his name as long as his charlatan book is remembered.” Such were the indignant words, and there was nothing in the tone with which they were uttered to weaken their expression.