He once recalled every detail about the dress which I had worn at a certain performance at the opera, where I had been seated exactly opposite his box, and then proceeded to describe the diadem of a friend of mine who had sat near me at the same gala performance. He explained that he so much admired the original design that he had had a similar one made for a wedding present. He then spoke of music, knowing how I loved music, and further astounded me by naming, during the conversation, nearly all the items of the programme on that night. He had a charming sense of humour, and I remember him saying: "In France, I enjoy myself, look round, and talk; in Germany, I observe and let others talk; in England... I shan't tell you what I do in England. I should be divulging State secrets!" At a great garden party at the British Embassy an eminent English personage, mentioning the fact that the Embassy was formerly the house of the notorious Pauline Borghese, added:-" Don't you think there is something piquant in the fact that the Ambassador of stern and solemn Old England lives in the house which once belonged to a famous crowned courtesan ?" BONNAT, MASSENET AND COPPÉE. Amongst the Frenchmen who frequented the salon of Madame Steinheil Three men stand out as faithful and trusted friends-three men wonderfully gifted and yet wonderfully modest, three men with golden hearts and lofty minds: Bonnat, the painter; Massenet, the composer; and Coppée, the poet. . . . Bonnat worked in silence. He did not think it necessary to make his model talk so as to get at his, or her, "psychology," but was satisfied with painting what he saw. In this, he reminded me of Rodin, the greatest sculptor since Michelangelo, whom I once heard say: the artist cannot improve upon nature, and Life is Beauty." Massenet, the composer of Manon, Thais, Sapho, Werther, and so many other delightful operas, did me, for many years, the great honour of calling himself my "respectful, obedient, and faithful accompanist.' I always found him whimsical, enthusiastic, mischievous, and fond of jokes. As he entered my salon, at some crowded reception, he would wave aside the valet about to announce his name, and shout in a stentorian voice: "Massenet !"... Once he added "Grand Officer of the Legion of Honour, author of a score of operas, member of several academies!" He said himself: "I am a composer, that's true and I can't help it, but at the same time I love fun and youth, and boys of sixty are incorrigible." François Coppée, an old comrade of my husband's and one of my “faithful," as he called himself, lived close to us and often came in to have a chat, to look at the flowers in my "winter garden," or to listen to music. One day, when Reyer, the composer of Sigurd was present, he remarked that music was not only the most sociological and popular of arts, it was also the easiest. "I could not play a chord, but I feel sure that it is easier to express one's self in music than in written words. . . . Reyer decreed: "It is quite as difficult to frame a melody as to frame a sonnet." But Coppée refused to believe it, and going to the piano, he struck a note mightily. "That's a warcry," he exclaimed; then touched the same note gently, "And that's melancholy," and playing it once more as softly as possible, "And that's reverie: Music is above all wonderful because it is so simple!" It was a mere sally on his part, and Reyer laughed heartily. ZOLA, GOURMET AND OBSERVER. Madame Steinheil gives us the following character portrait of Zola, with whom she once had a discussion on the peasants of France, saying: "I have loved the peasants," only to have the reply, "I have observed +hem." The author of the "Roujon-Macquarts" was manly and brave, besides being an able, if unsympathetic, novelist, but he had, to my knowledge, one little failing-he disliked talent in others, and one weakness-he was a gourmet. Therefore, on the two or three occasions when he dined with us, I arranged a menu which Brillat Savarin would have endorsed, and took care not to invite any other writer. Zola lacked in conversation what he lacked in his writing-delicacy, refinement, lightness. He was heavy, ponderous, and rather aggressive. I teased him one day: "How is the chase after human documents going on?" I asked. "Quite well, madame. I hunt my quarry everywhere and all day long. Human documents, slices of life, searching character-studies, that is all there is in literature." "But what of the writer's personality? Is that of no account whatever?" "It shouldn't be. I try to eliminate my personality from my books "And don't you succeed?" I asked. "I have the misfortune of being possessed of a temperament which I cannot altogether get rid of, alas !" came the pompous reply. A BON MOT BY HENNER. Amongst the "faithful" I must not forget to mention Henner," the great painter of the flesh," as he called himself in one of his rare poetic moments. I never knew Henner to be embarrassed. We treated him like a member of the family, and one day, wishing to make him understand that his nails were really too grimy, I asked him whether he wished to wash his hands before dinner. He looked at his nails, understood, and quietly said: “I am in mourning for Alsace and Lorraine." THE MEETING WITH FÉLIX FAURE. This life, busy with social duties and emptinesses, continued for over fifteen years, from marriage to the crime of May 30th, 1908. Madame Steinheil, the envied and sought-for, had her moments when she "loathed the artificiality of Parisian life," but, The naturally enough, she continued to enjoy it. culminating moment of her life, from a worldly point of view, was when she became the friend and confidante of Félix Faure, elected President of the Republic in January, 1895." She thus describes her first introduction, when, on a visit to the Alps, she and her husband met Félix Faure, there for manœuvres :— There, below me, was a group of men, and one of them, wearing a red shirt, a brown suit, yellowish gaiters, and a white béret, looked up at me and said something I could not hear. I believe he asked whether he should stop to be photographed. I failed to recognise the President of the Republic and his suite. But shortly afterwards an officer came to ask whether M. and Mme. Steinheil would lunch with the President. QUEEN OF PARIS. Matters progressed rapidly. Félix Faure visited the house of the Impasse Rousin, Madame Steinheil was overwhelmed with invitations to the Elysée, flowers rained upon her, while to her daughter the infatuated President sent a perfect doll, with a complete trousseau, exactly the same as I am sending to the Tsar's daughter." The acquaintance soon developed and Madame Steinheil became a political adviser to the President, meeting him almost every day, either in the Bois or at the Elysée :- A new life began for me; my rôle of confidante had its difficulties and even its dangers, but it had a wonderful fascination. My salon was now more crowded than ever before. warning the President against dangerous mistakes, preventing him from appointing to responsible positions men whom she judged dangerous or unsuitable -rendering valuable aid, because : No man is inscrutable to a woman, especially when that woman is devoted to one whom she has decided to help, and she is supposed to care for nothing more essential than music, flowers, dress or success. SIDELIGHTS ON FÉLIX FAURE. The memoirs give some interesting sidelights upon Faure as President, and generally upon the thankless rôle of elected head of the French Republic:: The President had a very high notion of his office, but frequently complained of his limited powers. "And yet," I once told him, "you appoint your Ministers, the nomination of all officials rests with you, and you control the Army and Navy. . . .' "Yes, but to what extent? . . You say I control the Navy! But I know for a fact that nearly all the powder in the maga zines of our battleships is defective, that the armour-plating of those battleships has not the thickness that was ordered--which, of course, means thousands of pounds to the swindlers !—and that the boilers are almost worthless! . . . I have lost my temper and more than once come down on them all like a ton of bricks, but things have not been altered. A President is but a figure-head! And I He loved to talk of naval matters. "I share Delcassé's views," he said once. "England is the great enemy, because England is the great naval power and is so close to our shores and our harbours. Unless we make friends with England, we must find the best way to harass her, in case of war. can see nothing better than reviving the old right of privateering and building small but extremely fast craft, large enough to carry a great deal of fuel, so as to be able to remain a long time at sea without replenishing their bunkers. We must be able to destroy the commerce of England, to starve her. To avoid important naval engagements and vanquish the enemy in numberless skirmishes, that should be our aim. We have neither the means nor the ability England possesses of building extensively and rapidly." "Quite so," said Félix Faure; "but as my friend Admiral Fournier says, the only way to make France powerful from a naval standpoint is to supply her with a unique fleet, as regards efficiency and number, of torpedo-boats, destroyers, and submarines." Félix Faure was less a statesman than a business man. He greatly admired the way in which the English managed their Colonies: "Theirs pay; ours don't. We laugh, alas! at the ideas and customs of the natives. Why don't we imitate the English or the Dutch? But there, we never had any respect for other people's notions or convictions." "It is no fun to be a President," he sighed. "I am deprived of music. . . . Of course, the band of the Republican Guard plays at dinner-parties at the Elysée, and there is the Opera, and.... the Marseillaise, wherever I go, but I seldom, if ever, hear the music I love, chamber music, or a simple song, sung at the piano!" "Do you know," he asked me, "that they are singing a song on the boulevards about the white béret I wore at the Alpine manoeuvres ?" "I suppose they are comparing it to Henri IV.'s famous white plume, M. le Président," a young officer suggested. No... I wish they did. There's nothing historical about the song. Still, it is an advertisement, and even presidents need réclame. It is a very caustic but still very jolly song." foolscap which I bought myself, for the President knew that his stationery was counted" :-- Everything went into these "Memoirs," which were already assuming bulky proportions: the evolution of the internal and the foreign policy of France, the Franco-Russian Alliance, the secret story of the Dreyfus affair, the schemes of the various Pretenders to the throne of France. There were details on financial problems, colonial expansion, armaments, electoral systems, Administration, the Army ard the Navy. . . To have been co-author of these Memoirs must have been to make oneself so dangerous a person that, while it was probable that an early death might occur, it was equally difficult to be sentenced to death in public. No! not even if one had been accused of the death of a husband and a mother! FASHODA. Of politics there is little save in so far as they directly and intimately touched Felix Faure. Fashoda and the Dreyfus case both contributed to the ending of Félix Faure's life. Russia refused her aid : "Witte said France should avoid all wars just now, and above all a war with England; and I knew what he meant. However, we shall see whether Russia will assist or not. . ." Count Muravieff soon answered that question in the negative, and we then have an interesting account of a scene in the Elysée : A large map of the world is unfolded on the President's table. He irritably wipes out the pencil mark he made a few days ago at the spot on the Indian border where he thought Russia might perhaps attack India. There are other blue marks on either side of the Channel, in the Mediterranean, in Africa. . . . For a long time we bend over the map and talk. A few days later A mounted municipal guardsman brings me a large envelope from the President. It is a copy of Punch, the famous London satirical journal. On the cover, Félix Faure has written : "Ma chère amie, please look at this shameful insult to France on the Fashoda question." I open the paper and see a cartoon by Sir John Tenniel. Yes, it makes one's blood boil. I reply to the President-" You are right. It is vulgar and despicable. The French are refined and witty; the English are blunt and have merely what they call a sense of humour.' Count Muravieff told you that an African swamp is not worth a war; I wish to add, still less a cartoon.' 6 L'AFFAIRE DREYFUS. With regard to Dreyfus, Félix Faure had no doubt that he was guilty. He said to Madame Steinheil :— "If the affair is re-opened, we shall never see the end of it; a revision would bring chaos and perhaps even civil war in its wake. Dreyfus was guilty. If we are firm all this agitation in his favour will subside, order will be restored and France will breathe again." Félix Faure meant well, but lacked foresight. As the tide in favour of revision rose steadily Félix Faure became more and more disgusted and indignant. "It unsettles him, it crushes him," he keeps repeating; "everything is changed." Madame Steinheil relates how the President meditated a coup d'état, and how she dissuaded him from disappearing on a yacht for a week, while those who are responsible for the present state of affairs extricate themselves as best they can from the disgraceful position in which they have placed themselves. FÉLIX FAURE'S DEATH. The sudden death of Félix Faure, a few hours after she had been with him, remains for Madame Steinheil a mystery. Whatever the real reason, the AntiDreyfusards accuse her of being the cause of the President's death, hinting that she was in the pay of the Dreyfusards. But at that time, with opinions overheated, everyone was accused. The death of the President and the undercurrent of accusation produced a marked change in Madame Steinheil's position. The salon was no longer crowded, and the "ordeal was worse when I went to other houses. When I entered a crowded drawing-room all eyes were turned on me and a sudden hush fell, wrapping me as in a cloak" : Why was I so anxious to return to my old position among the men and women of Paris? . . . Because my reputation was at stake. Whether I like it or not, whether the task was feasible or almost impossible, I had to battle and to conquer. And I did conquer. Calumny, the most elusive and dangerous and enemy that a woman may have to face, was routed some six months after the death of President Faure my re ... ceptions were more largely attended than ever. I had tested all those who claimed to be my friends and found they were sincere. In official circles my influence had not waned, and I was able to render services to many as in the past. TO BE PITIED OR TO BE ENVIED. But the glory had departed, and until the coming of the cause célèbre Madame Steinheil's social path led rather to sordid obscurity than to public applause. A wonderful woman, who has produced a remarkable book, but a book which must have been a hundred times more enthralling before, necessarily, many of the most interesting passages were sub-edited. Even now, however, it is a unique human document which makes us forgive the fact that it is also a pamphlet against the present methods of French law. For though in prison so long, she was never under sentence: she was eventually acquitted. But what of Madame Steinheil in her English home, never able to forget all the details, even the most minute, of her past life-is she to be pitied or envied ? THE BROWNING CENTENARY. IN the Fortnightly Review Alfred Noyes contributes a poem of twelve stanzas, "For the Centenary of Robert Browning, May 7th, 1912." Addressing the poet as "Singer of hope for all the world," he adjures him to come back to England, for "God is not in His heaven to-day, and with thy country naught is right": But thou, whose thought, profound and pure, Across the Dark didst flash the Light. No facile flatterers of the hour . Dare mock the splendour of thy full hope, Shallow Deep, deeper than the sea, BROWNING AND WORDSWORTH. Also in the Fortnightly Review Mr. H. C. Minchin He laments compares Browning and Wordsworth. that partisanship should have made Browning pick Wordsworth as a model for "The Lost Leader." He quotes Browning's remark that he could not get enthusiasm enough to cross the room if at the other end of it were Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Southey. In later life Wordsworth's poetry meant more to him. To Professor Knight he wrote that he treasured as precious every poem written about the first forty years of Wordsworth's life. Both Wordsworth and Browning sought to show "the correspondency of the universe to Deity"; both unflinchingly upheld the doctrine of immortality. Both had a dislike of making public speeches : The love of liberty; the will to defend it, by whatever individuals or combinations it be assailed; the desire to help others by teaching them to help themselves; these time-worn principles were among those which we believe to have been most deeply prized by the social and political consciences alike of William Wordsworth and of Robert Browning. A LITERARY TREASURE. In the Cornhill for May M. A. Phillips describes a literary treasure-a slim, calf-bound volume of Browning's own copy of the first edition of "Pauline, a Fragment of a Confession," presented by him "Tomy true friend, John Forster." On almost every page are notes in pencil by both John Stuart Mill and John Forster, and corrections and notes by Browning himself, which are in ink. It is indeed interesting to note the commendations and criticisms of John Stuart Mill, and Browning's rejoinder. John Stuart Mill writes at the end that "with considerable poetic powers, this writer seems to me possessed with a more intense and morbid self-consciousness than I ever knew in any sane human being. I should think it a sincere confession, though of a most unlovable state, if the Pauline were not evidently a mere phantom. A mind in that state can only be regenerated by some new passion, and I know not what to wish him but that he may meet with a real Pauline." |