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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Merry-Go-Round, by Carl Van Vechten
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Merry-Go-Round
+
+Author: Carl Van Vechten
+
+Release Date: August 15, 2008 [EBook #26320]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MERRY-GO-ROUND ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Bryan Ness, Diane Monico, and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced
+from scanned images of public domain material from the Google Print
+project.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+The
+Merry-Go-Round
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+_BOOKS BY_
+_CARL VAN VECHTEN_
+
+MUSIC AFTER THE GREAT WAR              1915
+
+MUSIC AND BAD MANNERS                  1916
+
+INTERPRETERS AND INTERPRETATIONS       1917
+
+THE MERRY-GO-ROUND                     1918
+
+THE MUSIC OF SPAIN                     1918
+
+
+
+
+The
+Merry-Go-Round
+
+_Carl Van Vechten_
+
+
+_"Tournez, tournez, bons chevaux de bois,
+  Tournez cent tours, tournez mille tours,
+  Tournez souvent et tournez toujours,
+  Tournez, tournez au sons de hautbois."_
+                      PAUL VERLAINE
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+New York   Alfred A. Knopf
+
+MCMXVIII
+
+
+
+
+COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY
+ALFRED A. KNOPF, INC.
+
+PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
+
+
+
+
+Contents
+
+
+                                                     PAGE
+
+IN DEFENCE OF BAD TASTE                                11
+
+MUSIC AND SUPERMUSIC                                   23
+
+EDGAR SALTUS                                           37
+
+THE NEW ART OF THE SINGER                              93
+
+_Au Bal Musette_                                      125
+
+MUSIC AND COOKING                                     149
+
+AN INTERRUPTED CONVERSATION                           179
+
+THE AUTHORITATIVE WORK ON AMERICAN MUSIC              197
+
+OLD DAYS AND NEW                                      215
+
+TWO YOUNG AMERICAN PLAYWRIGHTS                        227
+
+_De Senectute Cantorum_                               245
+
+IMPRESSIONS IN THE THEATRE
+
+    I _The Land of Joy_                               281
+
+    II A Note on Mimi Aguglia                         298
+
+    III The New Isadora                               307
+
+    IV Margaret Anglin Produces _As You Like It_      318
+
+THE MODERN COMPOSERS AT A GLANCE                      329
+
+FOOTNOTES                                             330
+
+INDEX                                                 331
+
+
+
+
+     Some of these essays have appeared in "The Smart Set,"
+     "Reedy's Mirror," "Vanity Fair," "The Chronicle," "The
+     Theatre," "The Bellman," "The Musical Quarterly," "Rogue,"
+     "The New York Press," and "The New York Globe." In their
+     present form, however, they have undergone considerable
+     redressing.
+
+
+
+
+In Defence of Bad Taste
+
+
+     "_It is a painful thing, at best, to live up to one's
+     bricabric, if one has any; but to live up to the bricabric
+     of many lands and of many centuries is a strain which no
+     wise man would dream of inflicting upon his constitution._"
+
+                        Agnes Repplier.
+
+
+
+
+In Defence of Bad Taste
+
+
+In America, where men are supposed to know nothing about matters of
+taste and where women have their dresses planned for them, the
+household decorator has become an important factor in domestic life.
+Out of an even hundred rich men how many can say that they have had
+anything to do with the selection or arrangement of the furnishings
+for their homes? In theatre programs these matters are regulated and
+due credit is given to the various firms who have supplied the myriad
+appeals to the eye; one knows who thought out the combinations of
+shoes, hats, and parasols, and one knows where each separate article
+was purchased. Why could not some similar plan of appreciation be
+followed in the houses of our very rich? Why not, for instance, a card
+in the hall something like the following:
+
+    _This house was furnished and decorated according
+      to the taste of Marcel of the Dilly-Billy Shop_
+
+or
+
+    _We are living in the kind of house Miss Simone
+        O'Kelly thought we should live in. The
+          decorations are pure Louis XV and
+             the furniture is authentic._
+
+It is not difficult, of course, to differentiate the personal from the
+impersonal. Nothing clings so ill to the back as borrowed finery and I
+have yet to find the family which has settled itself fondly and
+comfortably in chairs which were a part of some one else's aesthetic
+plan. As a matter of fact many of our millionaires would be more at
+home in an atmosphere concocted from the ingredients of plain pine
+tables and blanket-covered mattresses than they are surrounded by the
+frippery of China and the frivolity of France. If these gentlemen were
+fortunate enough to enjoy sufficient confidence in their own taste to
+give it a thorough test it is not safe to think of the extreme burden
+that would be put on the working capacity of the factories of the
+Grand Rapids furniture companies. We might find a few emancipated
+souls scouring the town for heavy refectory tables and divans into
+which one could sink, reclining or upright, with a perfect sense of
+ease, but these would be as rare as Steinway pianos in Coney Island.
+
+For Americans are meek in such matters. They credit themselves with no
+taste. They fear comparison. If the very much sought-after Simone
+O'Kelly has decorated Mr. B.'s house Mr. M. does not dare to struggle
+along with merely his own ideas in furnishing his. He calls in an
+expert who begins, rather inauspiciously, by painting the dining-room
+salmon pink. The tables and chairs will be made by somebody on Tenth
+Street, exact copies of a set to be found in the Musée Carnavalet. The
+legs under the table are awkwardly arranged for diners but they look
+very well when the table is unclothed. The decorator plans to hang Mr.
+M.'s personal bedroom in pale plum colour. Mr. M. rebels at this. "I
+detest," he remarks mildly, "all variants of purple." "Very well,"
+acquiesces the decorator, "we will make it green." In the end Mr. M.'s
+worst premonitions are realized: the walls are resplendent in a
+striking shade of magenta. Along the edge of each panel of Chinese
+brocade a narrow band of absinthe velvet ribbon gives the necessary
+contrast. The furniture is painted in dull ivory with touches of gold
+and beryl and the bed cover is peacock blue. Four round cushions of a
+similar shade repose on the floor at the foot of the bed. The fat
+manufacturer's wife as she enters this triumph of decoration which
+might satisfy Louise de la Vallière or please Doris Keane, is an
+anachronistic figure and she is aware of it. She prefers, on the
+whole, the brass bedsteads of the summer hotels. Mr. M. himself feels
+ridiculous. He never enters the room without a groan and a remark on
+the order of "Good God, what a colour!" His personal taste finds its
+supreme enjoyment in the Circassian walnut panelling, desk, and tables
+of the directors' room in the Millionaire's Trust and Savings Bank.
+"Rich and tasteful": how many times he has used this phrase to express
+his approval! In the mid-Victorian red plush of his club, too, he is
+comfortable. "Waiter, another whiskey and soda!"
+
+Mildred is expected home after her first year in boarding school. Her
+mother wishes to environ her, so to speak. Mildred is delicate in her
+tastes, so delicate that she scarcely ever expresses herself. Her mind
+and body are pure; her heart beats faster when she learns of distress.
+Voluptuousness, Venus, and Vice are all merely words to her. Mother
+does not explain this to the decorator. "My daughter is returning from
+school," she says, "I want her room done." "What style of room?"
+"After all you are supposed to know that. I am engaging you to arrange
+it for me." "Your daughter, I take it, is a modern girl?" "You may
+assume as much." In despair for a hint the decorator steals a look at
+a photograph of the miss, full-lipped, melting dark eyes, and
+blue-black hair. Sensing an houri he hangs the walls with a deep shade
+of Persian orange, over which flit tropical birds of emerald and
+azure; strange pomegranates bleed their seeds at regular intervals.
+The couch is an adaptation, in colour, of the celebrated _Sumurun_
+bed. The dressing table and the _chaise-longue_ are of Chinese
+lacquer. A heavy bronze incense burner pours forth fumes of Bichara's
+_Scheherazade_. From the window frames, stifling the light, depend
+flame-coloured brocaded curtains embroidered in Egyptian enamelled
+beads. It is a triumph, this chamber, of _style Ballet Russe_. Diana
+is banished ... and shrinking Mildred, returning from school, finds
+her demure soul at variance with her surroundings.
+
+A man's house should be the expression of the man himself. All the
+books on the subject and even the household decorators themselves will
+tell you that. But, if the decoration of a house is to express its
+owner, it is necessary that he himself inspire it, which implies, of
+course, the possession of ideas, even though they be bad. And men in
+these United States are not expected to display mental anguish or
+pleasure when confronted by colour combinations. In America one is
+constantly hearing young ladies say, "He's a man and so, of course,
+knows nothing about colour," or "Of course a man never looks at
+clothes." It does not seem to be necessary to argue this point. One
+has only to remember that Veronese was a man; so was Velasquez. Even
+Paul Poiret and Leon Bakst belong to the sex of Adam. Nevertheless
+most Americans still consider it a little _efféminé_, a trifle
+_declassé_, for a business man (allowances are sometimes made for
+poets, musicians, actors, and people who live in Greenwich Village),
+to make any references to colour or form. He may admire, with obvious
+emphasis on the women they lightly enclose, the costumes of the
+_Follies_ but he is not permitted to exhibit knowledge of materials
+and any suddenly expressed desire on his part to rush into a shop and
+hug some bit of colour from the show window to his heart would be
+regarded as a symptom of madness.
+
+The audience which gives the final verdict on a farce makes allowances
+for the author; permits him the use of certain conventions. For
+example, he is given leave to introduce a hotel corridor into his last
+act with seven doors opening on a common hallway so that his
+characters may conveniently and persistently enter the wrong rooms.
+It may be supposed that I ask for some such license from my audience.
+"How ridiculous," you may be saying, "I know of interior decorators
+who spend weeks in reading out the secrets of their clients' souls in
+order to provide their proper settings." There doubtless are interior
+decorators who succeed in giving a home the appearance of a well-kept
+hotel where guests may mingle comfortably and freely. I should not
+wish to deny this. But I do deny that soul-study is a requirement for
+the profession. If a man (or a woman) has a soul it will not be a
+decorator who will discover its fitting housing. Others may object,
+"But bad taste is rampant. Surely it is better to be guided by some
+one who knows than to surround oneself with rocking chairs, plaster
+casts of the Winged Victory, and photographs of various madonnas." I
+say that it is _not_ better. It is better for each man to express
+himself, through his taste, as well as through his tongue or his pen,
+as he may. And it is only through such expression that he will finally
+arrive (if he ever can) at a condition of household furnishing which
+will say something to his neighbour as well as to himself. It is a
+pleasure when one leaves a dinner party to be able to observe "That is
+_his_ house," just as it is a pleasure when one leaves a concert to
+remember that a composer has expressed himself and not the result of
+seven years study in Berlin or Paris.
+
+But Americans have little aptitude for self-expression. They prefer to
+huddle, like cattle, under unspeakable whips when matters of art are
+under discussion. They fear ridicule. As a consequence many of the
+richest men in this country never really live in their own homes,
+never are comfortable for a moment, although the walls are hung double
+with Fragonards and hawthorne vases stand so deep upon the tables that
+no space remains for the "Saturday Review" or "le Temps." And they
+never, never, never, will know the pleasure which comes while
+stumbling down a side street in London, or in the mouldy corners of
+the Venetian ghetto, or in the Marché du Temple in Paris, or, heaven
+knows, in New York, on lower Fourth Avenue, or in Chinatown, or in a
+Russian brass shop on Allen Street, or in a big department store (as
+often there as anywhere) in finding just the lamp for just the table
+in just the corner, or in discovering a bit of brocade, perhaps the
+ragged remnant of a waistcoat belonging to an aristocrat of the
+Directorate, which will lighten the depths of a certain room, or a
+chair which goes miraculously with a desk already possessed, or a
+Chinese mirror which one had almost decided did not exist. Nor will
+they ever experience the joy of sudden decision in front of a picture
+by Matisse, which ends in the sale of a Delacroix. Nor can they feel
+the thrill which is part of the replacing of a make-shift rug by _the_
+rug of rugs (let us hope it was Solomon's!).
+
+I know a lady in Paris whose salon presents a different aspect each
+summer. Do her Picassos go, a new Spanish painter has replaced them.
+Have you missed the Gibbons carving? Spanish church carving has taken
+its place. "And where are your Venetian embroideries?" "I sold them to
+the Marquise de V.... The money served to buy these Persian
+miniatures." This lady has travelled far. She is not experimenting in
+doubtful taste or bad art; she is not even experimenting in her own
+taste: she is simply enjoying different epochs, different artists,
+different forms of art, each in its turn, for so long as it says
+anything to her. Her house is not a museum. Space and comfort demand
+exclusion but she excludes nothing forever that she desires.... She
+exchanges.
+
+Taste at best is relative. It is an axiom that anybody else's taste
+can never say anything to you although you may feel perfectly certain
+that it is better than your own. If more of the money of the rich
+were spent in encouraging children to develop their own ideas in
+furnishing their own rooms it would serve a better purpose than it
+does now when it is dropped into the ample pockets of the professional
+decorators. Oscar Wilde wrote, "A colour sense is more important in
+the development of the individual than a sense of right and wrong."
+Any young boy or girl can learn something about such matters; most of
+them, if not shamed out of it, take a natural interest in their
+surroundings. You will see how true this is if you attempt to
+rearrange a child's room. Those who have bad taste, relatively, should
+literally be allowed to make their own beds. On the whole it is
+preferable to be comfortable in red and green velvet upholstery than
+to be beautiful and unhappy in a household decorator's gilded cage.
+
+  _September 3, 1915._
+
+
+
+
+Music and Supermusic
+
+
+     "_To know whether you are enjoying a piece of music or not
+     you must see whether you find yourself looking at the
+     advertisements of Pears' soap at the end of the program._"
+
+                        Samuel Butler.
+
+
+
+
+Music and Supermusic
+
+
+What is the distinction in the mind of Everycritic between good music
+and bad music, in the mind of Everyman between popular music and
+"classical" music? What is the essential difference between an air by
+Mozart and an air by Jerome Kern? Why is Chopin's _G minor nocturne_
+better music than Thécla Badarzewska's _La Prière d'une Vierge_? Why
+is a music drama by Richard Wagner preferable to a music drama by
+Horatio W. Parker? What makes a melody distinguished? What makes a
+melody commonplace or cheap? Why do some melodies ring in our ears
+generation after generation while others enjoy but a brief popularity?
+Why do certain composers, such as Raff and Mendelssohn, hailed as
+geniuses while they were yet alive, soon sink into semi-obscurity,
+while others, such as Robert Franz and Moussorgsky, almost
+unrecognized by their contemporaries, grow in popularity? Are there no
+answers to these conundrums and the thousand others that might be
+asked by a person with a slight attack of curiosity?... No one _does_
+ask and assuredly no one answers. These riddles, it would seem, are
+included among the forbidden mysteries of the sphynx. The critics
+assert with authority and some show of erudition that the Spohrs, the
+Mendelssohns, the Humperdincks, and the Montemezzis are great
+composers. They usually admire the grandchildren of Old Lady Tradition
+but they neglect to justify this partiality. Nor can we trust the
+public with its favourite Piccinnis and Puccinis.... What then is the
+test of supermusic?
+
+For we know, as well as we can know anything, that there is music and
+supermusic. Rubinstein wrote music; Beethoven wrote supermusic (Mr.
+Finck may contradict this statement). Bellini wrote operas; Mozart
+wrote superoperas. Jensen wrote songs; Schubert wrote supersongs. The
+superiority of _Voi che sapete_ as a vocal melody over _Ah! non
+giunge_ is not generally contested; neither can we hesitate very long
+over the question whether or not _Der Leiermann_ is a better song than
+_Lehn' deine Wang'_. Probably even Mr. Finck will admit that the
+_Sonata Appassionata_ is finer music than the most familiar portrait
+(I think it is No. 22) in the _Kamennoi-Ostrow_ set. But, if we agree
+to put Mozart, Bach, Beethoven, Schubert, and a few others on
+marmorean pedestals in a special Hall of Fame (and this is a
+compromise on my part, at any rate, as I consider much of the music
+written by even these men to be below any moderately high standard),
+what about the rest? Mr. Finck prefers Johann Strauss to Brahms, nay
+more to Richard himself! He has written a whole book for no other
+reason, it would seem, than to prove that the author of _Tod und
+Verklärung_ is a very much over-rated individual. At times sitting
+despondently in Carnegie Hall, I am secretly inclined to agree with
+him. Personally I can say that I prefer Irving Berlin's music to that
+of Edward MacDowell and I would like to have some one prove to me that
+this position is untenable.
+
+What is the test of supermusic? I have read that fashionable music,
+music composed in a style welcomed and appreciated by its contemporary
+hearers is seldom supermusic. Yet Handel wrote fashionable music, and
+so much other of the music of that epoch is Handelian that it is often
+difficult to be sure where George Frederick left off and somebody else
+began. Bellini wrote fashionable music and _Norma_ and _La Sonnambula_
+sound a trifle faded although they are still occasionally performed,
+but Rossini, whose only desire was to please his public, (Liszt once
+observed "Rossini and Co. always close with 'I remain your very
+humble servant'"), wrote melodies in _Il Barbiere di Siviglia_ which
+sound as fresh to us today as they did when they were first composed.
+And when this prodigiously gifted musician-cook turned his back to the
+public to write _Guillaume Tell_ he penned a work which critics have
+consistently told us is a masterpiece, but which is as seldom
+performed today as any opera of the early Nineteenth Century which
+occasionally gains a hearing at all. Therefor we must be wary of the
+old men who tell us that we shall soon tire of the music of Puccini
+because it is fashionable.
+
+Popularity is scarcely a test. I have mentioned Mendelssohn. Never was
+there a more popular composer, and yet aside from the violin concerto
+what work of his has maintained its place in the concert repertory?
+Yet Chopin, whose name is seldom absent from the program of a pianist,
+was a god in his own time and the most brilliant woman of his epoch
+fell in love with him, as Philip Moeller has recently reminded us in
+his very amusing play. On the other hand there is the case of Robert
+Franz whose songs never achieved real popularity during his lifetime,
+but which are frequently, almost invariably indeed, to be found on
+song recital programs today and which are more and more appreciated.
+The critics are praising him, the public likes him: they buy his
+songs. And there is also the case of Max Reger who was not popular, is
+not popular, and never will be popular.
+
+Can we judge music by academic standards? Certainly not. Even the
+hoary old academicians themselves can answer this question correctly
+if you put it in relation to any composer born before 1820. The
+greatest composers have seldom respected the rules. Beethoven in his
+last sonatas and string quartets slapped all the pedants in the ears;
+yet I believe you will find astonishingly few rules broken by Mozart,
+one of the gods in the mythology of art music, and Berlioz, who broke
+all the rules, is more interesting to us today as a writer of prose
+than as a writer of music.
+
+Is simple music supermusic? Certainly not invariably. _Vedrai Carino_
+is a simple tune, almost as simple as a folk-song and we set great
+store by it; yet Michael William Balfe wrote twenty-seven operas
+filled with similarly simple tunes and in a selective draft of
+composers his number would probably be 9,768. The _Ave Maria_ of
+Schubert is a simple tune; so is the _Meditation_ from _Thais_. Why do
+we say that one is better than the other.
+
+Or is supermusic always grand, sad, noble, or emotional? There must be
+another violent head shaking here. The air from _Oberon, Ocean, thou
+mighty monster_, is so grand that scarcely a singer can be found today
+capable of interpreting it, although many sopranos puff and steam
+through it, for all the world like pinguid gentlemen climbing the
+stairs to the towers of Notre Dame. The _Fifth Symphony_ of Beethoven
+is both grand and noble; probably no one will be found who will deny
+that it is supermusic, but Mahler's _Symphony of the Thousand_ is
+likewise grand and noble, and futile and bombastic to boot. _Or sai
+chi l'onore_ is a grand air, but _Robert je t'aime_ is equally grand
+in intention, at least. _Der Tod und das Mädchen_ is sad; so is _Les
+Larmes_ in _Werther_.... But a very great deal of supermusic is
+neither grand nor sad. Haydn's symphonies are usually as light-hearted
+and as light-waisted as possible. Mozart's _Figaro_ scarcely seems to
+have a care. Listen to Beethoven's _Fourth_ and _Eighth Symphonies_,
+_Il Barbiere_ again, _Die Meistersinger_.... But do not be misled:
+Massenet's _Don Quichotte_ is light music; so is Mascagni's
+_Lodoletta_....
+
+Is music to be prized and taken to our hearts because it is
+contrapuntal and complex? We frequently hear it urged that Bach (who
+was more or less forgotten for a hundred years, by the way) was the
+greatest of composers and his music is especially intricate. He is the
+one composer, indeed, who can _never_ be played with one finger! But
+poor unimportant forgotten Max Reger also wrote in the most
+complicated forms; the great Gluck in the simplest. Gluck, indeed, has
+even been considered weak in counterpoint and fugue. Meyerbeer, it is
+said, was also weak in counterpoint and fugue. Is he therefor to be
+regarded as the peer of Gluck? Is Mozart's _G minor Symphony_ more
+important (because it is more complicated) than the same composer's,
+_Batti, Batti_?
+
+We learn from some sources that music stands or falls by its melody
+but what is good melody? According to his contemporaries Wagner's
+music dramas were lacking in melody. _Sweet Marie_ is certainly a
+melody; why is it not as good a melody as _The Old Folks at Home_? Why
+is Musetta's waltz more popular than Gretel's? It is no better as
+melody. As a matter of fact there is, has been, and for ever will be
+war over this question of melody, because the point of view on the
+subject is continually changing. As Cyril Scott puts it in his book,
+"The Philosophy of Modernism": "at one time it (melody) extended over
+a few bars and then came to a close, being, as it were, a kind of
+sentence, which, after running for the moment, arrived at a full stop,
+or semicolon. Take this and compare it with the modern tendency: for
+that modern tendency is to argue that a melody might go on
+indefinitely almost; there is no reason why it should come to a full
+stop, for it is not a sentence, but more a line, which, like the
+rambling incurvations of a frieze, requires no rule to stop it, but
+alone the will and taste of its engenderer."
+
+Or is harmonization the important factor? Folk-songs are not
+harmonized at all, and yet certain musicians, Cecil Sharp for example,
+devote their lives to collecting them, while others, like Percy
+Grainger, base their compositions on them. On the other hand such
+music as Debussy's _Iberia_ depends for its very existence on its
+beautiful harmonies. The harmonies of Gluck are extremely simple,
+those of Richard Strauss extremely complex.
+
+H. T. Finck says somewhere that one of the greatest charms of music is
+modulation but the old church composers who wrote in the "modes" never
+modulated at all. Erik Satie seldom avails himself of this modern
+device. It is a question whether Leo Ornstein modulates. If we may
+take him at his word Arnold Schoenberg has a system of modulation. At
+least it is his very own.
+
+Are long compositions better than short ones? This may seem a silly
+question but I have read criticisms based on a theory that they were.
+Listen, for example, to de Quincy: "A song, an air, a tune,--that is,
+a short succession of notes revolving rapidly upon itself,--how could
+that by possibility offer a field of compass sufficient for the
+development of great musical effects? The preparation pregnant with
+the future, the remote correspondence, the questions, as it were,
+which to a deep musical sense are asked in one passage, and answered
+in another; the iteration and ingemination of a given effect, moving
+through subtile variations that sometimes disguise the theme,
+sometimes fitfully reveal it, sometimes throw it out tumultuously to
+the daylight,--these and ten thousand forms of self-conflicting
+musical passion--what room could they find, what opening, for
+utterance, in so limited a field as an air or song?" After this
+broadside permit me to quote a verse of Gérard de Nerval:
+
+    _"Il est un air pour qui je donnerais
+      Tout Rossini, tout Mozart, et tout Weber,
+      Un air très-vieux, languissant et funèbre,
+      Qui pour moi seul a des charmes secrets."_
+
+And now let us dispassionately, if possible, regard the evidence.
+Richard Strauss's _Alpine Symphony_, admittedly one of his weakest
+works and considered very tiresome even by ardent Straussians, plays
+for nearly an hour while any one can sing _Der Erlkönig_ in three
+minutes. Are short compositions better than long ones? Answer: _Love
+me and the World is Mine_ is a short song (although it seldom sounds
+so) while Schubert's _C major Symphony_ is called the "symphony of
+heavenly length."
+
+Is what is new better than what is old? Is what is old better than
+what is new? Schoenberg is new; is he therefor to be considered better
+than Beethoven? Stravinsky is new; is he therefor to be considered
+worse than Liszt?
+
+Is an opera better than a song? Compare _Pagliacci_ and Strauss's
+_Ständchen_. Is a string quartet better than a piece for the piano?
+But I grow weary.... Under the circumstances it would seem that if you
+have any strong opinions about music you are perfectly entitled to
+them, for the critics do not agree and you will find many of them
+basing their criticism on some of the various hypotheses I have
+advanced. H. T. Finck tells us that the sonata form is illogical,
+forgetting perhaps that once it served its purpose; Jean Marnold
+dubbed _Armide_ an _oeuvre bâtarde_; John F. Runciman called
+_Parsifal_ "decrepit stuff," while Ernest Newman assures us that it
+is "marvellous"; Pierre Lalo and Philip Hale disagree on the subject
+of Debussy's _La Mer_ while W. J. Henderson and James Huneker wrangle
+over Richard Strauss's _Don Quixote_.
+
+The clue to the whole matter lies in a short phrase: Imitative work is
+always bad. Music that tries to be something that something else has
+been may be thrown aside as worthless. It will not endure although it
+may sometimes please the zanies and jackoclocks of a generation. The
+critic, therefor, who comes nearest to the heart of the matter, is he
+who, either through instinct or familiarity with the various phenomena
+of music, is able to judge of a work's originality. There must be
+individuality in new music to make it worthy of our attention, and
+that, after all is all that matters. For the tiniest folk-song often
+persists in the hearts and minds of the people, often stirs the pulse
+of a musician, pursuing its tuneful way through two centuries, while a
+mighty thundering symphony of the same period may lie dead and
+rotting, food for the Niptus Hololencus and the Blatta Germanica. We
+still sing _The Old Folks At Home_ and _Le Cycle du Vin_ but we have
+laid aside _Di Tanti Palpiti_. Any piece of music possessing the
+certain magic power of individuality is of value, it matters not
+whether it be symphony or song, opera or dance. What most critics
+have forgotten is that in Music matter, form, and idea are one. In
+painting, in poetry the idea, the words, the form, may be separated;
+each may play its part, but in music there is no idea without form, no
+form without idea. That is what makes musical criticism difficult.
+
+  _January 24, 1918._
+
+
+
+
+Edgar Saltus
+
+    _"O no, we never mention him,
+      His name is never heard!"_
+
+                        Old Ballad.
+
+
+
+
+Edgar Saltus
+
+
+To write about Edgar Saltus should be _vieux jeu_. The man is an
+American; he was born in 1858; he accomplished some of his best work
+in the Eighties and the Nineties, in the days when mutton-legged
+sleeves, whatnots, Rogers groups, cat-tails, peacock feathers,
+Japanese fans, musk-mellon seed collars, and big-wheeled bicycles were
+in vogue. He has written history, fiction, poetry, literary criticism,
+and philosophy, and to all these forms he has brought sympathy,
+erudition, a fresh point of view, and a radiant style. He has
+imagination and he understands the gentle art of arranging facts in
+kaleidoscopic patterns so that they may attract and not repel the
+reader. America, indeed, has not produced a round dozen authors who
+equal him as a brilliant stylist with a great deal to say. And yet
+this man, who wrote some of his best books in the Eighties and who is
+still alive, has been allowed to drift into comparative oblivion. Even
+his early reviewers shoved him impatiently aside or ignored him
+altogether; a writer in "Belford's Magazine" for July, 1888, says:
+"Edgar Saltus should have his name changed to Edgar Assaulted." Soon
+he became a literary leper. The doctors and professors would have none
+of him. To most of them, nowadays, I suppose, he is only a name. Many
+of them have never read any of his books. I do not even remember to
+have seen him mentioned in the works of James Huneker and you will not
+find his name in Barrett Wendell's "A History of American Literature"
+(1901), "A Reader's History of American Literature" by Thomas
+Wentworth Higginson and Henry Walcott Boynton (1903), Katherine Lee
+Bates's "American Literature" (1898), "A Manual of American
+Literature," edited by Theodore Stanton (1909), William B. Cairns's "A
+History of American Literature" (1912), William Edward Simonds's "A
+Student's History of American Literature" (1909), Fred Lewis Pattee's
+"A History of American Literature Since 1870" (1915), John Macy's "The
+Spirit of American Literature" (1913), or William Lyon Phelps's "The
+Advance of the English Novel" (1916). The third volume of "The
+Cambridge History of American Literature," bringing the subject up to
+1900, has not yet appeared but I should be amazed to discover that the
+editors had decided to include Saltus therein. Curiously enough he is
+mentioned in Oscar Fay Adams's "A Dictionary of American Authors"
+(1901 edition) and, of all places, I have found a reference to him in
+one of Agnes Repplier's books.
+
+You will find few essays about the man or his work in current or
+anterior periodicals. There is, to be sure, the article by Ramsay
+Colles, entitled "A Publicist: Edgar Saltus," published in the
+"Westminster Magazine" for October, 1904, but this essay could have
+won our author no adherents. If any one had the courage to wade
+through its muddy paragraphs he doubtless emerged vowing never to read
+Saltus. Besides only the novels are touched on. In 1903 G. F.
+Monkshood and George Gamble arranged a compilation from Saltus's work
+which they entitled "Wit and Wisdom from Edgar Saltus" (Greening and
+Co., London). The work is done without sense or sensitiveness and the
+prefatory essay is without salt or flavour of any sort. An anonymous
+writer in "Current Literature" for July, 1907, asks plaintively why
+this author has been permitted to remain in obscurity and quotes from
+some of the reviews. In "The Philistine" for October, 1907, Elbert
+Hubbard takes a hand in the game. He says, "Edgar Saltus is the best
+writer in America--with a few insignificant exceptions," but he
+deplores the fact that Saltus knows nothing about the cows and
+chickens; only cities and gods seem to interest him. Still there is
+some atmosphere in this study, which is devoted to one book, "The
+Lords of the Ghostland." In the New York Public Library four of
+Saltus's books and one of his translations (about one-sixth of his
+published work) are listed. You may also find there in a series of
+volumes entitled "Nations of the World" his supplementary chapters
+bringing the books up to date. That is all.
+
+All these years, of course, Saltus has had his admiring circle,[1]
+people of intelligence, of whom, unfortunately, I cannot say that I
+was one. These, who have been content to read and admire without
+spreading the news, may well be inclined to regard my performance as
+repetitive and impertinent. Of these I must crave indulgence and of
+Saltus himself too. For he, knowing how well he has done his work,
+must sit like Buddha, ironic and indulgent, smiling on the poor
+benighted who have yet to approach his altars. Once, at least, he
+spoke: "A book that pleases no one may be poor. The book that pleases
+every one is detestable."
+
+I seem to remember to have heard his name all my life, but until
+recently I have not read one line concerning or by him. I find that my
+friends, many of whom are extensive readers, are in the same sad state
+of ignorance. There is an exception and that exception is responsible
+for my conversion. For six years, no less, Edna Kenton has been urging
+me to read Edgar Saltus. She has been gently insinuating but firm.
+None of us can struggle forever against fate or a determined woman. In
+the end I capitulated, purchased a book by Edgar Saltus at random, and
+read it ... at one sitting. I sought for more. As most of his books
+are out of print and as the list in the Public Library conspicuously
+omits all but one of his best _opera_ the matter presented
+difficulties. However, a little diligent search in the old book shops
+accomplished wonders. In less than two weeks I had dug up twenty-two
+titles and in less than two weeks I had read twenty-four; since then I
+have consumed the other four. There are few writers in American or any
+other literature who can survive such a test; there are few writers
+who have given me such keen pleasure.
+
+The events of his life, mostly remain shrouded in mystery. His comings
+and goings are not reported in the newspapers; he does not make
+public speeches; and his name is seldom, if ever, mentioned "among
+those present." That he has been married and has one daughter "Who's
+Who" proclaims, together with the few biographical details mentioned
+below. That is all. May we not herein find some small explanation for
+his apparent neglect? Many thousands of lesser men have lifted
+themselves to "literary" prominence by blowing their own tubas and
+striking their own crotals. Even in the case of a man of such manifest
+genius as George Bernard Shaw we may be permitted to doubt if he would
+be so well known, had he not taken the trouble to erect monuments to
+himself on every possible occasion in every possible location. Fame is
+a quaint old-fashioned body, who loves to be pursued. She seldom, if
+ever, runs after anybody except in her well-known rôle of necrophile.
+
+Edgar Evertson Saltus was born in New York City June 8, 1858. He is a
+lineal descendant of Admiral Kornelis Evertson, the commander of the
+Dutch fleet, who captured New York from the English, August 9, 1673.
+Francis Saltus, the poet, was his brother. He enjoyed a cosmopolitan
+education which may be regarded as an important factor in the
+development of his tastes and ideas. From St. Paul's School in Concord
+he migrated to the Sorbonne in Paris, and thence to Heidelberg and
+Munich, where he bathed in the newer Germanic philosophies. Finally he
+took a course of law at Columbia University. The influence of this
+somewhat heterogeneous seminary life is manifest in all his future
+writing. Beginning, no doubt, as a disciple of Emerson in New England,
+he fell under the spell of Balzac in Paris, of Schopenhauer and von
+Hartmann in Germany. Pages might be brought forward as evidence that
+he had a thorough classical education. His knowledge of languages made
+it easy for him to drink deeply at many fountain heads. If Oscar Wilde
+found his chief inspiration in Huysmans's "A Rebours," it is certain
+that Saltus also quaffed intoxicating draughts at this source. Indeed
+in one of his books he refers to Huysmans as his friend. It is further
+apparent that he is acquainted with the works of Barbey d'Aurevilly,
+Josephin Péladan,[2] Baudelaire, Mallarmé, Verlaine, Arthur Rimbaud,
+Catulle Mendès, and Jules Laforgue, especially the Laforgue of the
+"Moralités Legendaires." His kinship with these writers is near, but
+through this mixed blood run strains inherited from the early pagans,
+the mediaeval monks, the Germanic philosophers, and London of the
+Eighteen Nineties (although there is not one word about Saltus in
+Holbrook Jackson's book of the period), and perhaps, after all, his
+nearest literary relative was an American, Edgar Allan Poe, who
+bequeathed to him a garret full of strange odds and ends. But Saltus
+surpasses Poe in almost every respect save as a poet.
+
+Joseph Hergesheimer has expressed a theory to the effect that great
+art is always provincial, never cosmopolitan; that only provincial art
+is universal in its appeal. Like every other theory this one is to a
+large extent true, but Hergesheimer in his arbitrary summing up, has
+forgotten the fantastic. The fantastic in literature, in art of any
+kind, can never be provincial. The work of Poe is not provincial; nor
+is that of Gustave Moreau, an artist with whom Edgar Saltus can very
+readily be compared. If you have visited the Musée Moreau in Paris
+where, in the studio of the dead painter, is gathered together the
+most complete collection of his works, which lend themselves to
+endless inspection, you can, in a sense, reconstruct for yourself an
+idea of the works of Edgar Saltus. One finds therein the same
+unicorns, the same fabulous monsters, the same virgins on the rocks,
+the same exotic and undreamed of flora and fauna, the same mystic
+paganism, the same exquisitely jewelled workmanship. One can find
+further analogies in the Aubrey Beardsley of "Under the Hill," in the
+elaborate stylized irony of Max Beerbohm. Surely not provincials
+these, but just as surely artists.
+
+Moreover Saltus's style may be said to possess American
+characteristics. It is dashing and rapid, and as clear as the water in
+Southern seas. The man has a penchant for short and nervous sentences,
+but they are never jerky. They explode like so many firecrackers and
+remind one of the great national holiday!... Nevertheless Edgar Saltus
+should have been born in France.
+
+His essays, whether they deal with literary criticism, history,
+religion (which is almost an obsession with this writer),
+devil-worship, or cooking, are pervaded by that rare quality, charm.
+Somewhere he quotes a French aphorism:
+
+    _"Etre riche n'est pas l'affaire,
+      Toute l'affaire est de charmer,"_
+
+which might be applied to his own work. There is a deep and beneficent
+guile in the simplicity of his style, as limpid as a brook, and yet,
+as over a brook, in its overtones hover a myriad of sparkling
+dragon-flies and butterflies; in its depths lie a plethora of trout.
+He deals with the most obstruse and abstract subjects with such ease
+and grace, without for one moment laying aside the badge of authority,
+that they assume a mysterious fascination to catch the eye of the
+passerby. In his fictions he has sometimes cultivated a more hectic
+style, but that in itself constitutes one of the bases of its
+richness. Scarcely a word but evokes an image, a strange, bizarre
+image, often a complication of images. He is never afraid of the
+colloquial, never afraid of slang even, and he often weaves lovely
+patterns with obsolete or technical words. These lines, in which
+Saltus paid tribute to Gautier, he might, with equal justice, have
+applied to himself: "No one could torment a fancy more delicately than
+he; he had the gift of adjective; he scented a new one afar like a
+truffle; and from the Morgue of the dictionary he dragged forgotten
+beauties. He dowered the language of his day with every tint of dawn
+and every convulsion of sunset; he invented metaphors that were worth
+a king's ransom, and figures of speech that deserve the Prix Montyon.
+Then reviewing his work, he formulated an axiom which will go down
+with a nimbus through time: Whomsoever a thought however complex, a
+vision however apocalyptic, surprises without words to convey it, is
+not a writer. The inexpressible does not exist." It is impossible to
+taste at this man's table. One must eat the whole dinner to appreciate
+its opulent inevitability. Still I may offer a few olives, a branch or
+two of succulent celery to those who have not as yet been invited to
+sit down. One of his ladies walks the Avenue in a gown the "color of
+fried smelts." Such figurative phrases as "Her eyes were of that
+green-grey which is caught in an icicle held over grass," "The sand is
+as fine as face powder, _nuance_ Rachel, packed hard," "Death, it may
+be, is not merely a law but a place, perhaps a garage which the
+traveller reaches on a demolished motor, but whence none can proceed
+until all old scores are paid," "The ocean resembled nothing so much
+as an immense blue syrup," "She was a pale freckled girl, with hair
+the shade of Bavarian beer," "The sun rose from the ocean like an
+indolent girl from her bath," "Night, that queen who reigns only when
+she falls, shook out the shroud she wears for gown," are to be found
+on every page. Certain phrases sound good to him and are re-used:
+"Disappearances are deceptive," "ruedelapaixian" (to describe a
+dress), "toilet of the ring" (lifted from the bull-fight in "Mr.
+Incoul's Misadventure" to do service in an account of the arena games
+under Nero in "Imperial Purple"), but repetition of this kind is
+infrequent in his works and seemingly unnecessary. Ideas and phrases,
+endless chains of them, spurt from the point of his ardent pen.
+Standing on his magic carpet he shakes new sins out of his sleeve as a
+conjurer shakes out white rabbits and juggles words with an exquisite
+dexterity. He is, indeed, the _jongleur de notre âme_!
+
+From the beginning, his style has attracted the attention of the few
+and no one, I am sure, has ever written a three line review of a book
+by Saltus without referring to it. Mme. Amélie Rives has quoted Oscar
+Wilde as saying to her one night at dinner, "In Edgar Saltus's work
+passion struggles with grammar on every page!" Percival Pollard has
+dubbed him a "prose paranoiac," and Elbert Hubbard says, "He writes so
+well that he grows enamoured of his own style and is subdued like the
+dyer's hand; he becomes intoxicated on the lure of lines and the roll
+of phrases. He is woozy on words--locoed by syntax and prosody. The
+libation he pours is flavoured with euphues. It is all like a cherry
+in a morning Martini." A phrase which Remy de Gourmont uses to
+describe Villiers de l'Isle Adam might be applied with equal success
+to the author of "The Lords of the Ghostland": "_L'idéalisme de
+Villiers était un véritable idéalisme verbal, c'est-à-dire qu'il
+croyait vraiment à la puissance évocatrice des mots, à leur vertu
+magique._" And we may listen to Saltus's own testimony in the matter:
+"It may be noted that in literature only three things count, style,
+style polished, style repolished; these imagination and the art of
+transition aid, but do not enhance. As for style, it may be defined as
+the sorcery of syllables, the fall of sentences, the use of the exact
+term, the pursuit of a repetition even unto the thirtieth and fortieth
+line. Grammar is an adjunct but not an obligation. No grammarian ever
+wrote a thing that was fit to read."
+
+At his worst--and his worst can be monstrous!--garbed fantastically in
+purple patches and gaudy rags, he wallows in muddy puddles of Burgundy
+and gold dust; even then he is unflagging and holds the attention in a
+vise. His women have eyes which are purple pools, their hair is bitten
+by combs, their lips are scarlet threads. Even the names of his
+characters, Roanoke Raritan, Ruis Ixar, Tancred Ennever, Erastus
+Varick, Gulian Verplank, Melancthon Orr, Justine Dunnellen, Roland
+Mistrial, Giselle Oppensheim, Yoda Jones, Stella Sixmuth, Violet
+Silverstairs, Sallie Malakoff, Shane Wyvell, Dugald Maule, Eden
+Menemon (it will be observed that he has a persistent, balefully
+procacious, perhaps, indeed, Freudian predilection for the letters U,
+V, and X),[3] are fantastic and fabulous ... sometimes almost
+frivolous. And here we may find our paradox. His sense of humour is
+abnormal, sometimes expressed directly by way of epigram or sly
+wording but may it not also occasionally express itself indirectly in
+these purple towers of painted velvet words, extravagant fables, and
+unbelievable characters he is so fond of erecting? Some of his work
+almost approaches the burlesque in form. He carries his manner to a
+point where he seems to laugh at it himself, and then, with a touch of
+poignant realism or a poetic phrase, he confounds the reader's
+judgment. The virtuosity of the performance is breath-taking!
+
+He is always the snob (somewhere he defends the snob in an essay):
+rich food ("half-mourning" [artichoke hearts and truffles], "filet of
+reindeer," a cygnet in its plumage bearing an orchid in its beak,
+"heron's eggs whipped with wine into an amber foam," "mashed
+grasshoppers baked in saffron"), rich clothes, rich people interest
+him. There is no poverty in his books. His creatures do not toil. They
+cut coupons off bonds. Sometimes they write or paint, but for the most
+part they are free to devote themselves exclusively to the pursuit of
+emotional experience, eating, reading, and travelling the while. And
+when they have finished dining they wipe their hands, wetted in a
+golden bowl, in the curly hair of a tiny serving boy. A character in
+"Madam Sapphira" explains this tendency: "A writer, if he happens to
+be worth his syndicate, never chooses a subject. The subject chooses
+him. He writes what he must, not what he might. That's the thing the
+public can't understand."
+
+There is always a preoccupation with ancient life, sometimes freely
+expressed as in "Imperial Purple," but more often suggested by plot,
+phrase, or scene. He kills more people than Caligula killed during the
+whole course of his bloody reign. Murders, suicides, and other forms
+of sudden death flash their sensations across his pages. Webster and
+the other Elizabethans never steeped themselves so completely in gore.
+In almost every book there is an orgy of death and he has been
+ingenious in varying its forms. The poisons of rafflesia, muscarine,
+and orsere are introduced in his fictions; somewhere he devotes an
+essay to toxicology. Daggers with blades like needles, pistols,
+drownings, asphyxiations, play their rôles ... and in one book there
+is a crucifixion!
+
+Again I find that Mr. Saltus has said his word on the subject: "In
+fiction as in history it is the shudder that tells. Hugo could find no
+higher compliment for Baudelaire than to announce that the latter had
+discovered a new one. For new shudders are as rare as new vices;
+antiquity has made them all seem trite. The apt commingling of the
+horrible and the trivial, pathos and ferocity, is yet the one secret
+of enduring work--a secret, parenthetically, which Hugo knew as no one
+else."
+
+His fables depend in most instances upon sexual abberrations, curious
+coincidences, fantastic happenings. Rapes and incests decorate his
+pages. He does not ask us to believe his monstrous stories; he compels
+us to. He carries us by means of the careless expenditure of many
+passages of somewhat ribald beauty, along with him, captive to his
+pervasive charm. We are constantly reminded, in endless, almost
+wearisome, imagery, of gold and purple, foreign languages, esoteric
+philosophies, foods the names of which strike the ear as graciously
+as they themselves might strike the tongue. From Huysmans he has
+learned the formula for ravishing all our senses. Words are often used
+for their own sakes to call up images, colour flits across every page,
+across, indeed, every line. We taste, we smell, we see. There is the
+pomp and circumstance of the Roman Catholic ritual in these pages, the
+Roman Catholic ritual well supplied with mythical monsters, singing
+flowers, and blooming women. Strange scarlet and mulberry threads form
+the woof of these tapestries, threads pulled with great labour from
+all the art of the past. There is, in much of his work, an
+undercurrent of subtle sensuous erotic poison; in one of her stories
+Edna Kenton tells us that _chartreuse jaune_ and bananas form such a
+poison. There is a suggestion of _chartreuse jaune_ and bananas in
+much of the work of Edgar Saltus.
+
+He is constantly obsessed by the mysteries of love and death, the
+veils of Isis, the secrets of Moses. While others were delving in the
+American soil his soul sped afar; he is not even a cosmopolitan; he is
+a Greek, a Brahmin, a worshipper of Ishtar. There is a prodigious and
+prodigal display of genius in his work, savannahs of epigrams, forests
+of ideas, phrases enough to fill the ocean.[4] There is enough
+material in the romances of Edgar Saltus to furnish all the cinema
+companies in America with scenarios for a twelve-month.
+
+Early in the Eighties a writer in "The Argus" referred to him as "the
+prose laureate of pessimism." His philosophy may be summed up in a few
+phrases: Nothing matters, Whatever will be is, Everything is possible,
+and Since we live today let us make the best of it and live in Paris.
+And through all the _opera_ of Saltus, through the rapes and murders,
+the religious, philosophical, and social discussions, rings
+Cherubino's still unanswered question, _Che cosa e amor?_ like a
+persistent refrain.
+
+After having said so much it seems unnecessary to add that I strongly
+advise the reader to go out and buy all the books of Edgar Saltus he
+can find (and to find many will require patience and dexterity, as
+most of them are out of print). To further aid him in the matter I
+have prepared a short catalogue and with his permission I will guide
+him gently through this new land. I have also added a list of
+publishers, together with the dates of publication, although I cannot,
+in some instances, vouch for their having been the original imprints.
+It may be noted that almost all his books have been reprinted in
+England.[5]
+
+"Balzac,"[6] signed Edgar Evertson Saltus (for a time he used his full
+name) is such good literary criticism and such good personal biography
+that one wishes the author had tried the form again. He did not save
+in his prefaces to his translations, his essay on Victor Hugo, and his
+short study of Oscar Wilde. In its miniature way, for the book is
+slight, "Balzac" is as good of its kind as James Huneker's "Chopin,"
+Auguste Ehrhard's "Fanny Elssler," and Frank Harris's "Oscar Wilde."
+In style it is superior to any of these. It is a very pretty
+performance for a début and if it is out of print, as I think it is,
+some enterprising publisher should serve it to the public in a new
+edition. The two most interesting chapters, largely anecdotal but
+continuously illuminating, are entitled "The Vagaries of Genius,"
+wherein one may find an infinitude of details concerning the manner
+in which Balzac worked, and "The Chase for Gold," but tucked in
+somewhere else is a charming digression about realism in fiction and
+the bibliography should still be of use to students. Saltus tells us
+that Balzac took all his characters' names from life, frequently from
+signs which he observed on the street. In this respect Saltus
+certainly has not followed him; in another he has been more imitative:
+I refer to the Balzacian trick of carrying people from one book to
+another.
+
+"The Philosophy of Disenchantment"[7] is an ingratiating account of
+the pessimism of Schopenhauer, a philosophy with which it would seem,
+Saltus is fully in accord. Two-thirds of the book is allotted to
+Schopenhauer, but the remainder is devoted to an exposition of the
+teachings of von Hartmann and a final essay, "Is Life an Affliction?"
+which query the author seems to answer in the affirmative. One of the
+best-known of the Saltus books, "The Philosophy of Disenchantment" is
+written in a clear, translucent style without the iridescence which
+decorates his later _opera_.
+
+"After-Dinner Stories from Balzac, done into English by Myndart
+Verelst (obviously E. S.) with an introduction by Edgar Saltus"[8]
+contains four of the Frenchman's tales, "The Red Inn," "Madame
+Firmiani," "The 'Grande Bretèche'," and "Madame de Beauséant." The
+introduction is written in Saltus's most beguiling manner and may be
+referred to as one of the most delightful short essays on Balzac
+extant. The dedication is to V. A. B.
+
+"The Anatomy of Negation"[9] is Saltus's best book in his earlier
+manner, which is as free from flamboyancy as early Gothic, and one of
+his most important contributions to our literature. The work is a
+history of antitheism from Kapila to Leconte de Lisle and, while the
+writer in a brief prefatory notice disavows all responsibility for the
+opinions of others, it can readily be felt that the book is a labour
+of love and that his sympathy lies with the iconoclasts through the
+centuries. The chapter entitled, "The Convulsions of the Church," a
+brief history of Christianity, is one of the most brilliant passages
+to be found in any of the works of this very brilliant writer. Indeed,
+if you are searching for the soul of Saltus you could not do better
+than turn to this chapter. Of Jesus he says, "He was the most
+entrancing of nihilists but no innovator." Here is another excerpt:
+"Paganism was not dead; it had merely fallen asleep. Isis gave way to
+Mary; apotheosis was replaced by canonization; the divinities were
+succeeded by saints; and, Africa aiding, the Church surged from
+mythology with the Trinity for tiara." Again: "Satan was Jew from horn
+to hoof. The registry of his birth is contained in the evolution of
+Hebraic thought." Never was any book so full of erudition and ideas so
+easy to read, a fascinating _opus_, written by a true sceptic.
+Following the Baedeker system, adopted so amusingly by Henry T. Finck
+in his "Songs and Song Writers," this book should be triple-starred.
+
+"Tales before Supper, from Théophile Gautier and Prosper Mérimée, told
+in English by Myndart Verelst and delayed with a proem by Edgar
+Saltus."[10] Translation again. The stories are "Avatar" and "The
+Venus of Ille." The essay at the beginning is a very charming
+performance. This book is dedicated to E. C. R.
+
+"Mr. Incoul's Misadventure,"[11] Saltus's first novel, is also the
+best of his numerous fictions. It, too, should be triple-starred in
+any guide book through this _opus_-land. In it will be found,
+super-distilled, the very essence of all the best qualities of this
+writer. It is written with fine reserve; the story holds; the
+characters are unusually well observed, felt, and expressed. Irony
+shines through the pages and the final cadence includes a murder and a
+suicide. For the former, bromide of potassium and gas are utilized in
+combination; for the latter laudanum, taken hypodermically, suffices.
+There are scenes in Biarritz and Northern Spain which include a
+thrilling picture of a bull-fight. There is an interesting glimpse of
+the Paris Opéra. There is a description of an epithumetic library
+which embraces many forbidden titles, (How that "baron of moral
+endeavour ... the professional hound of heaven," Anthony Comstock,
+would have gloated over these shelves!), a vibrant page about Goya,
+and another about a Thibetian cat. Many passages could be brought
+forward as evidence that Mr. Saltus loves the fire-side sphynx. The
+Mr. Incoul of the title gives one a very excellent idea of how inhuman
+a just man can be. There is not a single slip in the skilful
+delineation of this monster. The beautiful heroine vaguely shambles
+into a tapestried background. She is _moyen age_ in her appealing
+weakness. The _jeune premier_, Lenox Leigh, is well drawn and
+lighted. Time after time the author strikes subtle harmonies which
+must have delighted Henry James. Why is this book not dedicated to
+author of "The Turn of the Screw" rather than to "E. A. S."? The pages
+are permeated with suspense, horror, information, irony, and charm,
+about evenly distributed, all of which qualities are expressed in the
+astounding title (astounding after you have read the book). There is a
+white marriage in this tale, stipulated in the hymeneal bond. In 1877
+Tschaikovsky made a similar agreement with the woman he married.
+
+"The Truth About Tristrem Varick"[12] is written with the same
+restraint which characterizes the style of "Mr. Incoul's
+Misadventure," a restraint seldom to be encountered in Saltus's later
+fictions. One of the angles of the plot in which an irate father
+attempts to suppress a marriage by suggesting incest, bobs up twice
+again in his stories, for the last time nearly thirty years later in
+"The Monster." Irony is the keynote of the work, a keynote sounded in
+the dedication, "To my master, the philosopher of the unconscious,
+Eduard von Hartmann, this attempt in ornamental disenchantment is
+dutifully inscribed." The heroine, as frequently happens with Saltus
+heroines, is veiled with the mysteries of Isis; we do not see the
+workings of her mind and so we can sympathize with Varick, who pursues
+her with persistent misunderstanding and arduous devotion through 240
+pages. He attributes her aloofness to his father's unfounded charge
+against his mother and her father. When he learns that she has borne a
+child he suspects rape and, with a needle-like dagger that leaves no
+sign, he kills the man he believes to have seduced her. Then he goes
+to the lady to receive her thanks, only to learn that she loved the
+man he has killed. Varick gives himself into the hands of the police,
+confesses, and is delivered to justice, the lady gloating. A
+strikingly pessimistic tale, only less good than "Mr. Incoul." There
+is superb writing in these pages, many delightful passages. _La
+Cenerentola_ and _Lucrezia Borgia_ are mentioned in passing. Saltus
+has (or had) an exuberant fondness for Donizetti and Rossini. Here is
+a telling bit of art criticism (attributed to a character) descriptive
+of the Paris Salon: "There was a Manet or two, a Moreau and a dozen
+excellent landscapes, but the rest represented the apotheosis of
+mediocrity. The pictures which Gerome, Cabanel, Bouguereau, and the
+acolytes of these pastry-cooks exposed were stupid and sterile as
+church doors." This required courage in 1888. One wonders where Kenyon
+Cox was at the time! Give this book at least two stars.
+
+"Eden"[13] is the third of Saltus's fictions and possibly the poorest
+of the three. Eden is the name of the heroine whose further name is
+Menemon. Stuyvesant Square is her original habitat but she migrates to
+Fifth Avenue. The tide is flowing South again nowadays. Her husband is
+almost too good, but nevertheless appearances seem against him until
+he explains that the lady with whom he has been seen in a cab is his
+daughter by a former marriage, and the young man who seems to have
+been making love to Eden is his son. Characteristic of Saltus is the
+use of the Spanish word for nightingale. There are no deaths, no
+suicides, no murders in these pages: a very eunuch of a book! A motto
+from Tasso, "_Perdute e tutto il tempo che in amor non si spende_"
+adorns the title page and the work is dedicated to "E----H
+Amicissima."
+
+With "The Pace that Kills"[14] Saltus doffs his old coat and dons a
+new and gaudier garment. Possibly he owed this change in style to the
+influence of the London movement so interestingly described in
+Holbrook Jackson's "The Eighteen-Nineties." The book begins with
+abortion and ends with a drop over a ferry-boat into the icy East
+River. There is an averted strangulation of a baby and for the second
+time in a Saltus _opus_ a dying millionaire leaves his fortune to the
+St. Nicholas Hospital. Was Saltus ballyhooing for this institution?
+The hero is a modern Don Juan. Alphabet Jones appears occasionally, as
+he does in many of the other novels. This Balzacian trick obsessed the
+author for a time. The book is dedicated to John S. Rutherford and
+bears as a motto on its title page this quotation from Rabusson:
+"_Pourquoi la mort? Dites, plutôt, pourquoi la vie?_"
+
+In "A Transaction in Hearts"[15] the Reverend Christopher Gonfallon
+falls in love with his wife's sister, Claire. A New England countess,
+a subsidiary figure, suggests d'Aurevilly. This story originally
+appeared in "Lippincott's Magazine" and the editor who accepted it was
+dismissed. A year or so later a new editor published "The Picture of
+Dorian Gray." Still later Saltus tells me he met Oscar Wilde in London
+and the Irish poet asked him for news of the new editor. "He's quite
+well," answered Saltus. Wilde did not seem to be pleased: "When your
+story appeared the editor was removed; when mine appeared I supposed
+he would be hanged. Now you tell me he is quite well. It is most
+disheartening." Saltus then asked Wilde why Dorian Gray was cut by his
+friends. Wilde turned it over. "I fancy they saw him eating fish with
+his knife."
+
+"A Transient Guest and other Episodes"[16] contains three short tales
+besides the title story: "The Grand Duke's Riches," an account of an
+ingenious robbery at the Brevoort, "A Maid of Athens," and "Fausta," a
+story of love, revenge, and death in Cuba. If the final cadence of the
+book is a dagger thrust the prelude is a subtle poison, rafflesia, a
+Sumatran plant, intended for the hero, Tancred Ennever, but consumed
+with fatal results by his faithful fox terrier, Zut Alors. The story
+is arresting and, as frequently happens in Saltus romances, a man
+finds himself no match for a woman. "A Transient Guest" is dedicated
+to K. J. M.
+
+The slender volume entitled "Love and Lore"[17] contains a short
+series of slight essays, interrupted by slighter sonnets, on subjects
+which, for the most part, Saltus has treated at greater length and
+with greater effect elsewhere. He makes a whimsical plea for a modern
+revival of the Court of Love and in "Morality in Fiction" he derides
+that Puritanism in American letters whose dark scourge H. L. Mencken
+still pursues with a cat-o'-nine-tails and a hand grenade. He gives us
+a fanciful set of rules for a novelist which, happily, he has ignored
+in his own fictions. The most interesting, personal, and charming
+chapter, although palpably derived from "The Philosophy of
+Disenchantment," is that entitled "What Pessimism Is Not"; here again
+we are in the heart of the author's philosophy. Those who like to read
+books about the Iberian Peninsula can scarcely afford to miss
+"Fabulous Andalucia," in which an able brief for the race of Othello
+is presented: "Under the Moors, Cordova surpassed Baghdad. They wrote
+more poetry than all the other nations put together. It was they who
+invented rhyme; they wrote everything in it, contracts, challenges,
+treaties, treatises, diplomatic notes and messages of love. From the
+earliest khalyf down to Boabdil, the courts of Granada, of Cordova and
+of Seville were peopled with poets, or, as they were termed, with
+makers of Ghazels. It was they who gave us the dulcimer, the hautbois
+and the guitar; it was they who invented the serenade. We are
+indebted to them for algebra and for the canons of chivalry as
+well.... It was from them that came the first threads of light which
+preceded the Renaissance. Throughout mediaeval Europe they were the
+only people that thought." The book is dedicated to Edgar Fawcett,
+"perfect poet--perfect friend" and is embellished with a portrait of
+its author.
+
+"The Story Without a Name"[18] is a translation of "Une Histoire Sans
+Nom" of Barbey d'Aurevilly, and is preceded by one of Saltus's
+charming and atmospheric literary essays, the best on d'Aurevilly to
+be found in English. When this book first appeared, Mr. Saltus informs
+me, a reviewer, "who contrived to be both amusing and complimentary,"
+said that Barbey d'Aurevilly was a fictitious person and that this
+vile story was Saltus's own vile work!
+
+"Mary Magdalen,"[19] on the whole disappointing, is nevertheless one
+of the important Saltus _opera_. The opening chapters, like Oscar
+Wilde's _Salome_ (published two years later than "Mary Magdalen") owe
+much to Flaubert's "Hérodias." The dance on the hands is a detail
+from Flaubert, a detail which Tissot followed in his painting of
+Salome.... From the later chapters it is possible that Paul Heyse
+filched an idea. The turning point of his drama, _Maria von Magdala_,
+hinges on Judas's love for Mary and his jealousy of Jesus. Saltus
+develops exactly this situation. Heyse's play appeared in 1899, eight
+years after Saltus's novel. However, Saltus has protested to me that
+it is an idea that might have occurred to any one. "I put it in," he
+added, "to make the action more nervous." The book begins well with a
+description of Herod's court and Rome in Judea, but as a whole it is
+unsatisfactory. Once the plot develops Saltus seems to lose interest.
+He lazily quotes whole scenes from the Bible (George Moore very
+cleverly avoided this pitfall in "The Brook Kerith"). The early
+chapters suggest "Imperial Purple," which appeared a year later and
+upon which he may well have been at work at this time. There is a
+foreshadowing, too, of "The Lords of the Ghostland" in a very amusing
+and slightly cynical passage in which Mary as a child listens to
+Sephorah the sorceress tell legends and myths of Assyria and Egypt.
+Mary interrupts with "Why you mean Moses! You mean Noah!" just as a
+child of today, if confronted with the situations in the Greek dramas
+would attribute them to Bayard Veiller or Eugene Walter. Saltus is too
+much of a scholar to find much novelty in Christianity. But aside from
+this passage cynicism is lacking from this book, a quality which makes
+another story on the same theme, "Le Procurateur de Judée," one of the
+greatest short stories in any language. Mary's sins are quickly passed
+over and we come almost immediately to her conversion. Herod Antipas,
+with his "fan-shaped beard" and vacillating Pilate, quite comparable
+to a modern politician, are the most human and best-realized
+characters in a book which should have been greater than it is. "Mary
+Magdalen" is dedicated to Henry James.
+
+"The facts in the Curious Case of H. Hyrtl, esq."[20] is a slight yarn
+in the mellow Stevenson manner, with a kindly old gentleman as the
+messenger of the supernatural who provides the wherewithal for a
+marriage between an impoverished artist, who is painting
+Heliogabolus's feast of roses, and his sweet young thing. Quite a
+departure this from the usual Saltus manner; nevertheless there are
+two deaths, one by shock, the other in a railway accident. The plot
+depends on as many impossible entrances and exits as a Palais Royal
+farce and the reader is asked to believe in many coincidences. The
+book is dedicated to Lorillard Ronalds who, the author explains in a
+few French phrases, asked him to write something "_de très pure et de
+très chaste, pour une jeunesse, sans doute_." He adds that the story
+is a rewriting of a tale which had appeared twenty years earlier.
+
+"Imperial Purple"[21] marks the high-tide of Saltus's peculiar genius.
+The emperors of imperial decadent Rome are led by the chains of art
+behind the chariot wheels of the poet: Julius Cæsar, whom Cato called
+"that woman," Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, the wicked Agrippina, for
+whom Agnes Repplier named her cat, Claudius, Nero, Hadrian, Vespasian,
+down to the incredible Heliogabolus. Saltus, who has given us many
+vivid details concerning the lives of his predecessors, seemingly
+falters at this dread name, but only seemingly. More can be found
+about this extraordinary and perverse emperor in Lombard's "L'Agonie"
+and in Franz Blei's "The Powder Puff," but, although Saltus is brief,
+he evokes an atmosphere and a picture in a few short paragraphs. The
+sheer lyric quality of this book has remained unsurpassed by this
+author. Indeed it is rare in all literature. Page after page that
+Walter Pater, Oscar Wilde, or J. K. Huysmans might have been glad to
+sign might be set before you. The man writes with invention, with sap,
+with urge. Our eyes are not clogged with foot-notes and references. It
+is plain that our author has delved in the "Scriptores Historiæ
+Augustæ," that he has read Lampridius, Suetonius, and the others, but
+he does not strive to make us aware of it. The historical form has at
+last found a poet to render it supportable. Blood runs across the
+pages; gore and booty are the principal themes; and yet Beauty struts
+supreme through the horror. The author's sympathy is his password, a
+sympathy which he occasionally exposes, for he is not above pinning
+his heart to his sleeve, as, for example, when he says, "In spite of
+Augustus's boast, the city was not by any means of marble. It was
+filled with crooked little streets, with the atrocities of the
+Tarquins, with houses unsightly and perilous, with the moss and dust
+of ages; it compared with Alexandria as London compares with Paris; it
+had a splendour of its own, but a splendour that could be heightened."
+Here is a picture of squalid Rome: "In the subura, where at night
+women sat in high chairs, ogling the passer with painted eyes, there
+was still plenty of brick; tall tenements, soiled linen, the odor of
+Whitechapel and St. Giles. The streets were noisy with match-pedlars,
+with vendors of cake and tripe and coke; there were touts there too,
+altars to unimportant divinities, lying Jews who dealt in old clothes,
+in obscene pictures and unmentionable wares; at the crossings there
+were thimbleriggers, clowns and jugglers, who made glass balls appear
+and disappear surprisingly; there were doorways decorated with curious
+invitations, gossipy barber shops, where, through the liberality of
+politicians, the scum of a great city was shaved, curled and painted
+free; and there were public houses, where vagabond slaves and sexless
+priests drank the mulled wine of Crete, supped on the flesh of beasts
+slaughtered in the arena, or watched the Syrian women twist to the
+click of castanets." The account of the arena under Nero should not be
+missed, but it is too long to quote here. The book, which we give
+three stars, is dedicated to Edwin Albert Schroeder. Fortunately, of
+all Saltus's works, it is the most readily procurable.
+
+"Imperial Purple" has had a curious history. Belford, Clarke and Co.,
+who hid their identity behind the "Morrill, Higgins" imprint, failed
+shortly after they had issued the book. "Presently," Mr. Saltus writes
+me, "a Chicago bibliofilou brought it out as the work of some one else
+and called it 'The Sins of Nero.'" Meanwhile Greening published it in
+London and finally Mitchell Kennerley reprinted it in New York. In
+1911 Macmillan in London brought out "The Amazing Emperor
+Heliogabolus" by the Reverend John Stuart Hay of Oxford. In the
+preface to this book I found the following: "I have also the
+permission of Mr. E. E. Saltus of Harvard University (_sic_) to quote
+his vivid and beautiful studies on the Roman Empire and her customs. I
+am also deeply indebted to Mr. Walter Pater, Mr. J. A. Symonds, and
+Mr. Saltus for many a _tournure de phrase_ and picturesque rendering
+of Tacitus, Suetonious, Lampridius, and the rest." The Reverend Doctor
+certainly helped himself to "Imperial Purple." Words, sentences, nay
+whole paragraphs appear without the formality of quotation marks,
+without any indication, indeed, save these lines in the preface, that
+they are not part of the Doctor's own imagination, unless one compares
+them with the style in which the rest of the book is written. "In one
+instance," Mr. Saltus writes me, "he gave a paragraph of mine as his
+own. Later on he added, 'as we have already said' and repeated the
+paragraph. The plural struck me as singular."
+
+"Madam Sapphira"[22] is a vivid study in unchastened womanhood. We see
+but little of the lady in the 251 pages of this "Fifth Avenue Story";
+her character is exposed to us through the experiences of her poor
+fool husband, who colloquially would be called a simp, by denizens of
+the Low World a boob. He redeems himself to some extent by sending
+Madam Sapphira a belated bouquet of cyanide of potassium. On the
+whole, though characters and phrases in his work might be brought
+forward to prove the contrary, Mr. Saltus obviously has a low opinion
+of women and thinks that men do better without them. The greater part
+of the time he appears to agree with Posthumus:
+
+    "Could I find out
+    The woman's part in me! For there's no motion
+    That tends to vice in man but I affirm
+    It is the woman's part; be it lying, note it
+    The woman's; flattering, hers; deceiving, hers;
+    Lust and rank thoughts, hers, hers; revenges, hers;
+    Ambitions, covetings, changes of prides, disdain,
+    Nice longings, slanders, mutability,
+    All faults that may be named, nay that hell knows,
+    Why, hers, in part or all; but rather, all;
+    For even to vice
+    They are not constant, but are changing still
+    One vice of a minute old for one
+    Not half so old as that. I'll write against them,
+    Detest them, curse them.--Yet 'tis greater skill
+    In a true hate, to pray they have their will:
+    The very devils cannot plague them better."
+
+"Enthralled, a story of international life setting forth the curious
+circumstances concerning Lord Cloden and Oswald Quain":[23] a mad
+_opus_ this, an insane phantasmagoria of crime, avarice, and murder.
+For the second time in this author's novels incest plays a rôle. This
+time it is real. Quain is indeed the half-brother of the lady who
+desires to marry him. He is as vile and virulent a villain as any who
+stalks through the pages of Ann Ker, Eliza Bromley, or Mrs. Radcliffe.
+A Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde motive is sounded. An ugly man comes back
+from London a handsome fellow after visits to a certain doctor who
+rearranges the lines of his face. The transformation is effected every
+day now (some of our prominent actresses are said to have benefited
+by this operation), but in 1894 the mechanism of the trick must have
+been appallingly creaky. This story, indeed, borders on the burlesque
+and has almost as much claim to the title as "The Green Carnation."
+Was the author laughing at the Eighteen Nineties? The period is subtly
+evoked in one detail, constantly reiterated in Saltus's early books:
+ladies and gentlemen when they leave a room "push aside the
+portieres." Sometimes the "rings jingle." He has in most instances
+mercifully spared us further descriptions of the interiors of New York
+houses at this epoch.... At a dinner party one of the guests refers to
+Howells as the "foremost novelist who is never read." The book is
+dedicated to "Cherubina, _dulcissime rerum_." Saltus returned to the
+central theme of "Enthralled" in a story called "The Impostor,"
+printed in "Ainslee's" for May, 1917.
+
+"When Dreams Come True"[24] again brings us in touch with Tancred
+Ennever, the stupid hero of "The Transient Guest." In the meantime he
+has become an almost intolerable prig. It is probable that Saltus
+meant more by this fable than he has let appear. The roar of the waves
+on the coast of Lesbos is distinctly audible for a time and the
+dénoûment seems to belong to quite another story.... Ennever has
+turned author. We are informed that he has completed studies on
+Huysmans and Leconte de Lisle; he is also engaged on a "Historia
+Amoris." There is an interesting passage relating to the names of
+great writers. Alphabet Jones assures us that they are always "in two
+syllables with the accent on the first. Oyez: Homer, Sappho, Horace,
+Dante, Petrarch, Ronsard, Shakespeare, Hugo, Swinburne ... Balzac,
+Flaubert, Huysmans, Michelet, Renan." The reader is permitted to add
+... "Saltus"!
+
+"Purple and Fine Women"[25] is a misnamed book. It should be called
+"Philosophic Fables." The first two stories are French in form. Paul
+Bourget himself is the hero of one of them! In "The Princess of the
+Sun" we are offered a new and fantastic version of the Coppelia story.
+"The Dear Departed" finds Saltus in a murderous amorous mood again. In
+"The Princess of the Golden Isles" a new poison is introduced,
+muscarine. Alchemy furnishes the theme for one tale; the protagonist
+seeks an alcahest, a human victim for his crucible. We are left in
+doubt as to whether he chooses his wife, who wears a diamond set in
+one of her teeth, or a gorilla. There are dramas of dual personality
+and of death. Metaphysics and spiritualism rise dimly out of the charm
+of this book. There is a duchess who mews like a cat and somewhere we
+are assured that _Perche non posso odiarte_ from _La Sonnnambula_ is
+the most beautiful aria in the Italian repertory. Here is a true and
+soul-revealing epigram: "The best way to master a subject of which you
+are ignorant is to write it up." Certainly not Saltus at his best,
+this _opus_, but far from his worst.
+
+"The Perfume of Eros"[26] is frenzied fiction again; amnesia,
+drunkenness, white slavery, sex, are its mingled themes. There is a
+pretty picture, recognizable in any smart community, of a witty woman
+of fashion, and a full-length portrait of a bounder. "The Yellow Fay,"
+Saltus's _cliché_ for the Demon Rum, was the original title of this
+"Fifth Avenue Incident." Romance and Realism consort lovingly together
+in its pages. There is an unforgetable passage descriptive of a young
+man ridding himself of his mistress. He interrupts his flow of
+explanation to hand her a card case, which she promptly throws out of
+the window.
+
+"'That is an agreeable way of getting rid of twelve thousand dollars,'
+he remarked.
+
+"Yet, however lightly he affected to speak, the action annoyed him.
+Like all men of large means he was close. It seemed to him beastly to
+lose such a sum. He got up, went to the window and looked down. He
+could not see the case and he much wanted to go and look for it. But
+that for the moment Marie prevented."
+
+"The Pomps of Satan"[27] is replete with grace and graciousness, and
+full of charm, a quality more valuable to its possessor than
+juvenility, our author tells us in a chapter concerning the lost
+elixir of youth. Neither form nor matter assume ponderous shape in
+this volume, which in the quality of its contents reminds one faintly
+of Franz Blei's lady's breviary, "The Powder Puff," but Saltus's book
+is the more ingratiating of the two. Satan's pomps are varied; the
+author exposes his whims, his ideas, images the past, forecasts the
+future, deplores the present. There is a chapter on cooking and we
+learn that Saltus does not care for food prepared in the German style
+... nor yet in the American. He forbids us champagne: "Champagne is
+not a wine. It is a beverage, lighter indeed than brandy and soda,
+but, like cologne, fit only for demi-reps." But he seems untrue to
+himself in an essay condemning the use of perfumes. His own books are
+heavily scented. With the rare prescience and clairvoyance of an
+artist he includes the German Kaiser in a chapter on hyenas (in
+1906!); therein stalk the blood-stained shadows of Caligula,
+Caracalla, Atilla, Tamerlane, Cesare Borgia, Philip II, and Ivan the
+Terrible. The paragraph is worth quoting: "Power consists in having a
+million bayonets behind you. Its diffusion is not general. But there
+are people who possess it. For one, the German Kaiser. Not long since
+somebody or other diagnosed in him the habitual criminal. We doubt
+that he is that. But we suspect that, were it not for the press, he
+would show more of primitive man than he has thus far thought
+judicious." Has Mme. de Thèbes done better? Saltus also foresaw
+Gertrude Stein. Peering into the future he wrote: "When that day comes
+the models of literary excellence will not be the long and windy
+sentences of accredited bores, but ample brevities, such as the 'N' on
+Napoleon's tomb, in which, in less than a syllable, an epoch, and the
+glory of it, is resumed." Saltus forsakes his previous choice from
+Bellini and installs _Tu che a Dio_ as his favourite Italian opera
+air. Here is another flash of self-revealment: "Byzance is rumoured
+to have been the sewer of every sin, yet such was its beauty that it
+is the canker of our heart we could not have lived there." Always this
+turning to the far past, this delving in rosetta stones and
+palimpsests, this preoccupation with the sights and sins of the
+ancient gods and kings. A chapter on poisons, another on Gille de
+Retz, which probably owes something to "La Bas," betray this
+preference. He playfully suggests that the Academy of Arts and Letters
+be filled up with young nobodies: "They have, indeed, done nothing
+yet. But therein is their charm. An academy composed of young people
+who have done nothing yet would be more alluring than one made up of
+fossils who are unable to do anything more." Herein are contained
+enough aphorisms and epigrams to make up a new book of Solomonic
+wisdom. Hardly as evenly inspired as "Imperial Purple," "The Pomps of
+Satan" is more dashing and more varied. It is also more tired.
+
+"Vanity Square"[28] in Stella Sixmuth boasts such a "vampire" as even
+Theda Bara is seldom called upon to portray. Not until the final
+chapters of this mystery story do we discover that this lady has been
+poisoning a rich man's wife, with an eye on the rich man's heart and
+hand. Oraere is this slow and subtle poison which leaves no subsequent
+trace. She is thwarted but in a subsequent attempt she is successful.
+Robert Hichens has used this theme in "Bella Donna." There is a
+suicide by pistol. An exciting story but little else, this book
+contains fewer references to the gods and the cæsars than is usual
+with Saltus. To compensate there are long discussions about phobias,
+dual personalities (a girl with six is described) and theories about
+future existence. Vanity Square, we are told, is bounded by Central
+Park, Madison Avenue, Seventy-second Street and the Plaza.
+
+It will be remembered that Tancred Ennever was at work on "Historia
+Amoris"[29] in 1895, which would seem to indicate that Saltus had
+begun to collect material for it himself at that time. The title is a
+literal description of the contents of the book: it is a history of
+love. Such a work might have been made purely anecdotal or scientific,
+but Saltus's purpose has been at once more serious and more graceful,
+to show how the love currents flowed through the centuries, to show
+what effect period life had on love and what effect love had on period
+life. Beginning with Babylon and passing on through the "Song of
+Songs" we meet Helen of Troy, Scheherazade (though but briefly),
+Sappho (to whom an entire chapter is devoted), Cleopatra (whom Heine
+called "_cette reine entretenue_"), Mary Magdalen, Héloïse.... The
+Courts of Love are described and deductions are drawn as to the effect
+of the Renaissance on the Gay Science. "Historia Amoris" is concluded
+by a Schopenhauerian essay on "The Law of Attraction." Cicisbeism is
+not treated in extenso, as it should be, and I also missed the
+fragrant name of Sophie Arnould. Readers of "Love and Lore," "The
+Pomps of Satan," "Imperial Purple," and "The Lords of the Ghostland"
+will find much of their material adjusted to the purposes of this
+History of Love, which, nevertheless, no one interested in Saltus can
+afford to miss.
+
+In "The Lords of the Ghostland, a history of the ideal,"[30] Saltus
+returns to the theme of "The Anatomy of Negation." The newer work is
+both more cynical and more charming. It is, of course, a history and a
+comparison of religions. With Reinach Saltus believes that
+Christianity owes much to its ancestors. Brahma, Ormuzd, Amon-Râ,
+Bel-Marduk, Jehovah, Zeus, Jupiter, and many lesser deities parade
+before us in defile. Prejudice, intolerance, tolerance even are
+lacking from this book, as they were from "Imperial Purple." "The
+Lords of the Ghostland" is neither reverent nor irreverent, it is
+unreverent. Mr. Saltus finds joy in writing about the gods, the joy of
+a poet, and if his chiefest pleasure is to extol the gods of Greece
+that is only what might be expected of this truly pagan spirit.
+Students of comparative theology can learn much from these pages, but
+they will learn it unwittingly, for the poet supersedes the teacher.
+Saltus is never professorial. The scientific spirit is never to the
+fore; no marshalling of dull facts for their own sakes. Nevertheless I
+suspect that the book contains more absorbing information than any
+similar volume on the subject. With a fascinating and guileful style
+this divine devil of an author leads us on to the spot where he can
+point out to us that the only original feature of Christianity is the
+crucifixion, and even that is foreshadowed in Hindoo legend, in which
+Krishna dies, nailed by arrows to a tree. This book should be required
+reading for the first class in isogogies.
+
+Most of the scenes of "Daughters of the Rich"[31] are laid in Paris.
+The plot hinges on mistaken identity and the whole is a very
+ingenious detective story. The book begins rather than ends with a
+murder, but that is because the tale is told backward. Through lies,
+deceit, and treachery the woman in the case, one Sallie Malakoff,
+betrays the hero into marriage with her. When he discovers her perfidy
+he cheerfully cuts her throat from ear to ear and goes to join the
+lady from whom he has been estranged. She receives him with open arms
+and suggests wedding bells. No woman, she asserts, could resist a man
+who has killed another woman for her sake. This is decidedly a Roman
+point of view! Some of the action takes place in a house on the Avenue
+Malakoff, which must have been near the _hôtel_ of the Princesse de
+Sagan and the apartment occupied by Miss Mary Garden.... A fat
+manufacturer's wife confronts the proposal of a mercenary duke with an
+epic rejoinder: "Pay a man a million dollars to sleep with my
+daughter! Never!"... Again Saltus demonstrates how completely he is
+master of the story-telling gift, how surely he possesses the power to
+compel breathless attention.
+
+"The Monster"[32] is fiction, incredible, insane fiction. The monster
+is incest, in this instance _inceste manqué_ because it doesn't come
+off. On the eve of a runaway marriage Leilah Ogsten is informed by
+her father that her intended husband is her own brother (he inculpates
+her mother in the scandal). Leilah disappears and to put barriers
+between her and the man she loves becomes the bride of another.
+Verplank pursues. There are two fabulous duels and a scene in which
+our hero is mangled by dogs. The stage (for we are always in some
+extravagant theatre) is frequently set in Paris and the familiar
+scenes of the capital are in turn exposed to our view. It is all mad,
+full of purple patches and crimson splotches and yet, once opened, it
+is impossible to lay the book down until it is completed. From this
+novel Mr. Saltus fashioned his only play, _The Gates of Life_, which
+he sent to Charles Frohman and which Mr. Frohman returned. The piece
+has neither been produced nor published.
+
+Last year (1917) the Brothers of the Book in Chicago published
+privately an extremely limited edition (474 copies) of a book by Edgar
+Saltus entitled, "Oscar Wilde: An Idler's Impression," which contains
+only twenty-six pages, but those twenty-six pages are very beautiful.
+They evoke a spirit from the dead. Indeed, I doubt if even Saltus has
+done better than his description of a strange occurrence in a Regent
+Street Restaurant on a certain night when he was supping with Wilde
+and Wilde was reading _Salome_ to him: "apropos of nothing, or rather
+with what to me at the time was curious irrelevance, Oscar, while
+tossing off glass after glass of liquor, spoke of Phémé, a goddess
+rare even in mythology, who after appearing twice in Homer, flashed
+through a verse of Hesiod and vanished behind a page of Herodotus. In
+telling of her, suddenly his eyes lifted, his mouth contracted, a
+spasm of pain--or was it dread?--had gripped him. A moment only. His
+face relaxed. It had gone.
+
+"I have since wondered, could he have evoked the goddess then? For
+Phémé typified what modern occultism terms the impact--the premonition
+that surges and warns. It was Wilde's fate to die three times--to die
+in the dock, to die in prison, to die all along the boulevards of
+Paris. Often since I have wondered could the goddess have been
+lifting, however slightly, some fringe of the crimson curtain, behind
+which, in all its horror, his destiny crouched. If so, he braved it.
+
+"I had looked away. I looked again. Before me was a fat pauper, florid
+and over-dressed, who, in the voice of an immortal, was reading the
+fantasies of the damned. In his hand was a manuscript, and we were
+supping on _Salome_."
+
+Edgar Saltus began with Balzac in 1884 and he has reached Oscar Wilde
+in 1917. His other literary essays, on Gautier and Mérimée in "Tales
+Before Supper," on Barbey d'Aurevilly in "The Story Without a Name,"
+and on Victor Hugo in "The Forum" (June, 1912,) all display the finest
+qualities of his genius. Pervaded with his rare charm they are
+clairvoyant and illuminating, more than that arresting. They should be
+brought together in one volume, especially as they are at present
+absolutely inaccessible, terrifyingly so, every one of them. And if
+they are to be thus collected may we not hope for one or two new
+essays with, say, for subjects, Flaubert and Huysmans?
+
+It is, you may perceive, as an essayist, a historian, an amateur
+philosopher that Saltus excels, but his fiction should not be
+underrated on that account. His novels indeed are half essays, just as
+his essays are half novels. Even the worst of them contains charming
+pages, delightful and unexpected interruptions. His series of fables
+suggests a vast _Comédie Inhumaine_ but this statement must not be
+regarded as dispraise: it is merely description. You will find
+something of the same quality in the work of Edgar Allan Poe, but
+Saltus has more grace and charm than Poe, if less intensity. After one
+dip into realism ("Mr. Incoul's Misadventure") Saltus became an
+incorrigible romantic. All his characters are the inventions of an
+errant fancy; scarcely one of them suggests a human being, but they
+are none the less creations of art. This, perhaps, was a daring
+procedure in an era devoted to the exploitation in fiction of the
+facts of hearth and home.... After all, however, his way may be the
+better way. Personally I may say that my passion for realism is on the
+wane.
+
+In these strange tales we pass through the familiar haunts of
+metropolitan life, but the creatures are amazingly unfamiliar. They
+have horns and hoofs, halos and wings, or fins and tails. An esoteric
+band of fabulous monsters these: harpies and vampires take tea at
+Sherry's; succubi and incubbi are observed buying opal rings at
+Tiffany's; fairies, angels, dwarfs, and elves, bearing branches of
+asphodel, trip lightly down Waverly Place; peris, amshaspahands, æsir,
+izeds, and goblins sleep at the Brevoort; seraphim and cherubim
+decorate drawing rooms on Irving Place; griffons, chimeras, and
+sphynxes take courses in philosophy at Harvard; willis and sylphs sing
+airs from _Lucia di Lammermoor_ and _Le Nozze di Figaro_; naiads and
+mermaids embark on the Cunard Line; centaurs and amazons drive in the
+Florentine Cascine; kobolds, gnomes, and trolls stab, shoot, and
+poison one another; and a satyr meets the martichoras in Gramercy
+Park. No such pictures of monstrous, diverting, sensuous existence can
+be found elsewhere save in the paintings of Arnold Böcklin, Franz von
+Stuck, and above all those of Gustave Moreau. If he had done nothing
+else Edgar Saltus should be famous for having given New York a
+mythology of its own!
+
+  _January 12, 1918._
+
+
+
+
+The New Art of the Singer
+
+     "_It's the law of life that nothing new can come into the
+     world without pain._"
+
+                        Karen Borneman.
+
+
+
+
+The New Art of the Singer
+
+
+The art of vocalization is retarding the progress of the modern music
+drama. That is the simple fact although, doubtless, you are as
+accustomed as I am to hearing it expressed _à rebours_. How many times
+have we read that the art of singing is in its decadence, that soon
+there would not be one artist left fitted to deliver vocal music in
+public. The Earl of Mount Edgcumbe wrote something of the sort in 1825
+for he found the great Catalani but a sorry travesty of his early
+favourites, Pacchierotti and Banti. I protest against this
+misconception. Any one who asserts that there are laws which govern
+singing, physical, scientific laws, must pay court to other ears than
+mine. I have heard this same man for twenty years shouting in the
+market place that a piece without action was not a play (usually the
+drama he referred to had more real action than that which decorates
+the progress of _Nellie, the Beautiful Cloak Model_), that a
+composition without melody (meaning something by Richard Wagner,
+Robert Franz, or even Edvard Grieg) was not music, that verse without
+rhyme was not poetry. This same type of brilliant mind will go on to
+aver (forgetting the Scot) that men who wear skirts are not men,
+(forgetting the Spaniards) that women who smoke cigars are not women,
+and to settle numberless other matters in so silly a manner that a ten
+year old, half-witted school boy, after three minutes light thinking,
+could be depended upon to do better.
+
+The rules for the art of singing, laid down in the Seventeenth and
+Eighteenth Centuries, have become obsolete. How could it be otherwise?
+They were contrived to fit a certain style of composition. We have but
+the briefest knowledge, indeed, of how people sang before 1700,
+although records exist praising the performances of Archilei and
+others. If a different standard for the criticism of vocalization
+existed before 1600 there is no reason why there should not after
+1917. As a matter of fact, maugre much authoritative opinion to the
+contrary, a different standard does exist. In certain respects the new
+standard is taken for granted. We do not, for example, expect to hear
+male sopranos at the opera. The Earl of Mount Edgcumbe admired this
+artificial form of voice almost to the exclusion of all others. His
+favourite singer, indeed, Pacchierotti, was a male soprano. But other
+breaks have been made with tradition, breaks which are not yet taken
+for granted. When you find that all but one or two of the singers in
+every opera house in the world are ignoring the rules in some respect
+or other you may be certain, in spite of the protests of the
+professors, that the rules are dead. Their excuse has disappeared and
+they remain only as silly commandments made to fit an old religion. A
+singer in Handel's day was accustomed to stand in one spot on the
+stage and sing; nothing else was required of him. He was not asked to
+walk about or to act; even expression in his singing was limited to
+pathos. The singers of this period, Nicolini, Senesino, Cuzzoni,
+Faustina, Caffarelli, Farinelli, Carestini, Gizziello, and
+Pacchierotti, devoted their study years to preparing their voices for
+the display of a certain definite kind of florid music. They had
+nothing else to learn. As a consequence they were expected to be
+particularly efficient. Porpora, Caffarelli's teacher, is said to have
+spent six years on his pupil before he sent him forth to be "the
+greatest singer in the world." Contemporary critics appear to have
+been highly pleased with the result but there is some excuse for H. T.
+Finck's impatience, expressed in "Songs and Song Writers": "The
+favourites of the eighteenth-century Italian audiences were artificial
+male sopranos, like Farinelli, who was frantically applauded for such
+circus tricks as beating a trumpeter in holding on to a note, or
+racing with an orchestra and getting ahead of it; or Caffarelli, who
+entertained his audiences by singing, _in one breath_, a chromatic
+chain of trills up and down two octaves. Caffarelli was a pupil of the
+famous vocal teacher Porpora, who wrote operas consisting chiefly of
+monotonous successions of florid arias resembling the music that is
+now written for flutes and violins." All very well for the day, no
+doubt, but could Cuzzoni sing Isolde? Could Faustina sing Mélisande?
+And what modern parts would be allotted to the Julian Eltinges of the
+Eighteenth Century?
+
+When composers began to set dramatic texts to music trouble
+immediately appeared at the door. For example, the contemporaries of
+Sophie Arnould, the "creator" of _Iphigénie en Aulide_, are agreed
+that she was greater as an actress than she was as a singer. David
+Garrick, indeed, pronounced her a finer actress than Clairon. From
+that day to this there has been a continual triangular conflict
+between critic, composer, and singer, which up to date, it must be
+admitted, has been won by the academic pundits, for, although the
+singer has struggled, she has generally bent under the blows of the
+critical knout, thereby holding the lyric drama more or less in the
+state it was in a hundred years ago (every critic and almost every
+composer will tell you that any modern opera can be sung according to
+the laws of _bel canto_ and enough singers exist, unfortunately, to
+justify this assertion) save that the music is not so well sung,
+according to the old standards, as it was then. No singer has had
+quite the courage to entirely defy tradition, to refuse to study with
+a teacher, to embody her own natural ideas in the performance of
+music, to found a new school ... but there have been many rebells.
+
+The operas of Mozart, Bellini, Donizetti, and Rossini, as a whole, do
+not demand great histrionic exertion from their interpreters and for a
+time singers trained in the old Handelian tradition met every
+requirement of these composers and their audiences. If more action was
+demanded than in Handel's day the newer music, in compensation, was
+easier to sing. But even early in the Nineteenth Century we observe
+that those artists who strove to be actors as well as singers lost
+something in vocal facility (really they were pushing on to the new
+technique). I need only speak of Ronconi and Mme. Pasta. The lady was
+admittedly the greatest lyric artist of her day although it is
+recorded that her slips from true intonation were frequent. When she
+could no longer command a steady tone the _beaux restes_ of her art
+and her authoritative style caused Pauline Viardot, who was hearing
+her then for the first time, to burst into tears. Ronconi's voice,
+according to Chorley, barely exceeded an octave; it was weak and
+habitually out of tune. This baritone was not gifted with vocal
+agility and he was monotonous in his use of ornament. Nevertheless
+this same Chorley admits that Ronconi afforded him more pleasure in
+the theatre than almost any other singer he ever heard! If this critic
+did not rise to the occasion here and point the way to the future in
+another place he had a faint glimmering of the coming revolution:
+"There might, there _should_ be yet, a new _Medea_ as an opera.
+Nothing can be grander, more antique, more Greek, than Cherubini's
+setting of the 'grand fiendish part' (to quote the words of Mrs.
+Siddons on Lady Macbeth). But, as music, it becomes simply impossible
+to be executed, so frightful is the strain on the energies of her who
+is to present the heroine. Compared with this character, Beethoven's
+Leonora, Weber's Euryanthe, are only so much child's play." This is
+topsy-turvy reasoning, of course, but at the same time it is
+suggestive.
+
+The modern orchestra dug a deeper breach between the two schools.
+Wagner called upon the singer to express powerful emotion, passionate
+feeling, over a great body of sound, nay, in many instances, _against_
+a great body of sound. (It is significant that Wagner himself admitted
+that it was a singer [Madame Schroeder-Devrient] who revealed to him
+the possibilities of dramatic singing. He boasted that he was the only
+one to learn the lesson. "She was the first artist," writes H. T.
+Finck, "who fully revealed the fact that in a dramatic opera there may
+be situations where _characteristic_ singing is of more importance
+than _beautiful_ singing.") It is small occasion for wonder that
+singers began to bark. Indeed they nearly expired under the strain of
+trying successfully to mingle Porpora and passion. According to W. F.
+Apthorp, Max Alvary once said that, considering the emotional
+intensity of music and situations, the constant co-operation of the
+surging orchestra, and, most of all, the unconquerable feeling of the
+reality of it all, it was a wonder that singing actors did not go
+stark mad, before the very faces of the audience, in parts like
+Tristan or Siegfried.... The critics, however, were inexorable; they
+stood by their guns. There was but one way to sing the new music and
+that was the way of Bernacchi and Pistocchi. In time, by dint of
+persevering, talking night and day, writing day and night, they
+convinced the singer. The music drama developed but the singer was
+held in his place. Some artists, great geniuses, of course, made the
+compromise successfully.... Jean de Reszke, for example, and Lilli
+Lehmann, who said to H. E. Krehbiel ("Chapters of Opera"): "It is
+easier to sing all three Brünnhildes than one Norma. You are so
+carried away by the dramatic emotion, the action, and the scene, that
+you do not have to think how to sing the words. That comes of itself"
+... but they made the further progress of the composer more difficult
+thereby; music remained merely pretty. The successors of these supple
+singers even learned to sing Richard Strauss with broad cantilena
+effects. As for Puccini! At a performance of _Madama Butterfly_ a
+Japanese once asked why the singers were producing those nice round
+tones in moments of passion; why not ugly sounds?
+
+Will any composer arise with the courage to write an opera which
+_cannot_ be sung? Stravinsky almost did this in _The Nightingale_ but
+the break must be more complete. Think of the range of sounds made by
+the Japanese, the gipsy, the Chinese, the Spanish folk-singers. The
+newest composer may ask for shrieks, squeaks, groans, screams, a
+thousand delicate shades of guttural and falsetto vocal tones from his
+interpreters. Why should the gamut of expression on our opera stage be
+so much more limited than it is in our music halls? Why should the
+Hottentots be able to make so many delightful noises that we are
+incapable of producing? Composers up to date have taken into account a
+singer's apparent inability to bridge difficult intervals. It is only
+by ignoring all such limitations that the new music will definitely
+emerge, the new art of the singer be born. What marvellous effects
+might be achieved by skipping from octave to octave in the human
+voice! When will the obfusc pundits stop shouting for what Avery
+Hopwood calls "ascending and descending tetrarchs!"
+
+But, some one will argue, with the passing of _bel canto_ what will
+become of the operas of Mozart, Bellini, Rossini, and Donizetti? Who
+will sing them? Fear not, lover of the golden age of song, _bel canto_
+is not passing as swiftly as that. Singers will continue to be born
+into this world who are able to cope with the floridity of this music,
+for they are born, not made. Amelita Galli-Curci will have her
+successors, just as Adelina Patti had hers. Singers of this kind begin
+to sing naturally in their infancy and they continue to sing, just
+sing.... One touch of drama or emotion and their voices disappear.
+Remember Nellie Melba's sad experience with _Siegfried_. The great
+Mario had scarcely studied singing (one authority says that he had
+taken a few lessons of Meyerbeer!) when he made his début in _Robert,
+le Diable_ and there is no evidence that he studied very much
+afterwards. Melba, herself, spent less than a year with Mme. Marchesi
+in preparation for her opera career. Mme. Galli-Curci asserts that she
+has had very little to do with professors and I do not think Mme.
+Tetrazzini passed her youth in mastering _vocalizzi_. As a matter of
+fact she studied singing only six months. Adelina Patti told Dr.
+Hanslick that she had sung _Una voce poco fà_ at the age of seven with
+the same embellishments which she used later when she appeared in the
+opera in which the air occurs. No, these singers are freaks of nature
+like tortoise-shell cats and like those rare felines they are usually
+females of late, although such singers as Battistini and Bonci remind
+us that men once sang with as much agility as women. But when this
+type of singer finally becomes extinct naturally the operas which
+depend on it will disappear too for the same reason that the works of
+Monteverde and Handel have dropped out of the repertory, that the
+Greek tragedies and the Elizabethan interludes are no longer current
+on our stage. None of our actors understands the style of Chinese
+plays; consequently it would be impossible to present one of them in
+our theatre. As Deirdre says in Synge's great play, "It's a heartbreak
+to the wise that it's for a short space we have the same things only."
+We cannot, indeed, have everything. No one doubts that the plays of
+Æschylus, Euripides, and Sophocles are great dramas; the operas I have
+just referred to can also be admired in the closet and probably they
+will be. Even today no more than two works of Rossini, the most
+popular composer of the early Nineteenth Century, are to be heard.
+What has become of _Semiramide_, _La Cenerentola_, and the others?
+There are no singers to sing them and so they have been dropped from
+the repertory without being missed. Can any of our young misses hum
+_Di Tanti Palpiti_? You know they cannot. I doubt if you can find two
+girls in New York (and I mean girls with a musical education) who can
+tell you in what opera the air belongs and yet in the early Twenties
+this tune was as popular as _Un Bel Di_ is today.
+
+Coloratura singing has been called heartless, not altogether without
+reason. At one time its exemplars fired composers to their best
+efforts. That day has passed. That day passed seventy years ago. It
+may occur to you that there is something wrong when singers of a
+certain type can only find the proper means to exploit their voices in
+works of the past, operas which are dead. It is to be noted that
+Nellie Melba and Amelita Galli-Curci are absolutely unfitted to sing
+in music dramas even so early as those of Richard Wagner; Dukas,
+Strauss, and Stravinsky are utterly beyond them. Even Adelina Patti
+and Marcella Sembrich appeared in few, if any, new works of
+importance. They had no bearing on the march of musical history. Here
+is an entirely paradoxical situation; a set of interpreters who exist,
+it would seem, only for the purpose of delivering to us the art of the
+past. What would we think of an actor who could make no effect save in
+the tragedies of Corneille? It is such as these who have kept Leo
+Ornstein from writing an opera. Berlioz forewarned us in his
+"Memoirs." He was one of the first to foresee the coming day: "We
+shall always find a fair number of female singers, popular from their
+brilliant singing of brilliant trifles, and odious to the great
+masters because utterly incapable of properly interpreting them. They
+have voices, a certain knowledge of music, and flexible throats: they
+are lacking in soul, brain, and heart. Such women are regular monsters
+and all the more formidable to composers because they are often
+charming monsters. This explains the weakness of certain masters in
+writing falsely sentimental parts, which attract the public by their
+brilliancy. It also explains the number of degenerate works, the
+gradual degradation of style, the destruction of all sense of
+expression, the neglect of dramatic properties, the contempt for the
+true, the grand, and the beautiful, and the cynicism and decrepitude
+of art in certain countries."
+
+So, even if, as the ponderous criticasters are continually pointing
+out, the age of _bel canto_ is really passing there is no actual
+occasion for grief. All fashions in art pass and what is known as _bel
+canto_ is just as much a fashion as the bombastic style of acting that
+prevailed in Victor Hugo's day or the "realistic" style of acting we
+prefer today. All interpretative art is based primarily on the
+material with which it deals and with contemporary public taste. This
+kind of singing is a direct derivative of a certain school of opera
+and as that school of opera is fading more expressive methods of
+singing are coming to the fore. The very first principle of _bel
+canto_, an equalized scale, is a false one. With an equalized scale a
+singer can produce a perfectly ordered series of notes, a charming
+string of matched pearls, but nothing else. It is worthy of note that
+it is impossible to sing Spanish or negro folk-songs with an equalized
+scale. Almost all folk-music, indeed, exacts a vocal method of its
+interpreter quite distinct from that of the art song.
+
+We know now that true beauty lies deeper than in the emission of
+"perfect tone." Beauty is truth and expressiveness. The new art of the
+singer should develop to the highest degree the significance of the
+text. Calvé once said that she did not become a real artist until she
+forgot that she had a beautiful voice and thought only of the proper
+expression the music demanded.
+
+Of the old method of singing only one quality will persist in the late
+Twentieth Century (mind you, this is deliberate prophecy but it is
+about as safe as it would be to predict that Sarah Bernhardt will live
+to give several hundred more performances of _La Dame aux Camélias_)
+and that is style. The performance of any work demands a knowledge of
+and a feeling for its style but style is about the last thing a singer
+ever studies. When, however, you find a singer who understands style,
+there you have an artist!
+
+Style is the quality which endures long after the singer has lost the
+power to produce a pure tone or to contrive accurate phrasing and so
+makes it possible for artists to hold their places on the stage long
+after their voices have become partially defective or, indeed, have
+actually departed. It is knowledge of style that accounts for the long
+careers of Marcella Sembrich and Lilli Lehmann or of Yvette Guilbert
+and Maggie Cline for that matter. It is knowledge of style that makes
+De Wolf Hopper a great artist in his interpretation of the music of
+Sullivan and the words of Gilbert. Some artists, indeed, with barely a
+shred of voice, have managed to maintain their positions on the stage
+for many years through a knowledge of style. I might mention Victor
+Maurel, Max Heinrich (not on the opera stage, of course), Antonio
+Scotti, and Maurice Renaud.
+
+A singer may be born with the ability to produce pure tones (I doubt
+if Mme. Melba learned much about tone production from her teachers),
+she may even phrase naturally, although this is more doubtful, but the
+acquirement of style is a long and tedious process and one which
+generally requires specialization. For style is elusive. An auditor, a
+critic, will recognize it at once but very few can tell of what it
+consists. Nevertheless it is fairly obvious to the casual listener
+that Olive Fremstad is more at home in the music dramas of Gluck and
+Wagner than she is in _Carmen_ and _Tosca_, and that Marcella Sembrich
+is happier when she is singing Zerlina (as a Mozart singer she has had
+no equal in the past three decades) than when she is singing _Lakmé_.
+Mme. Melba sings _Lucia_ in excellent style but she probably could not
+convince us that she knows how to sing a Brahms song. So far as I know
+she has never tried to do so. A recent example comes to mind in Maria
+Marco, the Spanish soprano, who sings music of her own country in her
+own language with absolutely irresistible effect, but on one occasion
+when she attempted _Vissi d'Arte_ she was transformed immediately into
+a second-rate Italian singer. Even her gestures, ordinarily fully of
+grace and meaning, had become conventionalized.
+
+If this quality of style (which after all means an understanding of
+both the surface manner and underlying purpose of a composition and an
+ability to transmit this understanding across the footlights) is of
+such manifest importance in the field of art music it is doubly so in
+the field of popular or folk-music. A foreigner had best think twice
+before attempting to sing a Swedish song, a Hungarian song, or a
+Polish song, popular or folk. (According to no less an authority than
+Cecil J. Sharp, the peasants themselves differentiate between the two
+and devote to each a _special vocal method_. Here are his words
+["English Folk-Song"]: "But, it must be remembered that the vocal
+method of the folk-singer is inseparable from the folk-song. It is a
+cult which has grown up side by side with the folk-song, and is, no
+doubt, part and parcel of the same tradition. When, for instance, an
+old singing man sings a modern popular song, he will sing it in quite
+another way. The tone of his voice will change and he will slur his
+intervals, after the approved manner of the street-singer. Indeed, it
+is usually quite possible to detect a genuine folk-song simply by
+paying attention to the way in which it is sung.") Strangers as a rule
+do not attempt such matters although we have before us at the present
+time the very interesting case of Ratan Devi. It is a question,
+however, if Ratan Devi would be so much admired if her songs or their
+traditional manner of performance were more familiar to us.
+
+On our music hall stage there are not more than ten singers who
+understand how to sing American popular songs (and these, as I have
+said elsewhere at some length,[33] constitute America's best claim in
+the art of music). It is very difficult to sing them well. Tone and
+phrasing have nothing to do with the matter; it is all a question of
+style (leaving aside for the moment the important matter of
+personality which enters into an accounting for any artist's
+popularity or standing). Elsie Janis, a very clever mimic, a
+delightful dancer, and perhaps the most deservedly popular artist on
+our music hall stage, is not a good interpreter of popular songs. She
+cannot be compared in this respect with Bert Williams, Blanche Ring,
+Stella Mayhew, Al Jolson, May Irwin, Ethel Levey, Nora Bayes, Fannie
+Brice, or Marie Cahill. I have named nearly all the good ones. The
+spirit, the very conscious liberties taken with the text (the
+vaudeville singer must elaborate his own syncopations as the singer of
+early opera embroidered on the score of the composer) are not matters
+that just happen. They require any amount of work and experience with
+audiences. None of the singers I have named is a novice. Nor will you
+find novices who are able to sing Schumann and Franz _lieder_,
+although they may be blessed with well-nigh perfect vocal organs.
+
+Still the music critics with strange persistence continue to adjudge a
+singer by the old formulæ and standards: has she an equalized scale?
+Has she taste in ornament? Does she overdo the use of _portamento_,
+_messa di voce_, and such devices? How is her shake? etc., etc. But
+how false, how ridiculous, this is! Fancy the result if new writers
+and composers were criticized by the old laws (so they are, my son,
+but not for long)! Creative artists always smash the old tablets of
+commandments and it does not seem to me that interpretative artists
+need be more unprogressive. Acting changes. Judged by the standards by
+which Edwin Booth was assessed John Drew is not an actor. But we know
+now that it is a different kind of acting. Acting has been flamboyant,
+extravagant, and intensely emotional, something quite different from
+real life. The present craze for counterfeiting the semblance of
+ordinary existence on the stage will also die out for the stage is not
+life and representing life on the stage (except in a conventionalized
+or decorative form) is not art. Our new actors (with our new
+playwrights) will develop a new and fantastic mode of expression
+which will supersede the present fashion.... Rubinstein certainly did
+not play the piano like Chopin. Presently a _virtuoso_ will appear who
+will refuse to play the piano at all and a new instrument without a
+tempered scale will be invented so that he may indulge in all the
+subtleties between half-tones which are denied to the pianist.
+
+It's all very well to cry, "Halt!" and "Who goes there?" but you can't
+stop progress any more than you can stop the passing of time. The old
+technique of the singer breaks down before the new technique of the
+composer and the musician with daring will go still further if the
+singer will but follow. Would that some singer would have the complete
+courage to lead! But do not misunderstand me. The road to Parnassus is
+no shorter because it has been newly paved. Indeed I think it is
+longer. Caffarelli studied six years before he made his début as "the
+greatest singer in the world" but I imagine that Waslav Nijinsky
+studied ten before he set foot on the stage. The new music drama,
+combining as it does principles from all the arts is all-demanding of
+its interpreters. The new singer must learn how to move gracefully and
+awkwardly, how to make both fantastic and realistic gestures, always
+unconventional gestures, because conventions stamp the imitator. She
+must peer into every period, glance at every nation. Every nerve
+centre must be prepared to express any adumbration of plasticity. Many
+of the new operas, _Carmen_, _La Dolores_, _Salome_, _Elektra_, to
+name a few, call for interpretative dancing of the first order.
+_Madama Butterfly_ and _Lakmé_ demand a knowledge of national
+characteristics. _Pelléas et Mélisande_ and _Ariane et Barbe-Bleue_
+require of the interpreter absolutely distinct enunciation. In
+Handel's operas the phrases were repeated so many times that the
+singer was excused if he proclaimed the meaning of the line once.
+After that he could alter the vowels and consonants to suit his vocal
+convenience. _Monna Vanna_ and _Tristan und Isolde_ exact of their
+interpreters acting of the highest poetic and imaginative scope....
+
+It is a question whether certain singers of our day have not solved
+these problems with greater success than that for which they are given
+credit.... Yvette Guilbert has announced publicly that she never had a
+teacher, that she would not trust her voice to a teacher. The
+enchanting Yvette practises a sound by herself until she is able to
+make it; she repeats a phrase until she can deliver it without an
+interrupting breath, and is there a singer on the stage more
+expressive than Yvette Guilbert? She sings a little tenor, a little
+baritone, and a little bass. She can succeed almost invariably in
+making the effect she sets out to make. And Yvette Guilbert is the
+answer to the statement often made that unorthodox methods of singing
+ruin the voice. Ruin it for performances of _Linda di Chaminoux_ and
+_La Sonnambula_ very possibly, but if young singers sit about saving
+their voices for performances of these operas they are more than
+likely to die unheard. It is a fact that good singing in the
+old-fashioned sense will help nobody out in _Elektra_, _Ariane et
+Barbe-Bleue_, _Pelléas et Mélisande_, or _The Nightingale_. These
+works are written in new styles and they demand a new technique. Put
+Mme. Melba, Mme. Destinn, Mme. Sembrich, or Mme. Galli-Curci to work
+on these scores and you will simply have a sad mess.
+
+We have, I think, but a faint glimmering of what vocal expressiveness
+may become. Such torch-bearers as Mariette Mazarin and Feodor
+Chaliapine have been procaciously excoriated by the critics. Until
+recently Mary Garden, who of all artists on the lyric stage, is the
+most nearly in touch with the singing of the future, has been treated
+as a charlatan and a fraud. W. J. Henderson once called her the "Queen
+of Unsong." Well, perhaps she is, but she is certainly better able to
+cope artistically with the problems of the modern music drama than
+such Queens of Song as Marcella Sembrich and Adelina Patti would be.
+Perhaps Unsong is the name of the new art.
+
+I do not think I have ever been backward in expressing my appreciation
+of this artist. My essay devoted to her in "Interpreters and
+Interpretations" will certainly testify eloquently as to my previous
+attitude in regard to her. But it has not always been so with some of
+my colleagues. Since she has been away from us they have learned
+something; they have watched and listened to others and so when Mary
+Garden came back to New York in _Monna Vanna_ in January, 1918, they
+were ready to sing choruses of praise in her honour. They have been
+encomiastic even in regard to her voice and her manner of singing.
+
+Even my own opinion of this artist's work has undergone a change. I
+have always regarded her as one of the few great interpreters, but in
+the light of recent experience I now feel assured that she is the
+greatest artist on the contemporary lyric stage. It is not, I would
+insist, Mary Garden that has changed so much as we ourselves. She has,
+it is true, polished her interpretations until they seem incredibly
+perfect, but has there ever been a time when she gave anything but
+perfect impersonations of Mélisande or Thais? Has she ever been
+careless before the public? I doubt it.
+
+The fact of the matter is that when Mary Garden first came to New York
+only a few of us were ready to receive her at anywhere near her true
+worth. In a field where mediocrity and brainlessness, lack of
+theatrical instinct and vocal insipidity are fairly the rule her
+dominant personality, her unerring search for novelty of expression,
+the very completeness of her dramatic and vocal pictures, annoyed the
+philistines, the professors, and the academicians. They had been
+accustomed to taking their opera quietly with their after-dinner
+coffee and, on the whole, they preferred it that way.
+
+But the main obstacle in the way of her complete success lay in the
+matter of her voice, of her singing. Of the quality of any voice there
+can always exist a thousand different opinions. To me the great beauty
+of the middle register of Mary Garden's voice has always been
+apparent. But what was not so evident at first was the absolute
+fitness of this voice and her method of using it for the dramatic
+style of the artist and for the artistic demands of the works in
+which she appeared. Thoroughly musical, Miss Garden has often puzzled
+her critical hearers by singing _Faust_ in one vocal style and _Thais_
+in another. But she was right and they were wrong. She might, indeed,
+have experimented still further with a new vocal technique if she had
+been given any encouragement but encouragement is seldom offered to
+any innovator. As Edgar Saltus puts it, "The number of people who
+regard a new idea or a fresh theory as a personal insult is curiously
+large; indeed they are more frequent today than when Socrates quaffed
+the hemlock." It must, therefore, be a source of ironic amusement to
+her to find herself now appreciated not alone by her public, which has
+always been loyal and adoring, but also by the professors themselves.
+
+It would do no harm to any singer to study the multitude of vocal
+effects this artist achieves. I can think of nobody who could not
+learn something from her. How, for example, she gives her voice the
+hue and colour of a _jeune fille_ in _Pelléas et Mélisande_, for
+although Mélisande had been the bride of Barbe-Bleue before Golaud
+discovered her in the forest she had never learned to be anything else
+than innocent and distraught, unhappy and mysterious. Her treatment of
+certain important phrases in this work is so electrifying in its
+effect that the heart of every auditor is pierced. Remember, for
+example, her question to Pelléas at the end of the first act,
+"_Pourquoi partez-vous?_" to which she imparts a kind of dreamy
+intuitive longing; recall the amazement shining through her grief at
+Golaud's command that she ask Pelléas to accompany her on her search
+for the lost ring: "_Pelléas!--Avec Pelléas!--Mais Pelléas ne voudra
+pas_..."; and do not forget the terrified cry which signals the
+discovery of the hidden Golaud in the park, "_Il y a quelqu'un
+derrière nous!_"
+
+In _Monna Vanna_ her most magnificent vocal gesture rested on the
+single word _Si_ in reply to Guido's "_Tu ne reviendras pas?_" Her
+performance of this work, however, offers many examples of just such
+instinctive intonations. One more, I must mention, her answer to
+Guido's insistent, "_Cet homme t'a-t-il prise_?"... "_J'ai dit la
+vérité.... Il ne m'a pas touchée_," sung with dignity, with force,
+with womanliness, and yet with growing impatience and a touch of
+sadness.
+
+Let me quote Pitts Sanborn: "It is easy to be flippant about Miss
+Garden's singing. Her faults of voice and technique are patent to a
+child, though he might not name them. One who has become a man can
+ponder the greatness of her singing. I do not mean exclusively in
+Debussy, though we all know that as a singer of Debussy ... she has
+scarce a rival. Take her _mezza voce_ and her phrasing in the second
+act of _Monna Vanna_, take them and bow down before them. Ponder a
+moment her singing in _Thais_. The converted Thais, about to betake
+herself desertward with the insistent monk, has a solo to sing. The
+solo is Massenet, simon-pure Massenet, the idol of the Paris
+_midinette_. Miss Garden, with a defective voice, a defective
+technique, exalts and magnifies that passage till it might be the
+noblest air of Handel or of Mozart. By a sheer and unashamed reliance
+on her command of style, Miss Garden works that miracle, transfigures
+Massenet into something superearthly, overpowering. Will you rise up
+to deny that is singing?"
+
+As for her acting, there can scarcely be two opinions about that! She
+is one of the few possessors of that rare gift of imparting atmosphere
+and mood to a characterization. Some exceptional actors and singers
+accomplish this feat occasionally. Mary Garden has scarcely ever
+failed to do so. The moment Mélisande is disclosed to our view, for
+example, she seems to be surrounded by an aura entirely distinct from
+the aura which surrounds Monna Vanna, Jean, Thais, Salome, or Sapho.
+She becomes, indeed, so much a part of the character she assumes that
+the spectator finds great difficulty in dissociating her from that
+character, and I have found those who, having seen Mary Garden in only
+one part, were quite ready to generalize about her own personality
+from the impression they had received.
+
+One of the tests of great acting is whether or not an artist remains
+in the picture when she is not singing or speaking. Mary Garden knows
+how to listen on the stage. She does not need to move or speak to make
+herself a part of the action and she is never guilty of such an
+offence against artistry as that committed by Tamagno, who, according
+to Victor Maurel, allowed a scene in _Otello_ to drop to nothing while
+he prepared himself to emit a high B.
+
+Watching her magnificent performance of Monna Vanna it struck me that
+she would make an incomparable Isolde. At the present moment I cannot
+imagine Mary Garden learning Boche or singing in it even if she knew
+it, but if some one will present us Wagner's (who hated the Germans as
+much as Theodore Roosevelt does) music drama in French or English with
+Mary Garden as Isolde, I think the public will thank me for having
+suggested it.
+
+Or it would be even better if Schoenberg, or Stravinsky, or Leo
+Ornstein, inspired by the new light the example of such a singer has
+cast over our lyric stage, would write a music drama, ignoring the
+technique and the conventions of the past, as Debussy did when he
+wrote _Pelléas et Mélisande_ (creating opportunities which any
+opera-goer of the last decade knows how gloriously Miss Garden
+realized). It is thus that the new order will gradually become
+established. And then the new art ... the new art of the singer....
+
+  _April 18, 1918._
+
+
+
+
+Au Bal Musette
+
+    _"Auprès de ma blonde
+      Qu'il fait bon, fait bon, bon, bon...."_
+
+                        Old French Song.
+
+
+
+
+Au Bal Musette
+
+
+It has often been remarked by philosophers and philistines alike that
+the commonest facts of existence escape our attention until they are
+impressed upon it in some unusual way. For example I knew nothing of
+the sovereign powers of citronella as a mosquito dispatcher until a
+plague of the insects drove me to make enquiries of a chemist. For
+years I believed that knocking the necks off bottles, lacking an
+opener, was the only alternative. A friend who caught me in this
+predicament showed me the other use to which the handles of high-boy
+drawers could be put. It was long my habit to quickly dispose of
+trousers which had been disfigured by cigarette burns, but that was
+before I had heard of _stoppage_, a process by which the original
+weave is cleverly counterfeited. And, wishing to dance, in Paris, I
+have been guilty of visits to the great dance halls and to the small
+smart places where champagne is oppressively the only listed beverage.
+But that was before I discovered the _bal musette_.
+
+One July night in Paris I had dinner with a certain lady at the
+Cou-Cou, followed by cognac at the Savoyarde. I find nothing strange
+in this program; it seems to me that I must have dined at the Cou-Cou
+with every one I have known in Paris from time to time, a range of
+acquaintanceship including Fernand, the _apache_, and the Comtesse de
+J----, and cognac at the Savoyarde usually followed the dinner. This
+evening at the Cou-Cou then resembled any other evening. Do you know
+how to go there? You must take a taxi-cab to the foot of the hill of
+Montmartre and then be drawn up in the _finiculaire_ to the top where
+the church of Sacré-Coeur squats proudly, for all the world like a
+mammoth Buddha (of course you may ride all the way up the mountain in
+your taxi if you like). From Sacré-Coeur one turns to the left around
+the board fence which, it would seem, will always hedge in this
+unfinished monument of pious Catholics; still turning to the left,
+through the Place du Tertre, in which one must not be stayed by the
+pleasant sight of the _Montmartroises bourgeoises_ eating _petite
+marmite_ in the open air, one arrives at the Place du Calvaire. The
+tables of the Restaurant Cou-Cou occupy nearly the whole of this tiny
+square, to which there are only two means of approach, one up the
+stairs from the city below, and the other from the Place du Tertre. An
+artist's house disturbs the view on the side towards Paris; opposite
+is the restaurant, flanked on the right by a row of modest apartment
+houses, to which one gains entrance through a high wall by means of a
+small gate. Sundry visitors to these houses, some on bicycles, make
+occasional interruptions in the dinner.... From over this wall, too,
+comes the huge Cheshire cat (much bigger than Alice's, a beautiful
+animal), which lounges about in the hope, frequently realized, that
+some one will give him a chicken bone.... Conterminous to the
+restaurant, on the right, is a tiny cottage, fronted by a still tinier
+garden, fenced in and gated. Many of the visitors to the Cou-Cou hang
+their hats and sticks on this fence and its gate. I have never seen
+the occupants of the cottage in any of my numerous visits to this open
+air restaurant, but once, towards eleven o'clock the crowd in the
+square becoming too noisy, the upper windows were suddenly thrown up
+and a pailful of water descended.... "_Per Baccho!_" quoth the
+inn-keeper for, it must be known, the Restaurant Cou-Cou is Italian by
+nature of its _patron_ and its cooking.
+
+This night, I say, had been as the others. The Cou-Cou is (and in this
+respect it is not exceptional in Paris) safe to return to if you have
+found it to your liking in years gone by. Perhaps some day the small
+boy of the place will be grown up. He is a real _enfant terrible_. It
+is his pleasure to _tutoyer_ the guests, to amuse himself by
+pretending to serve them, only to bring the wrong dishes, or none at
+all. If you call to him he is deaf. Any hope of _revanche_ is
+abandoned in the reflection of the super-retaliations he himself
+conceives. One young man who expresses himself freely on the subject
+of Pietro receives a plate of hot soup down the back of his neck,
+followed immediately by a "_Pardon, Monsieur_," said not without
+respect. But where might Pietro's father be? He is in the kitchen
+cooking and if you find your dinner coming too slowly at the hands of
+the distracted maid servants, who also have to put up with Pietro, go
+into the kitchen, passing under the little vine-clad porch wherein you
+may discover a pair of lovers, and help yourself. And if you find some
+one else's dinner more to your liking than your own take that off the
+stove instead. At the Cou-Cou you pay for what you eat, not for what
+you order. And the Signora, Pietro's mother? That unhappy woman
+usually stands in front of the door, where she interferes with the
+passage of the girls going for food. She wrings her hands and moans,
+"_Mon Dieu, quel monde!_" with the idea that she is helping vastly in
+the manipulation of the machinery of the place.
+
+And the _monde_; who goes there? It is not too _chic_, this _monde_,
+and yet it is surely not _bourgeois_; if one does not recognize M.
+Rodin or M. Georges Feydeau, yet there are compensations.... The girls
+who come attended by bearded companions, are unusually pretty; one
+sees them afterwards at the bars and _bals_ if one does not go to the
+Abbaye or Pagés.... It makes a very pleasant picture, the Place du
+Calvaire towards nine o'clock on a summer night when tiny lights with
+pink globes are placed on the tables. The little square twinkles with
+them and the couples at the tables become very gay, and sometimes
+sentimental. And when the pink lights appear a small boy in blue
+trousers comes along to light the street lamp. Then the urchins gather
+on the wall which hedges in the garden on the fourth side of the
+square and chatter, chatter, chatter, about all the things that French
+boys chatter about. Naturally they have a good deal to say about the
+people who are eating.
+
+I have described the Cou-Cou as it was this night and as it has been
+all the nights during the past eight summers that I have been there.
+The dinner too is always the same. It is served _à la carte_, but one
+is not given much choice. There is always a _potage_, always
+_spaghetti_, always chicken and a salad, always a lobster, and
+_zabaglione_ if one wants it. The wine--it is called _chianti_--is
+tolerable. And the _addition_ is made upon a slate with a piece of
+white chalk. "_Qu'est-ce que monsieur a mangé?_" Sometimes it is very
+difficult to remember, but it is necessary. Such honesty compels an
+exertion. It is all added up and for the two of us on this evening, or
+any other evening, it may come to nine _francs_, which is not much to
+pay for a good dinner.
+
+Then, on this evening, and every other evening, we went on, back as we
+had come, round past the other side of Sacré-Coeur, past the statue of
+the Chevalier who was martyred for refusing to salute a procession
+(why he refused I have never found out, although I have asked
+everybody who has ever dined with me at the Cou-Cou) to the Café
+Savoyarde, the broad windows of which look out over pretty much all
+the Northeast of Paris, over a glittering labyrinth of lights set in
+an obscure sea of darkness. It was not far from here that Louise and
+Julien kept house when they were interrupted by Louise's mother, and
+it was looking down over these lights that they swore those eternal
+vows, ending with Louise's "_C'est une Féerie!_" and Julien's "_Non,
+c'est la vie!_" One always remembers these things and feels them at
+the Savoyarde as keenly as one did sometime in the remote past
+watching Mary Garden and Léon Beyle from the topmost gallery of the
+Opéra-Comique after an hour and a half wait in the _queue_ for one
+_franc_ tickets (there were always people turned away from
+performances of _Louise_ and so it was necessary to be there early;
+some other operas did not demand such punctuality). There is a terrace
+outside the Savoyarde, a tiny terrace, with just room for one man, who
+griddles _gaufrettes_, and three or four tiny tables with chairs. At
+one of these we sat that night (just as I had sat so many times
+before) and sipped our cognac.
+
+It is difficult in an adventure to remember just when the departure
+comes, when one leaves the past and strides into the future, but I
+think that moment befell me in this café ... for it was the first time
+I had ever seen a cat there. He was a lazy, splendid animal. In New
+York he would have been an oddity, but in Paris there are many such
+beasts. Tawny he was and soft to the touch and of a hugeness. He was
+lying on the bar and as I stroked his coat he purred melifluously....
+I stroked his warm fur and thought how I belonged to the mystic band
+(Gautier, Baudelaire, Mérimée, all knew the secrets) of those who are
+acquainted with cats; it is a feeling of pride we have that
+differentiates us from the dog lovers, the pride of the appreciation
+of indifference or of conscious preference. And it was, I think, as I
+was stroking the cat that my past was smote away from me and I was
+projected into the adventure for, as I lifted the animal into my arms,
+the better to feel its warmth and softness, it sprang with strength
+and unsheathed claws out of my embrace, and soon was back on the bar
+again, "just as if nothing had happened." There was blood on my face.
+Madame, behind the bar, was apologetic but not chastening. "_Il avait
+peur_," she said. "_Il n'est pas méchant._" The wound was not deep,
+and as I bent to pet the cat again he again purred. I had interfered
+with his habits and, as I discovered later, he had interfered with
+mine.
+
+We decided to walk down the hill instead of riding down in the
+_finiculaire_, down the stairs which form another of the pictures in
+_Louise_, with the abutting houses, into the rooms of which one looks,
+conscious of prying. And you see the old in these interiors, making
+shoes, or preparing dinner, or the middle-aged going to bed, but the
+young one never sees in the houses in the summer.... It was early and
+we decided to dance; I thought of the Moulin de la Galette, which I
+had visited twice before. The Moulin de la Galette waves its gaunt
+arms in the air half way up the _butte_ of Montmartre; it serves its
+purpose as a dance hall of the quarter. One meets the pretty little
+_Montmartroises_ there and the young artists; the entrance fee is not
+exorbitant and one may drink a bock. And when I have been there,
+sitting at a small table facing the somewhat vivid mural decoration
+which runs the length of one wall, drinking my brown _bock_, I have
+remembered the story which Mary Garden once told me, how Albert Carré
+to celebrate the hundredth--or was it the twenty-fifth?--performance
+of _Louise_, gave a dinner there--so near to the scenes he had
+conceived--to Charpentier and how, surrounded by some of the most
+notable musicians and poets of France, the composer had suddenly
+fallen from the table, face downwards; he had starved himself so long
+to complete his masterpiece that food did not seem to nourish him. It
+was the end of a brilliant dinner. He was carried away ... to the
+Riviera; some said that he had lost his mind; some said that he was
+dying. Mary Garden herself did not know, at the time she first sang
+_Louise_ in America, what had happened to him. But a little later the
+rumour that he was writing a trilogy was spread about and soon it was
+a known fact that at least one other part of the trilogy had been
+written, _Julien_; that lyric drama was produced and everybody knows
+the story of its failure. Charpentier, the natural philosopher and the
+poet of Montmartre, had said everything he had to say in _Louise_. As
+for the third play, one has heard nothing about that yet.
+
+But on this evening the Moulin de la Galette was closed and then I
+remembered that it was open on Thursday and this was Wednesday. Is it
+Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday that the Moulin de la Galette is open?
+I think so. By this time we were determined to dance; but where? We
+had no desire to go to some stupid place, common to tourists, no such
+place as the Bal Tabarin lured us; nor did the Grelot in the Place
+Blanche, for we had been there a night or two before. The Elysée
+Montmartre (celebrated by George Moore) would be closed. Its _patron_
+followed the schedule of days adopted for the Galette.... To chance I
+turn in such dilemmas.... I consulted a small boy, who, with his
+companion, had been good enough to guide us through many winding
+streets to the Moulin. Certainly he knew of a _bal_. Would _monsieur_
+care to visit a _bal musette_? His companion was horrified. I caught
+the phrase "_mal frequenté_." Our curiosity was aroused and we gave
+the signal to advance.
+
+There were two grounds for my personal curiosity beyond the more
+obvious ones. I seemed to remember to have read somewhere that the
+ladies of the court of Louis XIV played the _musette_, which is French
+for bag-pipe. It was the fashionable instrument of an epoch and the
+_musettes_ played by the _grandes dames_ were elaborately decorated.
+The word in time slunk into the dictionaries of musical terms as
+descriptive of a drone bass. Many of Gluck's ballet airs bear the
+title, _Musette_. Perhaps the bass was even performed on a
+bag-pipe.... "_Mal frequenté_" in Parisian _argot_ has a variety of
+significations; in this particular instance it suggested _apaches_ to
+me. A _bal_, for instance, attended by _cocottes_, _mannequins_, or
+_modèles_, could not be described as _mal frequenté_ unless one were
+speaking to a boarding school miss, for all the public _bals_ in Paris
+are so attended. No, the words spoken to me, in this connection, could
+only mean _apaches_. The confusion of epochs began to invite my
+interest and I wondered, in my mind's eye, how a Louis XIV _apache_
+would dress, how he would be represented at a costume ball, and a
+picture of a ragged silk-betrousered person, flaunting a plaid-bellied
+instrument came to mind. An imagination often leads one violently
+astray.
+
+The two urchins were marching us through street after street, one of
+them whistling that pleasing tune, _Le lendemain elle était
+souriante_. Dark passage ways intervened between us and our
+destination: we threaded them. The cobble stones of the underfoot were
+not easy to walk on for my companion, shod in high-heels from the
+Place Vendôme.... The urchins amused each other and us by capers on
+the way. They could have made our speed walking on their hands, and
+they accomplished at least a third of the journey this way. Of course,
+I deluged them with large round five and ten _centimes_ pieces.
+
+We arrived at last before a door in a short street near the Gare du
+Nord. Was it the Rue Jessaint? I do not know, for when, a year later,
+I attempted to re-find this _bal_ it had disappeared.... We could hear
+the hum of the pipes for some paces before we turned the corner into
+the street, and never have pipes sounded in my ears with such a shrill
+significance of being somewhere they ought not to be, never but once,
+and that was when I had heard the piper who accompanies the dinner of
+the Governor of the Bahamas in Nassau. Marching round the porch of the
+Governor's Villa he played _The Blue Bells of Scotland_ and _God Save
+the King_, but, hearing the sound from a distance through the
+interstices of the cocoa-palm fronds in the hot tropical night, I
+could only think of a Hindoo blowing the pipes in India, the charming
+of snakes.... So, as we turned the corner into the Rue Jessaint, I
+seemed to catch a faint glimpse of a scene on the lawn at
+Versailles.... Louis XIV--it was the epoch of Cinderella!
+
+But it wasn't a bag-pipe at all. That we discovered when we entered
+the room, after passing through the bar in the front. The _bal_ was
+conducted in a large hall at the back of the _maison_. In the doorway
+lounged an _agent de service_, always a guest at one of these
+functions, I found out later. There were rows of tables, long tables,
+with long wooden benches placed between them. One corner of the floor
+was cleared--not so large a corner either--for dancing, and on a small
+platform sat the strangest looking youth, like Peter Pan never to grow
+old, like the _Monna Lisa_ a boy of a thousand years, without emotion
+or expression of any sort. He was playing an accordion; the bag-pipe,
+symbol of the _bal_, hung disused on the wall over his head. His
+accordion, manipulated with great skill, was augmented by sleigh-bells
+attached to his ankles in such a manner that a minimum of movement
+produced a maximum of effect; he further added to the complexity of
+sound and rhythm by striking a cymbal occasionally with one of his
+feet. The music was both rhythmic and ordered, now a waltz, now a tune
+in two-four time, but never faster or slower, and never ending ...
+except in the middle of each dance, for a brief few seconds, while the
+_patronne_ collected a _sou_ from each dancer, after which the dance
+proceeded. All the time we remained never did the musician smile,
+except twice, once briefly when I sent word to him by the waiter to
+order a _consommation_ and once, at some length, when we departed. On
+these occasions the effect was almost emotionally illuminating, so
+inexpressive was the ordinary cast of his features. A strange lad; I
+like to think of him always sitting there, passively, playing the
+accordion and shaking his sleigh-bells. He suggested a static picture,
+a thing of always, but I know it is not so, for even the next summer
+he had disappeared along with the _bal_ and now he may have been shot
+in the Battle of the Marne or he may have murdered his _gigolette_ and
+been transported to one of the French penal colonies.... An _apache,
+en musicien!_ ... black cloth around his throat, hair parted in the
+middle, _velours_ trousers; a _vrai apache_ I tell you, a cool,
+cunning creature, shredded with cocaine and absinthe, monotonous in
+his virtuosity, playing the accordion. He had begun before we arrived
+and he continued after we left. I like to think of him as always
+playing, but it is not so....
+
+As for the dancers, they were of various kinds and sorts. The women
+had that air which gave them the stamp of a quarter; they wore loose
+_blouses_, tucked in plaid skirts, or dark blue skirts, or
+multi-coloured calico skirts (if you have seen the lithographs of
+Steinlen you may reconstruct the picture with no difficulty) and they
+danced in that peculiar fashion so much in vogue in the Northern
+outskirts of Paris. The men seized them tightly and they whirled to
+the inexorable music when it was a waltz, whirled and whirled, until
+one thought of the Viennese and how they become as dervishes and
+Japanese mice when one plays Johann Strauss. But in the dances in
+two-four time their way was more our way, something between a
+one-step, a mattchiche, and a tango, with strange fascinating steps of
+their own devising, a folk-dance manner.... Yes, under their feet, the
+dance became a real dance of the people and, when we entered into it,
+our feet seemed heavy and our steps conventional, although we tried
+to do what they did. (How they did laugh at us!) And the strange
+youth emphasized the effect of folk-dancing by playing old _chansons
+de France_ which he mingled with his repertory of _café-concert_ airs.
+And there was achieved that wonderful thing (to an artist) a mixture
+of _genres_--intriguing one's curiosity, awakening the most dormant
+interest, and inspiring the dullest imagination.
+
+This was my first night at a _bal musette_ and my last in that year,
+for shortly afterwards I left for Italy and in Italy one does not
+dance. But the next season found me anxious to renew the adventure, to
+again enjoy the pleasures of the _bal musette_. I have said I was
+perhaps wrong in recalling the street as the Rue Jessaint, or perhaps
+the old _maison_ had disappeared. At any rate, when I searched I could
+not find the _bal_, not even the bar. So again I appealed for help,
+this time to a chauffeur, who drove me to the opposite side of the
+city, to the _quartier_ of the _Halles_.... And I was beginning to
+think that the man had misunderstood me, or was stupid. "He will take
+me to a cabaret, l'Ange Gabriel or"--and I rapidly revolved in my mind
+the possibilities of this quarter where the _apaches_ come to the
+surface to feel the purse of the tourist, who buys drinks as he
+listens to stories of murders, some of which have been committed, for
+it is true that some of the real _apaches_ go there (I know because my
+friend Fernand did and it was in l'Ange Gabriel that he knocked all
+the teeth down the throat of Angélique, _sa gigolette_. You may find
+the life of these creatures vividly and amusingly described in that
+amazing book of Charles-Henry Hirsch, "Le Tigre et Coquelicot" It is
+the only book I have read about the _apaches_ of modern Paris that is
+worth its pages). But the idea of l'Ange Gabriel was not amusing to me
+this evening and I leaned forward to ask my chauffeur if he had it in
+mind to substitute another attraction for my desired _bal musette_.
+His reply was reassuring; it took the form of a gesture, the waving of
+a hand towards a small lighted globe depending over the door of a
+little _marchand de vin_. On this globe was painted in black letters
+the single word, _bal_. We were in the narrow Rue des Gravilliers--I
+was there for the first time--and the _bal_ was the Bal des
+Gravilliers.
+
+The bar is so small, when one enters, that there is no intimation of
+the really splendid aspect of the dancing room. For here there are two
+rooms separated by the dancing floor, two halls filled with tables,
+with long wooden benches between them. Benches also line the walls,
+which are white with a grey-blue frieze; the lighting is brilliant.
+The musicians play in a little balcony, and here there are two of
+them, an accordionist and a guitarist. The performer on the accordion
+is a _virtuoso_; he takes delight in winding florid ornament, after
+the manner of some brilliant singer impersonating Rosina in _Il
+Barbiere_, around the melodies he performs. As in the Rue Jessaint a
+_sou_ is demanded in the middle of each dance. But there comparison
+must cease, for the life here is gayer, more of a character. The types
+are of the _Halles_.... There are strange exits....
+
+A short woman enters; "_elle s'avance en se balançant sur ses hanches
+comme une pouliche du haras de Cordoue_"; she suggests an operatic
+Carmen in her swagger. She is slender, with short, dark hair, cropped
+_à la_ Boutet de Monvel, and she flourishes a cigarette, the smoke
+from which wreathes upward and obscures--nay makes more subtle--the
+strange poignancy of her deep blue eyes. Her nose is of a snubness. It
+is the _môme_ Estelle, and as she passes down the narrow aisle,
+between the tables, there is a stir of excitement.... The men raise
+their eyes.... Edouard, _le petit_, flicks a _louis_ carelessly
+between his thumb and fore-finger, with the long dirty nails, and
+then passes it back into his pocket. Do not mistake the gesture; it
+is not made to entice the _môme_, nor is it a sign of affluence; it is
+Edouard's means of demanding another _louis_ before the night is up,
+if it be only a "_louis de dix francs_." Estelle looks at him boldly;
+there is no fear in her eyes; you can see that she would face death
+with Carmen's calm if the Fates cut the thread to that effect.... The
+music begins and Estelle dances with Carmella, _l'Arabe_. Edouard
+glowers and pulls his little grey cap down tower.... It is a waltz....
+Suddenly he is on the floor and Estelle is pressed close to his
+body.... Carmella sits down. She smiles, and presently she is dancing
+with Jean-Baptiste.... Estelle and Edouard are now whirling, whirling,
+and all the while his dark eyes look down piercingly into her blue
+eyes. The music stops. Estelle fumbles in her stocking for two _sous_.
+Edouard lights a _Maryland_.
+
+There is a newcomer tonight. (I am talking to the _agent de service_.)
+She is of a youth and she is certainly from Brittany. I see her
+sitting in a corner, waiting for something, trying to know. "She will
+learn," says my friend, "She will learn to pay like the others." That
+is the _gros_ Pierre who regards her. He twirls his moustache and
+considers, and in the end he lumbers to her and asks her to dance.
+She is willing to do so, but the intensity of Pierre frightens her,
+frightens and intrigues.... There is a sign on the wall that one must
+not stamp one's feet, but no other prohibition.... He twists her
+finger purposely as they whirl ... and whirl. She cowers. _Gros_
+Pierre is very big and strong. "_T'es bath, môme_," I hear him say, as
+they pass me by.... The dance over, he towers above her for a brief
+second before he swaggers out.... Estelle smiles. Her lips move and
+she speaks quickly to Edouard, _le petit_.... He does not listen. Why
+should he listen to his _gigolette_? She is wasting her time here
+anyway. He becomes impatient.... Carmella smiles across the room in a
+brief second of chance and Estelle answers the smile. Carmella holds
+up three fingers (it is now 1.30). Estelle nods her head quickly. The
+musicians are always playing, except in the middle of the dance when
+_madame, la patronne_, gathers in the _sous_.... Only from one she
+takes nothing.... He is twenty and very blonde and he is dancing with
+_Madame_.... Between dances she pays his _consommations_.... Estelle
+rises slowly and walks out while Carmella, _l'Arabe_, follows her with
+his eyes. Edouard, _le petit_, lights a _Maryland_ and poises a
+_louis_ between his thumb and fore-finger, the nails of which are
+long and dirty.... The music is always playing.... The little girl
+from Brittany is again alone in the corner. There is fear in her face.
+She is beginning to know. She summons her courage and walks to the
+door, on through.... The _agent de service_ twirls his moustache and
+points after her. "She soon will know." I follow. She hesitates for a
+second at the street door and then starts towards the corner.... She
+reaches the corner and passes around it.... I hear a scream ... the
+sound of running footsteps ... the beat of a horse's hoofs ... the
+rolling of wheels on the cobble stones....
+
+
+  _November 11, 1915._
+
+
+
+
+Music and Cooking
+
+    _"Give me some music,--music, moody food
+      Of us that trade in love."_
+
+                        Shakespeare's _Cleopatra_.
+
+
+
+
+Music and Cooking
+
+
+It is my firm belief that there is an intimate relationship between
+the stomach and the ear, the saucepan and the crotchet, the mysteries
+of Mrs. Rorer and the mysteries of Mme. Marchesi. It has even occurred
+to me that one of the reasons our American composers are so barren in
+ideas is because as a race we are not interested in cooking and
+eating. Those countries in which music plays the greater part in the
+national life are precisely those which are the most interested in the
+culinary art. The food of Italy, the cooking, is celebrated; every
+peasant in that sunny land sings, and the voices of some Italians have
+reverberated around the world. The very melodies of Verdi and Rossini
+are inextricably twined in our minds around memories of _ravioli_ and
+_zabaglione_. _Vesti la Giubba_ is _spaghetti_. The composers of these
+melodies and their interpreters alike cooked, ate, and drank with joy,
+and so they composed and sang with joy too. Men with indigestion may
+be able to write novels, but they cannot compose great music.... The
+Germans spend more time eating than the people of any other country
+(at least they did once). It is small occasion for wonder, therefore,
+that they produce so many musicians. They are always eating, mammoth
+plates heaped high with Bavarian cabbage, _Koenigsberger Klopps_,
+_Hasenpfeffer_, noodles, sauerkraut, _Wiener Schnitzel_ ... drinking
+seidels of beer. They escort sausages with them to the opera. All the
+women have their skirts honeycombed with capacious pockets, in which
+they carry substantial lunches to eat while Isolde is deceiving King
+Mark. Why, the very principle of German music is based on a theory of
+well-fed auditors. The voluptuous scores of Richard Wagner, Richard
+Strauss, Max Schillings and Co. were not written for skinny,
+ill-nourished wights. Even Beethoven demands flesh and bone of his
+hearers. The music of Bach is directly aimed against the doctrine of
+asceticism. "The German capacity for feeling emotion in music has
+developed to the same extent as the capacity of the German stomach for
+containing food," writes Ernest Newman, "but in neither the one case
+nor the other has there been a corresponding development in refinement
+of perceptions. German sentimental music is not quite as gross as
+German food and German feeding, but it comes very near to it
+sometimes.... 'The Germans do not taste,' said Montaigne, 'they gulp.'
+As with their food, so with the emotions of their music. So long as
+they get them in sufficient mass, of the traditional quality, and with
+the traditional pungent seasoning, they are content to leave piquancy
+and variety of effect to others."... Once in Munich in a second
+storey window of the Bayerischebank I saw a small boy, about ten years
+old, sitting outside on the sill, washing the panes of glass. Opposite
+him on the same sill a dachshund reposed on her paws, regarding her
+master affectionately. Between the two stood a half-filled toby of
+foaming Löwenbrau, which, from time to time, the lad raised to his
+lips, quaffing deep draughts. And when he set the pot down he whistled
+the first subject of Beethoven's _Fifth Symphony_. On Sunday
+afternoons, in the gardens which invariably surround the Munich
+breweries, the happy mothers, who gather to listen to the band play
+while they drink beer, frequently replenish the empty nursing bottles
+of their offspring at the taps from which flows the deep brown
+beverage.... The food of the French is highly artificial, delicately
+prepared and served, and flavoured with infinite art: _vol au vent à
+la reine_ and Massenet, _petits pois à l'etuvée_ and Gounod, _oeuf
+Ste. Clotilde_ and César Franck, all strike the tongue and the ear
+quite pleasantly. Des Esseintes and his liqueur symphony were the
+inventions of a Frenchman.... Hungarian goulash and Hungarian
+rhapsodies are certainly designed to be taken in conjunction....
+Russian music tastes of _kascha_ and _bortsch_ and vodka. The happy,
+hearty eaters of Russia, the drunken, sodden drinkers of Russia are
+reflected in the scores of _Boris Godunow_ and _Petrouchka_.... In
+England we find that the great English meat pasties and puddings
+appeared in the same century with the immortal Purcell.... But in
+America we import our cooks ... and our music. As a race we do not
+like to cook. We scarcely like to eat. We certainly do not enjoy
+eating. We will never have a national music until we have national
+dishes and national drinks and until we like good food. It is
+significant that our national drinks at present are mixed drinks, the
+ingredients of which are foreign. It is doubly significant that that
+section of the country which produces chicken _à la Maryland_, corn
+bread, beaten biscuit, mint juleps, and New Orleans fizzes has
+furnished us with the best of such music as we can boast. Maine has
+offered us no _Suwanee River_; we owe no _Swing Low, Sweet Chariot_ to
+Nebraska. The best of our ragtime composers are Jews, a race which
+regards eating and cooking of sufficient importance to include rules
+for the preparation and disposition of food in its religious tenets.
+
+Most musicians and those who enjoy listening to music, like to eat
+(this does not mean that people who like to eat always desire to
+listen to music at the same time, but nowadays one has little choice
+in the matter); what is more pregnant, most of them like to cook. We
+may include even the music critics, one of whom (Henry T. Finck) has
+written a book about such matters. The others eat ... and expand.
+James Huneker devotes sixteen pages of "The New Cosmopolis" to the
+"maw of the monster." And as H. L. Mencken has pointed out, "The
+Pilsner motive runs through the book from cover to cover." Dinners are
+constantly being given for the musicians and critics to meet and talk
+over thirteen courses with wine. You may read Mr. Krehbiel's glowing
+accounts of the dinner given to Adelina Patti (a dinner referred to in
+Joseph Hergesheimer's lyric novel, "The Three Black Pennys") on the
+occasion of her twenty-fifth anniversary as a singer, of the dinner to
+Marcella Sembrich to mark her retirement from the opera stage, and of
+a dinner to Teresa Carreño when she proposed a toast to her three
+husbands.... Go to the opera house and observe the lady singers, with
+their ample bosoms and their broad hips, the men with their expansive
+paunches ... and use your imagination. Why is it, when a singer is
+interviewed for a newspaper, that she invariably finds herself tired
+of hotel food and wants an apartment of her own, where she can cook to
+her stomach's content? Why are the musical journals and the Sunday
+supplements of the newspapers always publishing pictures of contralti
+with their sleeves rolled back to the elbows, their Poiret gowns
+(cunningly and carefully exhibited nevertheless) covered with aprons,
+baking bread, turning omelettes, or preparing clam broth Uncle Sam?
+You, my reader, have surely seen these pictures, but it has perhaps
+not occurred to you to conjure up a reason for them.
+
+Edgar Saltus says: "A perfect dinner should resemble a concert. As the
+_morceaux_ succeed each other, so, too, should the names of the
+composers." Few dinners in New York may be regarded as concerts and
+still fewer restaurants may be looked upon as concert halls, except,
+unfortunately, in the literal sense. However, if you can find a
+restaurant where opera singers and conductors eat you may be sure it
+is a good one. Huneker describes the old Lienau's, where William
+Steinway, Anton Seidl, Theodore Thomas, Scharwenka, Joseffy, Lilli
+Lehmann, Max Heinrich, and Victor Herbert used to gather. Follow
+Alfred Hertz and you will be in excellent company in a double sense.
+Then watch him consume a plateful of Viennese pastry. If you have ever
+seen Emmy Destinn or Feodor Chaliapine eat you will feel that justice
+has been done to a meal. I once sat with the Russian bass for twelve
+hours, all of which time he was eating or drinking. He began with six
+plates of steaming onion soup (cooked with cheese and toast). The old
+New Year's eve festivities at the Gadski-Tauschers' resembled the
+storied banquets of the middle ages.... Boars' heads, meat pies,
+_salade macédoine_, _coeur de palmier_, _hollandaise_ were washed down
+with magnums and quarts of Irroy brut, 1900, Pol Roger, Chambertin,
+graceful Bohemian crystal goblets of Liebfraumilch and Johannisberger
+Schloss-Auslese. Mary Garden once sent a jewelled gift to the _chef_
+at the Ritz-Carlton in return for a superb fish sauce which he had
+contrived for her. H. E. Krehbiel says that Brignoli "probably ate as
+no tenor ever ate before or since--ravenously as a Prussian dragoon
+after a fast." _Pêche Melba_ has become a stable article on many menus
+in many cities in many lands. Agnes G. Murphy, in her biography of
+Mme. Melba, says that one day the singer, Joachim, and a party of
+friends stopped at a peasant's cottage near Bergamo, where they were
+regaled with such delicious macaroni that Melba persuaded her friends
+to return another day and wait while the peasant taught her the exact
+method of preparing the dish. In at least one New York restaurant
+_oeuf Toscanini_ is to be found on the bill. I have heard Olive
+Fremstad complain of the cooking in this hotel in Paris, or that hotel
+in New York, or the other hotel in Munich, and when she found herself
+in an apartment of her own she immediately set about to cook a few
+special dishes for herself.
+
+Two musicians I know not only keep restaurants in New York, but
+actually prepare the dinners themselves. One of them is at the same
+time a singer in the Metropolitan Opera Company. Have you seen Bernard
+Bégué standing before his cook stove preparing food for his patrons?
+His huge form, clad in white, viewed through the open doorway
+connecting the dining room with the kitchen, almost conceals the great
+stove, but occasionally you can catch sight of the pots and pans, the
+_casseroles_ of _pot-au-feu_, the roasting chicken, the filets of
+sole, all the ingredients of a dinner, _cuisine bourgeoise_ ... and
+after dining, you can hear Bégué sing the Uncle-priest in _Madama
+Butterfly_ at the Opera House.
+
+Or have you seen Giacomo (and have not Meyerbeer and Puccini been
+bearers of this name?) Pogliani turning from the _spaghetti_ theme
+chromatically to that of the _risotto_, the most succulent and
+appetizing _risotto_ to be tasted this side of Bonvecchiati's in
+Venice ... or the _polenta_ with _funghi_.... But, best of all, the
+roasts, and were it not that the Prince Troubetskoy is a vegetarian
+you would fancy that he came to Pogliani's for these viands. And it
+must not be forgotten that this supreme cook is--or was--a bassoon
+player of the first rank, that he is a graduate of the Milan
+Conservatory. The bassoon is a difficult instrument. It is sometimes
+called the "comedian of the orchestra," but there are few who can play
+it at all, still fewer who can play it well. Bassoonists are highly
+paid and they are in demand. Walter Damrosch used to say that when he
+was engaging a bassoon player he would ask him to play a passage from
+the bassoon part in _Scheherazade_. If he could play that, he could
+play anything else written for his instrument. Pogliani gave up the
+bassoon for the fork, spoon, and saucepan. Like Prospero he buried his
+magic wand and in Viafora's cartoon the instrument lies idle in the
+cobwebs.
+
+Charles Santley's "Reminiscences" and "Student and Singer" are full of
+references to food: "ox-hearts, stuffed with onions," "a joint of
+meat, well cooked, with a bright brown crust which prevented the
+juices escaping," "a splendid shoulder of mutton, a picture to behold,
+and a _peas pudding_," and "whaffles" are a few of the dishes referred
+to with enthusiasm. In America a newspaper gravely informed its
+readers that "Santley says squash pie is the best thing to sing on he
+knows!" Santley was a true pantophagist, but he was worsted in his
+first encounter with the American oyster: "I had often heard of the
+celebrated American oyster, which half a dozen people had tried to
+swallow without success, and was anxious to learn if the story were
+founded on fact. Cummings conducted me to a cellar in Broadway, where,
+upon his order, a waiter produced two plates, on which were half a
+dozen objects, about the size and shape of the sole of an ordinary
+lady's shoe, on each of which lay what appeared to me to be a very
+bilious tongue, accompanied by smaller plates containing shredded
+white cabbage raw. I did not admire the look of the repast, but I
+never discard food on account of looks. I took up an oyster and tried
+to get it into my mouth, but it was of no use; I tried to ram it in
+with the butt-end of the fork, but all to no purpose, and I had to
+drop it, and, to the great indignation of the waiter, paid and left
+the oysters for him to dispose of as he might like best. I presume
+those oysters are eaten, but I cannot imagine by whom; I have rarely
+seen a mouth capable of the necessary expansion. I soon found out that
+there were plenty of delicious oysters in the States within the
+compass of ordinary jaws."
+
+J. H. Mapleson says in his "Memoirs" that at the Opera at Lodi, where
+he made his début as a tenor, refreshments of all kinds were served to
+the audience between the acts and every box was furnished with a
+little kitchen for cooking macaroni and baking or frying pastry. The
+wine of the country was drunk freely, not out of glasses, but "in
+classical fashion--from bowls." Mapleson also tells us that Del Puente
+was a "very tolerable cook." On one trying occasion he prepared
+macaroni for his impressario. Michael Kelly declares that the sight of
+Signor St. Giorgio entering a fruit shop to eat peaches, nectarines,
+and a pineapple, was really what stimulated him to study for a career
+on the stage. "While my mouth watered, I asked myself why, if I
+assiduously studied music, I should not be able to earn money enough
+to lounge about in fruit-shops, and eat peaches and pineapples as
+well as Signor St. Giorgio...."
+
+Lillian Russell is a good cook. I can recommend her recipe for the
+preparation of mushrooms: "Put a lump of butter in a chafing dish (or
+a saucepan) and a slice of Spanish onion and the mushrooms minus the
+stems; let them simmer until they are all deliciously tender and the
+juice has run from them--about twenty minutes should be enough--then
+add a cupful of cream and let this boil. As a last touch squeeze in
+the juice of a lemon." When Luisa Tetrazzini was going mad with a
+flute in our vicinity she varied the monotony of her life by sending
+pages of her favourite recipes to the Sunday yellow press.
+Unfortunately, I neglected to make a collection of this series. A
+passion for cooking caused the death of Naldi, a buffo singer of the
+early Nineteenth Century. Michael Kelly tells the story: "His ill
+stars took him to Paris, where, one day, just before dinner, at his
+friend Garcia's house, in the year 1821, he was showing the method of
+cooking by steam, with a portable apparatus for that purpose;
+unfortunately, in consequence of some derangement of the machinery, an
+explosion took place, by which he was instantaneously killed." Almost
+everybody knows some story or other about a _virtuoso_, trapped into
+dining and asked to perform after dinner by his host. Kelly relates
+one of the first: "Fischer, the great oboe player, whose minuet was
+then all the rage ... being very much pressed by a nobleman to sup
+with him after the opera, declined the invitation, saying that he was
+usually much fatigued, and made it a rule never to go out after the
+evening's performance. The noble lord would, however, take no denial,
+and assured Fischer that he did not ask him professionally, but merely
+for the gratification of his society and conversation. Thus urged and
+encouraged, he went; he had not, however, been many minutes in the
+house of the consistent nobleman, before his lordship approached him,
+and said, 'I hope, Mr. Fischer, you have brought your oboe in your
+pocket.'--'No, my Lord,' said Fischer, 'my oboe never sups.' He turned
+on his heel, and instantly left the house, and no persuasion could
+ever induce him to return to it." You perhaps have heard rumours that
+Giuseppe Campanari prefers _spaghetti_ to Mozart, especially when he
+cooks it himself. When this baritone was a member of the Metropolitan
+Opera Company his paraphernalia for preparing his favourite food went
+everywhere with him on tour. Heinrich Conried (or was it Maurice
+Grau?) once tried to take advantage of this weakness, according to a
+story often related by the late Algernon St. John Brenon. Campanari
+was to appear as Kothner in _Die Meistersinger_, a character with no
+singing to do after the first act, although he appears in the
+procession in the third act. The singer told his impressario that he
+saw no reason why he should remain to the end and explained that he
+would leave his costume for a chorus man to don to represent him in
+the final episode. "What would the Master say?" demanded Conried,
+wringing his hands. "Would he approve of such a proceeding? No. That
+would not be truth! That would not be art!" Campanari was obdurate.
+The Herr Direktor became reflective. He was silent for a moment and
+then he continued: "If you will stay for the last act you will find in
+your room a little supper, a bottle of wine, and a box of cigars,
+which you may consume while you are waiting." In sooth when Campanari
+entered his dressing room after the first act of Wagner's comic opera
+he found that his director had kept his word.... The baritone ate the
+supper, drank the wine, put the cigars in his pocket ... and went
+home!
+
+If some singers are good cooks it does not follow that all good cooks
+are singers. Benjamin Lumley, in his "Reminiscences of the Opera,"
+tells the sad story of the Countess of Cannazaro's cook, which should
+serve as a lesson to housemaids who are desirous of becoming moving
+picture stars. "This worthy man, excellent no doubt as a _chef_, took
+it into his head that he was a vocalist of the highest order, and that
+he only wanted opportunity to earn musical distinction. His strange
+fancy came to the knowledge of Rubini, and it was arranged that a
+performance should take place in the morning, in which the cook's
+talent should be fairly tested. Certainly every chance was afforded
+him. Not only was he encouraged by Rubini and Lablache (whose gravity
+on the occasion was wonderful), but by a few others, Costa included,
+as instrumentalists. The failure was miserable, ridiculous, as
+everybody expected." Frederick Crowest describes a certain Count
+Castel de Maria who had a spit that played tunes, "and so regulated
+and indicated the condition of whatever was hung upon it to roast. By
+a singular mechanical contrivance this wonderful spit would strike up
+an appropriate tune whenever a joint had hung sufficiently long on its
+particular roast. Thus, _Oh! the roast beef of Old England_, when a
+sirloin had turned and hung its appointed time. At another air, a leg
+of mutton, _à l'Anglaise_ would be found excellent; while some other
+tune would indicate that a fowl _à la Flamande_ was cooked to a nicety
+and needed removal from the fowl roast."
+
+To Crowest, too, I am indebted for a list of beverages and eatables
+which certain singers held in superstitious awe as capable of
+refreshing their voices. Formes swore by a pot of good porter and
+Wachtel is said to have trusted to the yolk of an egg beaten up with
+sugar to make sure of his high Cs. The Swedish tenor, Labatt, declared
+that two salted cucumbers gave the voice the true metallic ring.
+Walter drank cold black coffee during a performance; Southeim took
+snuff and cold lemonade; Steger, beer; Niemann, champagne, slightly
+warmed, (Huneker once saw Niemann drinking cocktails from a beer
+glass; he sang Siegmund at the opera the next night); Tichatschek,
+mulled claret; Rübgam drank mead; Nachbaur ate bonbons; Arabanek
+believed in Gampoldskirchner wine. Mlle. Brann-Brini took beer and
+_cafe au lait_, but she also firmly believed in champagne and would
+never dare venture the great duet in the fourth act of _Les Huguenots_
+without a bottle of Moët Crémant Rose. Giardini being asked his
+opinion of Banti, previous to her arrival in England, said: "She is
+the first singer in Italy and drinks a bottle of wine every day."
+Malibran believed in the efficacy of porter. She made her last
+appearances in opera in Balfe's _Maid of Artois_ during the fall of
+1836 in London. On the first night she was in anything but good
+physical condition and the author of "Musical Recollections of the
+Last Half-Century" tells how she pulled herself through: "She
+remembered that an immense trial awaited her in the finale of the
+third act; and finding her strength giving way, she sent for Mr. Balfe
+and Mr. Bunn, and told them that unless they did as they were bid,
+after all the previous success, the end might result in failure; but
+she said, 'Manage to let me have a pot of porter somehow or other
+before I have to sing, and I will get you an encore which will bring
+down the house.' How to manage this was difficult; for the scene was
+so set that it seemed scarcely possible to hand her up 'the pewter'
+without its being witnessed by the audience. After much consultation,
+Malibran having been assured that her wish should be fulfilled, it was
+arranged that the pot of porter should be handed up to her through a
+trap in the stage at the moment when Jules had thrown himself on her
+body, supposing that life had fled; and Mr. Templeton was drilled into
+the manner in which he should so manage to conceal the necessary
+arrangement, that the audience would never suspect what was going on.
+At the right moment a friendly hand put the foaming pewter through the
+stage, to be swallowed at a draught, and success was won!... Malibran,
+however, had not overestimated her own strength. She knew that it
+wanted but this fillip to carry her through. She had resolved to have
+an encore, and she had it, in such a fashion as made the roof of 'Old
+Drury' ring as it had never rung before. On the repetition of the
+opera and afterwards, a different arrangement of the stage was made,
+and a property calabash containing a pot of porter was used; but
+although the same result was constantly won, Malibran always said it
+was not half so 'nice,' nor did her anything like the good it would
+have done if she could only have had it out of the pewter." Clara
+Louise Kellogg in her very lively "Memoirs" publishes a similar tale
+of another singer: "It was told of Grisi that when she was growing old
+and severe exertion told on her she always, after her fall as Lucrezia
+Borgia, drank a glass of beer sent up to her through the floor, lying
+with her back half turned to the audience." Miss Kellogg complains of
+the breaths of the tenors she sang with: "Stigelli usually exhaled an
+aroma of lager beer; while the good Mazzoleni invariably ate from one
+to two pounds of cheese the day he was to sing. He said it
+strengthened his voice. Many of them affected garlic." It is
+necessary, of course, that a singer should know what foods agree with
+him. He must keep himself in excellent physical condition: small
+wonder that many artists are superstitious in this regard.
+
+Charles Santley, who was so fond of eating and drinking himself,
+offers some excellent advice on the subject in "Student and Singer":
+"How the voice is produced or where, except that it is through the
+passage of the throat, is unimportant; it is reasonable to say that
+the passage must be kept clear, otherwise the sound proceeding from it
+will not be clear. I have known many instances of singers undergoing
+very disagreeable operations on their throats for chronic diseases of
+various descriptions; now, my observation and experience assure me
+that, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, the root of the evil is
+chronic inattention to food and raiment. It is a common thing to hear
+a singer say, 'I never touch such-and-such food on the days I sing.'
+My dear young friend, unless you are an absolute idiot, you would not
+partake of anything on the days you sing which might disagree with
+you, or over-tax your digestive powers; it is on the days you do not
+sing you ought more particularly to exercise your judgment and
+self-denial. I do not offer the pinched-up pilgarlic who dines off a
+wizened apple and a crust of bread as a model for imitation; at the
+same time, I warn you seriously against following the example of the
+gobbling glutton who swallows every dish that tempts his palate."
+
+Rossini, after he had composed _Guillaume Tell_, retired. He was
+thirty-seven, a man in perfect health, and he lived thirty-nine years
+longer, to the age of seventy-six, yet he never wrote another opera,
+hardly indeed did he dip his pen in ink at all. These facts have
+seriously disconcerted his biographers, who are at a loss to assign
+reasons for his actions. W. F. Apthorp gives us an ingenious
+explanation in "The Opera Past and Present." He says that after _Tell_
+Rossini's pride would not allow him to return to his earlier Italian
+manner, while the hard work needed to produce more _Tells_ was more
+than his laziness could stomach.... Perhaps, but it must be remembered
+that Rossini did not retire to his library or his music room, but to
+his kitchen. The simple explanation is that he preferred cooking to
+composing, a fact easy to believe (I myself vastly prefer cooking to
+writing). He could cook _risotto_ better than any one else he knew. He
+was dubbed a "hippopotamus in trousers," and for six years before he
+died he could not see his toes, he was so fat. Sir Arthur Sullivan
+relates an anecdote which shows that Rossini was conscious of his
+grossness. Once in Paris Sullivan introduced Chorley to Rossini, when
+the Italian said, "_Je vois, avec plaisir, que monsieur n'a pas de
+ventre_." Chorley indeed was noticeably slender. Rossini could write
+more easily, so his biographers tell us, when he was under the
+influence of champagne or some light wine. His provision merchant once
+begged him for an autographed portrait. The composer gave it to him
+with the inscription, "To my stomach's best friend." The tradesman
+used this souvenir as an advertisement and largely increased his
+business thereby, as such a testimonial from such an acknowledged
+epicure had a very definite value. J. B. Weckerlin asserts that when
+Rossini dined at the Rothschild's he first went to the kitchen to pay
+his respects to the _chef_, to look over the menu, and even to discuss
+the various dishes, after which he ascended to the drawing room to
+greet the family of the rich banker. Mme. Alboni told Weckerlin that
+Rossini had dedicated a piece of music to the Rothschild's _chef_.
+
+Anfossi, we are informed, could compose only when he was surrounded by
+smoking fowls and Bologna sausages; their fumes seemed to inflame his
+imagination, to feed his muse; his brain was stimulated first through
+his nose and then through his stomach. When Gluck wrote music he
+betook himself to the open fields, accompanied by at least two bottles
+of champagne. Salieri told Michael Kelly that a comic opera of Gluck's
+being performed at the Elector Palatine's theatre, at Schwetzingen,
+his Electoral Highness was struck with the music, and inquired who had
+composed it; on being informed that he was an honest German who loved
+_old wine_, his Highness immediately ordered him a tun of Hock.
+Beethoven, on the contrary, seems to have fed on his thoughts
+occasionally, although there is evidence that he was not only a good
+eater but also a good cook (the mothers of both Beethoven and Schubert
+were cooks in domestic service). There is a story related of him that
+about the time he was composing the _Sixth Symphony_ he walked into a
+Viennese restaurant and ordered dinner. While it was being prepared,
+he became involved in thought, and when the waiter returned to serve
+him, he said: "Thank you, I have dined!" laid the price of the dinner
+on the table, and took his departure. Grétry, too, lost his appetite
+when he was composing. There are numerous references to eating and
+drinking in Mendelssohn's letters. His particular preferences,
+according to Sir George Grove, were for rice milk and cherry pie.
+Dussek was a famous eater, and it is said that his ruling passion
+eventually killed him. His patron, the Prince of Benevento, paid the
+composer eight hundred napoleons a year, with a free table for three
+persons, at which, as a matter of fact, one person usually presided. A
+musical historian tells us that in the summer of 1797 he was dining
+with three friends at the Ship Tavern in Greenwich, when the waiter
+came and laid a cloth for one person at the next table, placing
+thereon a dish of boiled eels, one of fried flounders, a bowled fowl,
+a dish of veal cutlets, and a couple of tarts. Then Dussek entered and
+made away with the lot, leaving but the bones! In W. T. Parke's
+"Musical Memoirs" justice is done to the appetite of one C. F.
+Baumgarten, for many years leader of the band and composer at Covent
+Garden Theatre. Once at supper after the play he and a friend ate a
+full-grown hare between them. He would never condescend to drink out
+of anything but a quart pot. On one occasion, at the request of his
+friends, Baumgarten was weighed before and after dinner. There was
+eight pounds difference! William Shield, the composer who wrote many
+operas for Covent Garden Theatre, beginning aptly enough with one
+called _The Flitch of Bacon_, was something of an eater. Parke tells
+how at a dinner one evening there was a brace of partridges. The
+hostess handed Shield one of these to carve and absent-mindedly he set
+to and finished it, while the other guests were forced to make shift
+with the other partridge. Handel was a great eater. He was called the
+"Saxon Giant," as a tribute to his genius, but the phrase might have
+had a satirical reference to his enormous bulk. Intending to dine one
+day at a certain tavern, he ordered beforehand a dinner for three. At
+the hour appointed he sat down to the table and expressed astonishment
+that the dinner was not brought up. The waiter explained that he would
+begin serving when the company arrived. "Den pring up de tinner
+brestissimo," replied Handel, "I am de gombany." Lulli never forsook
+the _casserole_. Paganini was as good a cook as he was a violinist.
+Parke tells a story of Weichsell, not too celebrated a musician, but
+the father of Mrs. Billington and Charles Weichsell, the violinist:
+"He would occasionally supersede the labours of his cook, and pass a
+whole day in preparing his favourite dish, rump-steaks, for the
+stewing pan; and after the delicious viand had been placed on the
+dinner-table, together with early green peas of high price, if it
+happened that the sauce was not to his liking he has been known to
+throw rump-steaks, and green peas, and all, out of the window, whilst
+his wife and children thought themselves fortunate in not being thrown
+after them."
+
+Is there a cooking theme in _Siegfried_ to describe Mime's brewing?
+Lavignac and others, who have listed the _Ring motive_, have neglected
+to catalogue it, but it is mentioned by Old Fogy. Practically a whole
+act is taken up in _Louise_ with the preparation for and consumption
+of a dinner. Scarpia eats in _Tosca_ and the heroine kills him with a
+table knife. There is much talk of food in _Hänsel und Gretel_ and
+there is a supper in _The Merry Wives of Windsor_. There are drinking
+songs in _Don Giovanni_, _Lucrezia Borgia_, _Hamlet_, _La Traviata_,
+_Giroflé-Girofla_.... The reference to whiskey and soda in _Madama
+Butterfly_ is celebrated. J. E. Cox, the author of "Musical
+Recollections," describes Herr Pischek in the supper scene of _Don
+Giovanni_ as "out-heroding Herod by swallowing glass after glass of
+champagne like a sot, and gnawing the drumstick of a fowl, which he
+held across his mouth with his fingers, just as any of his own
+middle-class countrymen may be seen any day of the week all the year
+round at the _mit-tag_ or _abend-essen_ feeding at one of their
+largely frequented _tables-d'hôte_." Eating or drinking on the stage
+is always fraught with danger, as Charles Santley once discovered
+during Papageno's supper scene in _The Magic Flute_: "The supper which
+Tamino commands for the hungry Papageno consisted of pasteboard
+imitations of good things, but the cup contained real wine, a small
+draught of which I found refreshing on a hot night in July, amid the
+dust and heat of the stage. On the occasion in question I was putting
+the cup to lips, when I heard somebody call to me from the wings; I
+felt very angry at the interruption, and was just about to swallow the
+wine when I heard an anxious call not to drink. Suspecting something
+was wrong, I pretended to drink, and deposited the cup on the table.
+Immediately after the scene I made inquiries about the reason for the
+caution I received, and was informed that as each night the
+carpenters, who had no right to it, finished what remained of the wine
+before the property men, whose perquisite it was, could lay hold of
+the cup, the latter, to give their despoilers a lesson, had mingled
+castor-oil with my drink!"
+
+A young husband of my acquaintance once bemoaned to me the fact that
+his wife seemed destined to become a great singer. "She is such a
+remarkable cook!" he explained to account for his despondency. I
+reassured him: "She will cook with renewed energy when she begins to
+sing _Sieglinde_ and _Tosca_.... She will practise _Vissi d'Arte_ over
+the gumbo soup and _Du herstes Wunder_! while the Frankfurters are
+sizzling. Her trills, her chromatic scales, and her _messa di voce_
+will come right in the kitchen; she will equalize her scale and learn
+to breathe correctly bending over the oven. It is even likely that she
+will improve her knowledge of _portamento_ while she is washing
+dishes. When she can prepare a succulent roast suckling pig she will
+be able to sing _Ocean, thou mighty monster_! and she will understand
+_Abscheulicher_ when she understands the mysteries of old-fashioned
+strawberry shortcake. If you hear her shrieking _Suicidio_! invoking
+Agamemnon, or appealing to the _Casta Diva_ among the kettles and pots
+be not alarmed.... For the love you bear of good food, man, do not
+discourage your wife's ambition. The more she loves to sing, the
+better she will cook!"
+
+  _July 17, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+An Interrupted Conversation
+
+    _"We can never depend upon any right adjustment of emotion to
+    circumstance."_
+
+                        Max Beerbohm.
+
+
+
+
+An Interrupted Conversation
+
+
+Ordinarily one does not learn things about oneself from Edmund Gosse,
+but my discovery that I am a Pyrrhonist is due to that literary man. A
+Pyrrhonist, says Mr. Gosse, is "one who doubts whether it is worth
+while to struggle against the trend of things. The man who continues
+to cross the road leisurely, although the cyclists' bells are ringing,
+is a Pyrrhonist--and in a very special sense, for the ancient
+philosopher who gives his name to the class made himself conspicuous
+by refusing to get out of the way of careering chariots." Now the most
+unfamiliar friend I have ever walked with knows my extreme impassivity
+at the corners of streets, remembers the careless attitude with which
+I saunter from kerb to kerb, whether it be across the Grand Boulevard,
+Piccadilly, or Fifth Avenue. Only once has this nonchalant defiance of
+traffic caused me to come to even temporary grief; that was on the
+last night of the year 1913, when, in crossing Broadway, I became
+entangled, God knows how, in the wheels of a swiftly passing vehicle,
+and found myself, top hat and all, in the most ignominious position
+before I was well aware of what had really happened. Then a policeman
+stooped over me, book and pencil in hand, and another held the
+chauffeur of the victorious taxi-cab at bay some yards further up the
+street. But I was not hurt and I waved them all away with a
+magnanimous gesture.... It is owing to this habit of mine that I often
+make interesting _rencontres_ in the middle of streets. It accounts,
+in fact, for my running, quite absent-mindedly, plump into Dickinson
+Sitgreaves, who is more American than his name sounds, one August day
+in Paris.
+
+It was one of those charming days which make August perhaps the most
+delightful month to spend in Paris, although the facts are not known
+to tourists. Many a sly French pair, however, bored with Trouville, or
+the season at Aix, take advantage of the allurements of a Paris August
+to return surreptitiously to the boulevards. On this particular day
+almost all the seduction of an October day was in the air, a splendid
+dull warm-cool crispness, which filtered down through the faded
+chestnut leaves from the sunlight, and left pale splotches of purple
+and orange on the _trottoirs_ ... a really marvellous day, which I was
+spending in that most excellent occupation in Paris of gazing into
+shops and, passing cafés, staring into the faces of those who sat on
+the _terrasses_.... But this is an occupation for one alone; so, when
+I met Sitgreaves, we joined a _terrasse_ ourselves. We were near the
+Napolitain and there he and I sat down and began to talk as only we
+two can talk together after long separation. He explained in the
+beginning how I had interrupted him.... There was a _fille_, some
+little Polish beauty who had captivated his senses a day or so before,
+brought to him quite by accident in an hotel where the _patron_
+furnished his clients with such pleasure as the town and his address
+book afforded.... I knew the _patron_ myself, a fluent, amusing sort
+of person, who had been a _cuirassier_ and who resembled Mayol ... a
+_café-concert_ proprietor of an hotel.... It was his boast that he had
+never disappointed a client and it is certain that he would promise
+anything. Some have said that his stock in trade was one pretty girl,
+who assumed costumes, ages, hair, and accents, to please whatever
+demand was made upon her, but this I do not believe. There must have
+been at least two of them. The Grand Duchess Anastasia, it was
+rumoured, had dined with Marcel at one time, in his little hotel, and
+certainly one king had been seen to go there, and one member of the
+English royal family, but Marcel remained simple and obliging.
+
+"When will you look up the little _Polonaise_?" I asked, as we sipped
+_Amer Picon_ and stared with fresh interest at each new boot and ankle
+that passed. Paris in August is like another place in May.
+
+"Why don't you come along?" queried Sitgreaves in reply, "and we could
+go at once.... Oh, I know that you are in no mood for pleasure. You
+see the point is that I shall have to wait. Marcel will have to send
+for the _fille_. It is a bore to wait in a room with red curtains and
+a picture of _Amour et Psyche_ on the walls.... What have you been
+doing?" He paid the _consommation_ and started to leave without
+waiting for a reply, because he knew of my complaisance. I rose with
+him and we walked down the boulevard.
+
+"What is there to do in Paris in August but to enjoy oneself?" I
+asked. "I have made friends with an _apache_ and his _gigolette_. We
+eat bread and cheese and drink bad wine on the fortifications.... In
+the afternoon I walk. Sometimes I go to the Luxembourg gardens to hear
+the band bray sad music, or to watch the little boys play _diavolo_,
+or sail their tiny boats about the fountain pond; sometimes I walk
+quite silently up the Avenue Gabriel, with its _triste_ line of trees,
+and dream that I am a Grand Duke; in the evening there are again the
+_terrasses_ of the cafés, dinner in Montmartre at the Clou, or the
+Cou-Cou, a _revue_ at La Cigale, but it is all governed, my day and my
+night, by what happens and by whom I meet.... Have you seen Jacques
+Blanche's portrait of Nijinsky?"
+
+"I think it is Picasso that interests me now," Sitgreaves was saying.
+"He puts wood and pieces of paper into his composition; architecture,
+that's what it is.... I don't go to Blanche's any more. It's too
+delightfully perfect, the atmosphere there.... The books are by all
+the famous writers, and they are all dedicated to Blanche; the
+pictures are all of the great men of today, and they are all painted
+by Blanche; the music is played by the best musicians.... Do you know,
+I think Blanche is the one man who has made a successful profession of
+being an amateur--unless one excepts Robert de la Condamine.... You
+can scarcely call a man who does so much a dilettante. Yes, I think he
+is an amateur in the best sense."
+
+"I met the Countess of Jena there the other day," I responded. "She
+had scarcely left the room before three people volunteered, _sans
+rancune_, to tell her story. She is a devout Catholic, and her husband
+contrived in some way to substitute a spy for the priest in the
+confessional. He acquired an infinite amount of information, but it
+didn't do him any good. She is so witty that every one invites her
+everywhere in spite of her reputation, and he is left to dine alone at
+the Meurice. Dull men simply are not tolerated in Paris.
+
+"It was at Blanche's last year that I met George Moore," I continued.
+"You know I have just seen him in London. He is at work on _The
+Apostle_, making a novel of it, to be called 'The Brook Kerith.'...
+For a time he thought of finishing it up as a play because a novel
+meant a visit to Palestine and that was distasteful to him, but it
+finally became a novel. He went to Palestine and stayed six weeks,
+just long enough to find a monastery and to study the lay of the
+country. For he says, truly enough, that one cannot imagine
+landscapes; one does not know whether there is a high or low horizon.
+There may be a brook which all the characters must cross. It is
+necessary to see these things. Besides he had to find a monastery....
+He told me of his thrill when he discovered an order of monks living
+on a narrow ledge of cliff, with 500 feet sheer rise and descent above
+and below it ... and when he had found this his work was done and he
+returned to England to write the book, a reaction, for he told me that
+he was getting tired of being personal in literature. The book will
+exhibit a conflict between two types: Christ, the disappointed mystic,
+and Paul; Christ, who sees that there is no good to be served in
+saving the world by his death, and Paul, full of hope, idealism, and
+illusions. It is the drama of the conflict between the nature which is
+affected by externals and that which is not, he told me."
+
+"It's a subject for Anatole France," said Sitgreaves. "Moore, in my
+opinion, is not a novelist. His great achievements are his memoirs. I
+was interested in 'Evelyn Innes' and 'Esther Waters,' but something
+was lacking. There is nothing lacking in the three volumes of 'Hail
+and Farewell.' They grow in interest. Moore has found his _métier_."
+
+"But he insists," I explained, before the door of the little hotel,
+"that 'Hail and Farewell' is a novel. He is infuriated when some one
+suggests that it is a book after the manner of, say, 'The
+Reminiscences of Lady Randolph Churchill.'..."
+
+We entered and walked up the little staircase.
+
+"Do you mean that the incidents are untrue?"
+
+We were at the door of the _concierge_ and there stood Marcel, his
+apron spread neatly over his ample paunch. It was early in the
+afternoon and the room beyond him, sometimes filled with possibilities
+for customers, was empty.
+
+"_Ah, monsieur est revenu!_" he exclaimed in his piping voice. "_C'est
+pour la petite Polonaise sans doute que monsieur revient?_"
+
+"_Oui_," answered Sitgreaves, "_faut-il attendre longtemps?_"
+
+"_Mais non, monsieur, un petit moment. Elle habite en face. Je vais
+envoyer le garçon la chercher tout de suite. Et pour monsieur, votre
+ami?_"
+
+"_Je ne desire rien_," I replied.
+
+Marcel bowed humbly.... "_Comme monsieur voudra._" Then a doubt
+assailed him. "_Peut-être que la petite Polonaise vous suffira à tous
+les deux?_"
+
+"_Jamais de la vie!_" I shouted, "_Flûte, Mercure, allez! Je suis
+puceau!_"
+
+Marcel was equal to this. "_Et ta soeur?_" he demanded as he
+disappeared down the staircase.
+
+He had put us meanwhile in the very chamber with the red curtains and
+the picture of Cupid and Psyche that Sitgreaves had described. Perhaps
+all the rooms were similarly decorated. I lounged on the bed while
+Sitgreaves sat on a chair and smoked....
+
+I answered his last question, "No, they are true, but there is
+selection and form."
+
+"While other memoirs have neither selection nor form and usually are
+not altogether accurate in the bargain...."
+
+"Especially Madame Melba's...."
+
+"Especially," agreed Sitgreaves delightedly, "Madame Melba's."
+
+"Moore is really right," I went on. "He says that some people insist
+that Balzac was greater than Turgeniev, because the Frenchman took his
+characters from imagination, the Russian his from life. You will
+remember, however, that Edgar Saltus says, 'The manufacture of fiction
+from facts was begun by Balzac.' Moore's point is that all great
+writers write from observation. There is no other way. A character may
+have more or less resemblance to the original; it may be derived and
+bear a different name; still there must have been something.... In a
+letter which Moore once wrote me stands the phrase, 'Memory is the
+mother of the Muses.' 'Hail and Farewell' is just as much a work of
+imagination, according to Moore, as 'A Nest of Noblemen' or 'Les
+Illusions Perdues.'"
+
+"Of course," admitted Sitgreaves. "No writer but what has suffered
+from the recognition of his characters. Dickens got into trouble.
+Oscar Wilde is said to have done himself in 'Dorian Gray,' and
+Meredith's models for 'The Tragic Comedians' and 'Diana of the
+Crossways' are well known."
+
+"All Moore has done is to call his characters by their real names and
+he has reported their conversations as he remembered them, but, mind
+you, he has not put into the book all their conversations, or even all
+the people he knew at that period. Arthur Symons, for instance, a
+great friend of Moore's at that time, is scarcely mentioned, and with
+reason: he has no part in the form of the book; its plot is not
+concerned with him.
+
+"All artists create only in the image of the things they have seen,
+reduced to terms of art through their imagination. The paintings of
+Mina Loy seem to the beholder the strange creations of a vagrant
+fancy. I remember one picture of hers in which an Indian girl stands
+poised before an oriental palace, the most fantastic of palaces, it
+would seem. But the artist explained to me that it was simply the
+façade of Hagenbeck's menagerie in Hamburg, seen with an imaginative
+eye. The girl was a model.... One day on the beach at the Lido she saw
+a young man in a bathing suit lying stretched on the sand with his
+head in the lap of a beautiful woman. Other women surrounded the two.
+The group immediately suggested a composition to her. She went home
+and painted. She took the young man's bathing suit off and gave him
+wings; the women she dressed in lovely floating robes, and she called
+the picture, _l'Amour Dorloté par les Belles Dames_.
+
+"And once I asked Frank Harris to explain to me the origin of his
+vivid story, 'Montes the Matador.' 'It's too simple,' he said, 'the
+model for Montes was a little Mexican greaser whom I met in Kansas. He
+was one of many in charge of cattle shipped up from Mexico and down
+from the States. All the white cattle men, the gringos, held him in
+great contempt. But,' continued Harris, speaking deliberately with his
+beautifully modulated voice, and his eyes twinkling with the memory of
+the thing, 'I soon found that the greaser's contempt for the gringos
+was immeasureably greater than their's for him. "Bah," he would say,
+"they know nothing." And it was so. He could go into a cattle car on a
+pitch dark night and make the bulls stand up, a feat that none of the
+white men would have attempted. I asked him how he did this and he
+told me the answer in three words, "I know them." He could go into a
+herd of cattle just let loose together and pick out their leader
+immediately, pick him out before the cattle themselves had! There was
+the origin of "Montes the Matador." He was named, of course, after
+the famous _torero_ described by Gautier in his "Voyage en Espagne."
+When I was in Madrid sometime later I went to a number of bull-fights
+before I put the story together.' 'But,' I asked Harris, 'Is it
+possible for an _espada_ to stand in the bull ring with his back to
+the bull, during a charge, as you have made him do frequently in the
+story?' 'Of course not,' he answered me at once, smiling his frankly
+malevolent smile, 'Of course not. That part was put in to show how
+much the public will stand for in a work of fiction. I believe one of
+the _espadas_ tried it some time after the book appeared and was
+immediately killed.'
+
+"Fiction, history, poetry, criticism, at their best, are all the same
+thing. When they inflame the imagination and stir the pulse they are
+identical: all creative work. It does not matter what a man writes
+about. It matters how he writes it. Subject is nothing. Should we
+regard Velasquez as less important than Murillo because the former
+painted portraits of contemporaries, whom in his fashion he
+criticized, while the Spanish Bouguereau disguised his models as the
+Virgin? Walter Pater's description of the _Monna Lisa_ would live if
+the picture disappeared. Indeed it has created a factitious interest
+in da Vinci's masterwork. Even more might be said for Huysmans's
+description of Moreau's _Salomé_, which actually puts the figures in
+the picture in motion! The critic, the historian at their best are
+creative artists as the writers of fiction are creative artists.
+Should we regard, for example, 'Imperial Purple' less a work of
+creative art than 'The Rise of Silas Lapham'?"
+
+"I am getting your meaning more and more," said Sitgreaves. "And it
+occurs to me that perhaps I have been unjust in rating Moore low as a
+novelist. Perhaps I should have said that he is more successful in
+those books which depend more on his memory and less on his
+imaginative instinct. He cannot, after all, have known Jesus and
+Paul...."
+
+"You are quite wrong," I said. "At least from his point of view. He
+says that he knows Paul better than he has ever known any one else. He
+even finds hair on Paul's chest. He can describe Paul, I believe, to
+the last mole. He knows his favourite colours, and whether he prefers
+artichokes to alligator pears. As for Christ, everybody professes to
+know Christ these days. Since the world has become distinctly
+un-Christian it has become comparatively easy to discuss Christ. He
+is regarded as an historical character, and a much more simple one
+than Napoleon. I have heard anarchists in bar-rooms talk about him by
+the hour, sometimes very graphically and always with a certain amount
+of wit. No, it is all the same.... Moore, now that he has been to
+Palestine and read the gospels, feels as well acquainted with Christ
+and Paul as he does with Edward Martyn and Yeats and Lady Gregory."
+
+"I must fall back on the personal then," said Sitgreaves, now really
+at bay, "and say that I am less moved and interested when Moore is
+describing Evelyn Innes, than when he tells of his affair with Doris
+at Orelay."
+
+"I am glad that you mentioned 'Evelyn Innes' again," I said, "because
+it is in this very book that he is said to have painted so many of his
+friends. Ulick Dean is undoubtedly Yeats. It has been suggested that
+Arnold Dolmetsch posed for the portrait of Evelyn's father.
+Dolmetsch's testimony on this point goes farther. He says that he
+dictated certain passages in the book...."
+
+"What is it, then? What is the difference? There is some difference,
+of that I am sure...."
+
+"The difference is--" I began when the door opened and Marcel entered,
+the most amazingly comprehensive smile on his countenance.
+"_Mademoiselle vous attend_," he said, and he looked the question.
+"Shall I bring her in here?"
+
+Sitgreaves answered it immediately, "_Je viens_." And then to me,
+"Wait," as he vanished through the doorway.... I walked to the window,
+drew aside the red curtains, and looked out into the fountain-splashed
+court below....
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"What is the difference?"
+
+"I suppose it is that you prefer the new Moore to the old Moore, the
+author of the later and better written books to the author of the
+earlier ones. 'Evelyn Innes' was many times rewritten. Moore has said
+that he could never get it to suit him, but he has also said,
+recently, that he would never rewrite another book (a resolution he
+has not kept). 'Memoirs of My Dead Life' and 'Hail and Farewell' do
+not need rewriting. They are written to stand. 'The Brook Kerith,'
+perhaps, you will find equally to your taste. It will be the newest
+Moore...."
+
+"You have explained to me," said Sitgreaves, "the difference: it is
+one of development. Now that I think of it I don't believe that
+Anatole France could write 'The Brook Kerith.'... It would be too
+symbolical, too cynical, in his hands. Moore will perhaps make it
+more human, by knowing the characters. I wonder," he continued
+musingly, as we left the room, and descended the stairs, "if he told
+you whether that hair on Paul's chest was red or black...."
+
+  _February 1, 1915._
+
+
+
+
+The Authoritative Work on
+American Music
+
+
+
+
+The Authoritative Work on American Music
+
+
+H. L. Mencken pointed out to me recently, in his most earnest and
+persuasive manner, that it was my duty to write a book about the
+American composers, exposing their futile pretensions and describing
+their flaccid _opera_, stave by stave. It was in vain that I urged
+that this would be but a sleeveless errand, arguing that I could not
+fight men of straw, that these our composers had no real standing in
+the concert halls, and that pushing them over would be an easy
+exercise for a child of ten. On the contrary, he retorted, they
+belonged to the academies; certain people believed that they were
+important; it was necessary to dislodge this belief. I suggested, with
+a not too heavily assumed humility, that I had already done something
+of the sort in an essay entitled "The Great American Composer." "A
+good beginning," asserted Col. Mencken, "but not long enough. I won't
+be satisfied with anything less than a book." "But if I wrote a book
+about Professors Parker, Chadwick, Hadley, and the others I could find
+nothing different to say about them; they are all alike. Neither
+their lives nor their music offer opportunities for variations." "An
+excellent idea!" cried Major Mencken, enthusiastically, "Write one
+chapter and then repeat it verbatim throughout the book, changing only
+the name of the principal character. Then clap on a preface,
+explaining your reason for this procedure." My last protest was the
+feeblest of all: "I can't spend a year or a month or a week poring
+over the scores of these fellows; I can't go to concerts to hear their
+music. I might as well go to work in a coal mine." "I'll do it for
+you!" triumphantly checkmated General Mencken. "I'll read the scores
+and you shall write the book!" And so he left me, as on a similar
+occasion the fiend, having exhibited his prospectus, vanished from the
+eyes of our Lord. And I returned to my home sorely troubled, finding
+that the words of the man were running about in my head like so many
+little Japanese waltzing mice.
+
+And, after much cogitation, I went to such and such a book case and
+took down a certain volume written by Louis Charles Elson (a very
+large red tome) and another by Rupert Hughes, to see if their words of
+praise for our weak musical brothers would stir me to action. I found
+that they did not. My heart action remained normal; no film covered
+my eyes; foam did not issue from my mouth. Indeed I read, quite
+calmly, in Mr. Hughes's "American Composers" that A. J. Goodrich is
+"recognized among scholars abroad as one of the leading spirits of our
+time"; that "(Henry Holden) Huss has ransacked the piano and pillaged
+almost every imaginable fabric of high colour.... The result is
+gorgeous and purple"; that "The thing we are all waiting for is that
+American grand opera, _The Woman of Marblehead_ (by Louis Adolphe
+Coerne). It is predicted that it will not receive the marble heart";
+that "I know of no modern composer who has come nearer to relighting
+the fires that burn in the old gavottes and fugues and preludes (than
+Arthur Foote). His two gavottes are to me away the best since Bach";
+that "the song (_Israfel_ by Edgar Stillman-Kelley) is in my fervent
+belief, a masterwork of absolute genius, one of the very greatest
+lyrics in the world's music"; and in "The History of American Music"
+by Louis C. Elson that "Music has made even more rapid strides than
+literature among us," and that "he (George W. Chadwick) has reconciled
+the symmetrical (sonata) form with modern passion." But it was in the
+fourth volume of "The Art of Music," published by the National Society
+of Music, that I found the supreme examples of this kind of writing.
+The volume was edited by Arthur Farwell and W. Dermot Darby. Therein I
+read with a sort of awed astonishment that one of the songs of
+Frederick Ayres "reveals a poignancy of imagination and a perception
+and apprehension of beauty seldom attained by any composer." I learned
+that T. Carl Whitmer has a "spiritual kinship" with Arthur Shepherd,
+Hans Pfitzner, and Vincent d'Indy. His music is "psychologically
+subtle and spiritually rarefied: in colour it corresponds to the
+violet end of the spectrum." I turned the pages until I came to the
+name of Miss Gena Branscombe: "Inexhaustible buoyancy, a superlative
+emotional wealth, and wholly singular gift of musical intuition are
+the qualities which have shaped the composer's musical personality
+(without much effort of the imagination we might say that they are the
+qualities that shaped Beethoven's musical personality).... Her
+impatient melodies leap and dash with youthful life, while her
+accompaniments abound in harmonic hairbreadth escapes." Before he
+became acquainted with the later French idiom Harvey W. Loomis
+"spontaneously breathed forth the quality of spirit which we now
+recognize in a Debussy or a Ravel."
+
+Curiously enough, however, these statements did not annoy me. I found
+no desire arising in me to deny them and doubtless, though mayhap with
+a guilty conscience, I should have ditched the undertaking, consigned
+it to that heap of undone duties, where already lie notes on a
+comparison of Andalusian mules with the mules of Liane de Pougy, a few
+scribbled memoranda for a treatise on the love habits of the mole, and
+a half-finished biography of the talented gentleman who signed his
+works, "Nick Carter," if my by this time quite roving eye had not
+alighted, entirely fortuitously, on one of the forgotten glories of my
+library, a slender volume entitled "Popular American Composers."
+
+I recalled how I had bought this book. Happening into a modest
+second-hand bookshop on lower Third Avenue, maintained chiefly for the
+laudable purpose of redistributing paper novels of the Seaside and
+kindred libraries, of which, alas, we hear very little nowadays, I
+asked the proprietor if by chance he possessed any literature relating
+to the art of music. By way of answer, he retired to the very back of
+his little room, searched for a space in a litter on the floor, and
+then returned with a pile of nine volumes or so in his arms. The
+titles, such as "Great Violinists," "Harmony in Thirteen Lessons,"
+and "How to Sing," did not intrigue me, but in idly turning the pages
+of this "Popular American Composers" I came across a half-tone
+reproduction of a photograph of Paul Dresser, the only less celebrated
+brother of Theodore Dreiser, with a short biography of the composer of
+_On the Banks of the Wabash_. As Sir George Grove in his excellent
+dictionary neglected to mention this portentous name in American Art
+and Letters (although he devoted sixty-seven pages, printed in double
+columns, to Mendelssohn) I saw the advantage of adding the little book
+to my collection. The bookseller, when questioned, offered to
+relinquish the volume for a total of fifteen cents, and I carried it
+away with me. Once I had become more thoroughly acquainted with its
+pages I realized that I would willingly have paid fifteen dollars for
+it.
+
+This book, indeed, cannot fail to delight General Mencken. There is no
+reference in its pages to Edgar Stillman-Kelley, Miss Gena Branscombe,
+Louis Adolphe Coerne, Henry Holden Huss, T. Carl Whitmer, Arthur
+Farwell, Arthur Foote, or A. J. Goodrich. In fact, if we overlook
+brief notices of John Philip Sousa, Harry von Tilzer, Paul Dresser,
+Charles K. Harris, and Hattie Starr (whom you will immediately recall
+as the composer of _Little Alabama Coon_), the author, Frank L.
+Boyden, has not hesitated to go to the roots of his subject, pushing
+aside the college professors and their dictums, and has turned his
+attention to figures in the art life of America, from whom, Mencken
+himself, I feel sure, would not take a single paragraph of praise, so
+richly is it deserved. I am unfamiliar with the causes contributing to
+this book's comparative obscurity; perhaps, indeed, they are similar
+to those responsible for the early failure of "Sister Carrie." May not
+we even suspect that the odium cast by the Doubledays on the author of
+that romance might have been actively transferred in some degree to a
+work which contained a biographical notice and a picture of his
+brother? At any rate, "Popular American Composers," published in 1902,
+fell into undeserved oblivion and so I make no apology for inviting my
+readers to peruse its pages with me.
+
+Opening the book, then, at random, I discover on page 96 a biography
+of Lottie A. Kellow (her photograph graces the reverse of this page).
+In a few well-chosen words (almost indeed in "gipsy phrases") Mr.
+Boyden gives us the salient details of her career. Mrs. Kellow is a
+resident of Cresco, Iowa, a church singer of note, and the possessor
+of a contralto voice of great volume. As a composer she has to her
+credit "marches, cakewalks, schottisches, and other styles of
+instrumental music." We are given a picture of Mrs. Kellow at work:
+"Mrs. Kellow's best efforts are made in the evening, and in darkness,
+save the light of the moonbeams on the keys of her piano." We are also
+told that "she is happy in her inspirations and a sincere lover of
+music. All of her compositions show a decided talent and possess
+musical elements which are only to be found in the works of an artist.
+Mrs. Kellow's musical friends are confident of her success as a
+composer and predict for her a brilliant future."
+
+Let us turn to the somewhat more extensive biography of W. T. Mullin
+on Page 4 (his photograph faces this page). Almost in the first line
+the author rewards our attention: "To him may be applied the simplest
+and grandest eulogy Shakespeare ever pronounced: 'He was a man.'" We
+are also informed that he was born of a cultured family, that his
+inherited nobility of character has been carefully fostered by a
+thorough education, and told that one finds in him the unusual
+combination of genius wedded to sound common sense and practical
+business capacity. His family moved to Colorado, Texas, while he was
+still a lad and here his musical talent began to display itself. "The
+inventive faculties of the small boy, and the innate harmony of the
+musician, combined to improvise a crude instrument which emitted the
+notes of the scale. Successful at drawing forth a concord of sweet
+sounds, he continued to experiment upon everything which would emit
+musical vibrations. (Even the pigs, I take it, did not escape.) He
+consequently discovered the laws of vibrating chords before he had
+mastered the intricacies of the multiplication table. Yet strange as
+it may seem, his musical education was neglected. A four months'
+course in piano instruction was interrupted and then resumed for two
+months more. Upon this meagre foundation rested his subsequent
+phenomenal progress." I pause to point out to the astonished and
+breathless reader that even Mozart and Schubert, infant prodigies that
+they were, received more training than this.
+
+I continue to quote: "At the age of thirteen he joined The Colorado
+(Texas) Cornet Band as a charter member. The youngest member of the
+band, he soon outstripped his comrades by virtue of his superior
+natural ability. His position was that of second tenor. Wearying of
+the monotony of playing, he determined to venture on solo work. The
+boy felt the impetus of restless power and the following incident
+illustrates his remarkable originality. Taking the piano score of a
+favourite melody he transposed it within the compass of the second
+tenor. This feat evoked admiring applause because of his extreme youth
+and untrained abilities. The band-master remarked that elderly and
+experienced heads could hardly have accomplished this.
+
+"From boyhood to manhood he has remained with the Colorado (Texas)
+band as one of its most efficient members, composing in his leisure
+moments, marches, ragtimes, waltzes, song and dance schottisches, etc.
+Of his many meritorious compositions only one has so far been given to
+the public:--_The West Texas Fair March_, composed for and dedicated
+to the management of the West Texas Fair and Round-up. This
+institution holds its annual meetings at Abilene, Texas. There the
+march was played for the first time at their October, 1899, meet with
+great success, and again at their September, 1900, meet by the
+Stockman band of Colorado, Texas, which has furnished music for the
+West Texas Fair during their 1899 and 1900 meetings. Mr. Mullin's
+position in the Stockman band is that of euphonium soloist. He is a
+proficient performer upon all band instruments from cornet to tuba,
+including slide trombone, his favourites being the baritone and the
+trombone.
+
+"He plays many stringed instruments, as well as the piano and organ.
+He is the proud possessor of a genuine Stradivarius violin--a family
+heirloom--which he naturally prizes beyond the intrinsic value. The
+feat of playing on several instruments at once presents no difficulty
+to him.
+
+"This briefly sketches Mr. Mullin's life, character and ability as a
+musician. His accompanying photograph reveals his superb physique.
+Personally he possesses charming, agreeable manners and Chesterfieldan
+courteousness, which vastly contributes to his popularity. Sincere
+devotion to his art has been rewarded by that elevating nobility of
+soul, which alone can penetrate the blue expanse of space and revel in
+the music of the spheres."
+
+What more is there to say? I can only assure the reader that Mullin
+stands unique among all musicians, creative and interpretative, in
+being able to play the organ, many stringed instruments, and all the
+instruments in a brass band (several of them simultaneously; it would
+be interesting to know which and how) after studying the piano for six
+months. I sincerely hope that the mistake he made in withholding all
+his compositions, save one, from the public, has been rectified.
+
+Helen Kelsey Fox, like so many of our talented men and women, has a
+European strain in her blood. She is a lineal descendant on her
+mother's side of a French nobleman and a German princess. Nevertheless
+she continues to reside in Vermilion, Ohio. She is of a "decided
+poetic nature and lives in an atmosphere of her own. She dwells in a
+world of thought peopled by the creations of an active and lyric
+mentality." She is so imbued with the poetic spark that, as she
+expresses it, she "speaks in rhyme half the time."
+
+John Z. Macdonald, strictly speaking, is not an American composer. He
+was born in Scotland and came to America in 1881 at the age of 21, but
+as he is one of the very few composers since Nero to enter public
+political life he well deserves a place in this collection. In 1890 he
+was elected city clerk of Brazil, Indiana, a position which he held
+for seven years. In 1898 he was elected treasurer of Clay County,
+Indiana. This county is democratic "by between five and six hundred"
+but Mr. Macdonald was elected on the republican ticket by a majority
+of 133. He was the only republican elected. Among the best known of
+Mr. Macdonald's compositions is his famous "expansion" song, in which
+he predicted the fate of Aguinaldo. He has autograph letters, praising
+this song, from the late President McKinley, Col. Roosevelt, General
+Harrison, Admiral Schley, John Philip Sousa and other "eminent
+gentlemen."
+
+Edward Dyer, born in Washington, was the son of a marble cutter who
+"helped to erect the U. S. Treasury, Patent Office, and Capitol.... In
+the majority of his compositions there is a tinge of sadness which
+appeals to his auditors.... Mr. Dyer never descends to coarseness or
+vulgarity in his productions; he writes pure, clean words, something
+that can be sung in the home, school and on the stage to refined
+respectable people."
+
+We learn much of the study years of Mrs. Lucy L. Taggart: "From
+earliest childhood she received valuable musical instruction from her
+father (Mr. Longsdon) who, coming from England in 1835, purchased the
+first piano that came to Chicago, an elegant hand-carved instrument
+that is still treasured in the old home." Later "she studied under
+Prof. C. E. Brown, of Owego, N. Y., Prof. Heimburger, of San Francisco
+and Herr Chas. Goffrie. Mrs. Taggart was also for five years a pupil
+of Senor Arevalo, the famous guitar soloist of Los Angeles.... Mrs.
+Taggart has in preparation (1902) _Methought He Touched the Strings_,
+an idyl for piano in memory of the late Senor M. S. Arevalo."
+
+David Weidley, born in Philadelphia, is the composer of the following
+songs, _Old Spooney Spooppalay_, _Jennie Ree_, _Autumn Leaves_,
+_Hannah Glue_, and _Uncle Reuben and Aunt Lucinda_. "He has done much
+to create and elevate a taste for music in the community where he
+resides and where he is known as 'Dave.' Even the little children call
+him 'Dave' as freely and innocently as those who have known him for
+years, and there can be no greater compliment for any man than that he
+is known and loved by the children. Mr. Weidley is by profession a
+sheet metal worker. He is a P. G. of the I. O. O. F., and a P. C. in
+the Knights of Pythias. He is not identified with any church, but
+loves and serves his fellow-men."
+
+In the biography of Delmer G. Palmer we are assured that "Versatility
+is a trait with which musical composers are not excessively burdened.
+There are few performers who can include _The Moonlight Sonata_ and
+Schubert's _Serenade_ with selections from _The Merry-go-round_, and
+do justice to the expression of each, much less would such
+adaptability be looked for among composers. As most rules have
+exceptions, in this there is one who stands in a class occupied by no
+one else, Mr. Delmer G. Palmer, the 'Green Mountain Composer,' who at
+present resides in Kansas City.
+
+"As recently as 1899 Mr. Palmer wrote a song in the popular 'ragtime,'
+_My Sweetheart is a Midnight Coon_ and almost in the same breath also
+wrote the heavy sacred solo, _Christ in Gethsemane_. The first is of
+the usual light order characteristic of this class of music. The
+latter is as far removed to the contrary as is comedy from tragedy.
+The 'coon' song entered the bubbling effervescing cauldron of what is
+termed 'ragtime' music among the multitudinous others, and soon was
+seen peeping through at the surface among the lightest and most
+catchy.... The sacred solo found its level among the heavier in its
+class, and if the term may be here applied, it was also a hit."
+
+S. Duncan Baker, born August 25, 1855, still lives (1902) in the old
+family residence at Natchez, Miss. "In this house is located the den
+where he has spent many hours with his collection of banjos and
+pictures and in writing for and playing on the instrument which he
+adopted as a favourite during its dark days (about 1871)." We are told
+that he composed an "artistic banjo solo," entitled, _Memories of
+Farland_. "Had this production or its companion piece, _Thoughts of
+the Cadenza_, been written by an old master for some other instrument
+and later have been adapted by a modern composer to the banjo, either
+or both of them would have been pronounced classic, barring some
+slight defects in form."
+
+I cannot stop to quote from the delightful accounts offered us of the
+lives and works of Albert Matson, George D. Tufts, D. O. Loy, Lavinia
+Pascoe Oblad, and forty or fifty other American singers, but it seems
+to me that I have done enough, Mencken, to prove to you that the great
+book on American music has been written. Without one single mention of
+the names of Horatio Parker, George W. Chadwick, Frederick Converse,
+or Henry Hadley, by a transference of the emphasis to the place where
+it belongs, the author of this undying book has answered your prayer.
+
+  _December 11, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+Old Days and New
+
+
+
+
+Old Days and New
+
+
+Some toothless old sentimentalist or other periodically sets up a
+melancholy howl for "the good old days of comic opera," whatever or
+whenever they were. Perhaps none of us, once past forty, is guiltless
+in this respect. Nothing, not even the smell of an apple-blossom from
+the old homestead, the sight of a daguerreotype of a miss one kissed
+at the age of ten, or a taste of a piece of the kind of pie that
+"mother used to make" so arouses the sensibility of a man of middle
+age as the memory of some musical show which he saw in his budding
+manhood. That is why revivals of these venerable institutions are
+frequently projected and, some of them, very successfully
+accomplished. When a manager revives an old drama he must appeal to
+the interest of his audience; it may not be the identical interest
+which held the original spectators of the piece spell-bound, but, none
+the less, it must be an interest. When a manager revives an old
+musical comedy he appeals directly to sentiment.
+
+Of course, the exact date of the good old days is a variable quantity.
+I have known a vain regretter to turn no further back than to the
+nights of _The Merry Widow_, _The Waltz Dream_, _The Chocolate
+Soldier_, _The Girl in the Train_, and _The Dollar Princess_, in other
+words to the Viennese renaissance; another, in using the phrase, is
+subconsciously conjuring up pictures of _La Belle Hélène_, _Orphée aux
+Enfers_, or _La Fille de Madame Angot_, good fodder for memory to feed
+on here; a third will instinctively revert to the Johann Strauss
+operetta period, the era of _The Queen's Lace Handkerchief_ and _Die
+Fledermaus_; a fourth cries, "Give us Gilbert and Sullivan!" A fifth,
+when his ideas are chased to their lair, will rhapsodize endlessly
+over the charms of the London Gaiety when _The Geisha_, _The Country
+Girl_, and _The Circus Girl_ were in favour; a sixth, it seems, finds
+his pleasure in Americana, _Robin Hood_, _Wang_, _The Babes in
+Toyland_, and _El Capitan_; a seventh becomes maudlin to the most
+utter degree when you mention _Les Cloches de Corneville_, or _La
+Mascotte_, products of a decadent stage in the history of French
+opéra-bouffe. Not long ago I heard a man speak of the cadet operas in
+Boston (did a man named Barnet write them?) as the last of the great
+musical pieces; and every one of you who reads this essay will have a
+brother, or a son, or a friend who went to see _Sybil_ forty-three
+times and _The Girl from Utah_ seventy-six. Twenty years from now, as
+he sits before the open fire, the mere mention of _They Wouldn't
+Believe Me_ will cause the tears to course down his cheeks as he pats
+the pate of his infant son or daughter and weepingly describes the
+never-to-be-forgotten fascination of Julia Sanderson, the (in the then
+days) unattainable agility of Donald Brian.
+
+In no other form of theatrical entertainment is the appeal to softness
+so direct. The man who attends a performance of a musical farce goes
+in a good mood, usually with a couple of friends, or possibly with
+_the_ girl. If he has dined well and his digestion is in working order
+and he is young enough, the spell of the lights and the music is
+irresistible to his receptive and impressionable nature. There are
+those young men, of course, who are constant attendants because of the
+altogether too wonderful hair of the third girl from the right in the
+front row. Others succumb to the dental perfection of the prima donna
+or to the shapely legs of the soubrette. All of us, I am almost proud
+to admit, at some time or other, are subject to the contagion. I well
+remember the year in which I considered myself as a possible suitor
+for the hand of Della Fox. Photographs and posters of this deity
+adorned my walls. I was an assiduous collector of newspaper clippings
+referring to her profoundly interesting activities, although my
+sophistication had not reached the stage where I might appeal to
+Romeike for assistance. The mere mention of Miss Fox's name was
+sufficient cause to make me blush profusely. Eventually my father was
+forced to take steps in the matter when I began, in a valiant effort
+to summon up the spirit of the lady's presence, to disturb the early
+morning air with vocal assaults on _She Was a Daisy_, which, you will
+surely remember, was the musical gem of _The Little Trooper_. Here are
+the words of the refrain:
+
+    "She was a daisy, daisy, daisy!
+    Driving me crazy, crazy, crazy!
+    Helen of Troy and Venus were to her cross-eyed crones!
+    She was dimpled and rosy, rosy, rosy!
+    Sweet as a posy, posy, posy!
+    How I doted upon her, my Ann Jane Jones!"
+
+You will admit, I think, at first glance, the superior literary
+quality of these lines; you will perceive at once to what immeasurably
+higher class of art they belong than the lyrics that librettists forge
+for us today.
+
+Wall Street broker, poet, green grocer, soldier, banker, lawyer,
+whatever you are, confess the facts to yourself: you were once as I.
+You have suffered the same feelings that I suffered. Perhaps with you
+it was not Della Fox.... Who then? Did saucy Marie Jansen awaken your
+admiration? Was pert Lulu Glaser the object of your secret but
+persistent attention? How many times did you go to see Marie Tempest
+in _The Fencing Master_, or Alice Nielsen in _The Serenade_? Was
+Virginia Earle in _The Circus Girl_ the idol of your youth or was it
+Mabel Barrison in _The Babes in Toyland_? Theresa Vaughn in _1492_,
+May Yohe in _The Lady Slavey_, Hilda Hollins in _The Magic Kiss_, or
+Nancy McIntosh in _His Excellency_? Madge Lessing in _Jack and the
+Beanstalk_, Edna May in _The Belle of New York_, Phyllis Rankin in
+_The Rounders_, or Gertrude Quinlan in _King Dodo_?
+
+What do you whistle in your bathtub when you are in a reminiscent
+mood? Is it _The Typical Tune of Zanzibar_, or _Baby, Baby, Dance My
+Darling Baby_, or _Starlight, Starbright_, or _Tell Me, Pretty
+Maiden_, or _A Simple Little String_, or _J'aime les Militaires_ (if
+you whistle this, ten to one your next door neighbour thinks you have
+been to an orchestra concert and heard Beethoven's _Seventh
+Symphony_), or _Sister Mary Jane's Top Note_, or _A Wandering
+Minstrel I_, or _See How It Sparkles_, or the _Lullaby_ from
+_Erminie_, which Pauline Hall used to sing as if she herself were
+asleep, and which Emma Abbott interpolated in _The Mikado_, or _A
+Pretty Girl, A Summer Night_, or the _Policeman's Chorus_ from _The
+Pirates of Penzance_, or _The Soldiers in the Park_, or _My Angeline_,
+or the _Letter Song_ from _The Chocolate Soldier_, or _I'm Little
+Buttercup_, or the _Gobble Song_ from _The Mascot_, or the _Anna Song_
+from _Nanon_, or the march from _Fatinitza_, or _I'm All the Way from
+Gay Paree_, or _Love Comes Like a Summer Sigh_, or _In the North Sea
+Lived a Whale_, or _Jusqu'là_, or _The Harmless Little Girlie With the
+Downcast Eyes_, or _They All Follow Me_, or _The Amorous Goldfish_, or
+_Don't Be Cross_, or _Slumber On, My Little Gypsy Sweetheart_, or
+_Good-bye Flo_, or _La Légende de la Mère Angot_, or _My Alamo Love_?
+
+There is a very subtle and fragrant charm about these old
+recollections which the sight or sound of a score, a view of an old
+photograph of Lillian Russell or Judic, or a dip in the _Théâtre
+Complet_ of Meilhac and Halévy will reawaken. But it is only at a
+revival of one of our old favourites that we can really bathe in
+sentimentality, drink in draughts of joy from the past, allow memory
+full away. You whose hair is turning white will be in Row A, Seat No.
+1 for the first performance of a revival of _Robin Hood_. You will not
+hear Edwin Hoff in his original rôle; Jessie Bartlett Davis is dead
+and, alas, Henry Clay Barnabee is no longer on the boards, but the
+newcomers, possibly, are respectable substitutes and the airs and
+lines remain. You can walk about in the lobby and say proudly that you
+attended the _first_ performance of the opera ever so long ago when
+operettas had tune and reason. "Yes sir, there were plots in those
+days, and composers, and the singers could _act_. Times have certainly
+changed, sir. Come to the corner and have a Manhattan.... There were
+no cocktails in those days.... There is no singer like Mrs. Davis
+today!"
+
+Well the poor souls who cannot feel tenderly about a past they have
+not yet experienced have their recompenses. For one thing I am certain
+that the revivals of the Gilbert and Sullivan operettas to which De
+Wolf Hopper devoted his best talents were better, in many respects,
+than the original London productions; just as I am equally certain
+that the representations of _Aida_ at the Metropolitan Opera House are
+way ahead of the original performance of that work given at Cairo
+before the Khedive of Egypt.
+
+Then there is the musical revue, a form which we have borrowed from
+the French, but which we have vastly improved upon and into which we
+have poured some of our most national feeling and expression. The
+interpretation of these frivolities is a new art. Gaby Deslys may be
+only half a loaf compared to Marie Jansen, but I am sure that Elsie
+Janis is more than three-quarters. Frank Tinney and Al Jolson can, in
+their humble way, efface memories of Digby Bell and Dan Daly. Adele
+Rowland and Marie Dressler have their points (and curves). Irving
+Berlin, Louis A. Hirsch, and Jerome Kern are not to be sniffed at.
+Neither is P. G. Wodehouse. Harry B. Smith we have always with us: he
+is the Sarah Bernhardt of librettists.
+
+Joseph Urban has wrought a revolution in stage settings for this form
+of entertainment. Louis Sherwin has offered us convincing evidence to
+support his theory that the new staging in America is coming to us by
+way of the revue and not through the serious drama. Melville Ellis,
+Lady Duff-Gordon, and Paul Poiret have done their bit for the dresses.
+In fact, my dear young man--who are reading this article--you will
+feel just as tenderly in twenty years about the _Follies of 1917_ as
+your father does now about _Wang_. Only, and this is a very big ONLY,
+the _Follies of 1917_, depending as it does entirely on topical
+subjects and dimpled knees, cannot be revived. Fervid and enlivening
+as its immediate impression may be it cannot be lasting. You can never
+recapture the thrills of this summer by sitting in Row A, Seat No. 1
+at any 1937 _reprise_. There can never be anything of the sort. The
+revue, like the firefly, is for a night only. We take it in with the
+daily papers ... and the next season, already old-fashioned, it goes
+forth to show Grinnell and Davenport how Mlle. Manhattan deported
+herself the year before.
+
+So if the youth of these days chooses to be sentimental in the years
+to come over the good old days of Urban scenery and Olive Thomas, the
+Balloon Girls of the Midnight Frolic and the chorus of the Winter
+Garden, he will be obliged to give way to the mood at home in front of
+the fire, see the pictures in the smoke, and hear the tunes in the
+dropping of the coals. Which is perhaps as it should be. For in 1937
+the youth of that epoch can sit in Row A, Seat No. 1 himself and not
+be ousted from his place by a sentimental gentleman of middle age who
+longs to hear _Poor Butterfly_ again.
+
+  _April 25, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+Two Young American Playwrights
+
+     _"Gautier had a theory to the effect that to be a member of
+     the Academy was simply and solely a matter of
+     predestination. 'There is no need to do anything,' he would
+     say, 'and so far as the writing of books is concerned that
+     is entirely useless. A man is born an Academician as he is
+     born a bishop or a cook. He can abuse the Academy in a dozen
+     pamphlets if it amuses him, and be elected all the same; but
+     if he is not predestined, three hundred volumes and ten
+     masterpieces, recognized as such by the genuflections of an
+     adoring universe, will not aid him to open its doors.'
+     Evidently Balzac was not predestined but then neither was
+     Molière, and there must have been some consolation for him
+     in that."_
+
+                        Edgar Saltus.
+
+
+
+
+Two Young American Playwrights
+
+
+In the newspaper reports relating to the death of Auguste Rodin I read
+with some astonishment that if the venerable sculptor, who lacked
+three years of being eighty when he died, had lived two weeks longer
+he would have been admitted to the French Academy! In other words, the
+greatest stone-poet since Michael Angelo, internationally famous and
+powerful, the most striking artist figure, indeed, of the last half
+century, was to be permitted, in the extremity of old age, to inscribe
+his name on a scroll, which bore the signatures of many inoffensive
+nobodies. I could not have been more amused if the newspapers, in
+publishing the obituary notices of John Jacob Astor, had announced
+that if the millionaire had not perished in the sinking of the
+_Titanic_, his chances of being invited to join the Elks were good; or
+if "Variety" or some other tradespaper of the music halls, had
+proclaimed, just before Sarah Bernhardt's début at the Palace Theatre,
+that if her appearances there were successful she might expect an
+invitation to membership in the White Rats.... These hypothetical
+instances would seem ridiculous ... but they are not. The Rodin case
+puts a by no means seldom-recurring phenomenon in the centre of the
+stage under a calcium light. The ironclad dreadnaughts of the academic
+world, the reactionary artists, the dry-as-dust lecturers are
+constantly ignoring the most vital, the most real, the most important
+artists while they sing polyphonic, antiphonal, Palestrinian motets in
+praise of men who have learned to imitate comfortably and efficiently
+the work of their predecessors.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+If there are other contemporary French sculptors than Rodin their
+names elude me at the moment; yet I have no doubt that some ten or
+fifteen of these hackmen have their names emblazoned in the books of
+all the so-called "honour" societies in Paris. It is a comfort, on the
+whole, to realize that America is not the only country in which such
+things happen. As a matter of fact, they happen nowhere more often
+than in France.
+
+If some one should ask you suddenly for a list of the important
+playwrights of France today, what names would you let roll off your
+tongue, primed by the best punditic and docile French critics? Henry
+Bataille, Paul Hervieu, and Henry Bernstein. Possibly Rostand. Don't
+deny this; you know it is true, unless it happens you have been doing
+some thinking for yourself. For even in the works of Remy de Gourmont
+(to be sure this very clairvoyant mind did not often occupy itself
+with dramatic literature) you will find little or nothing relating to
+Octave Mirbeau and Georges Feydeau. True, Mirbeau did not do his best
+work in the theatre. That stinging, cynical attack on the courts of
+Justice (?) of France (nay, the world!), "Le Jardin de Supplice" is
+not a play and it is probably Mirbeau's masterpiece and the best piece
+of critical fiction written in France (or anywhere else) in the last
+fifty years. However Mirbeau shook the pillars of society even in the
+playhouse. _Le Foyer_ was hissed repeatedly at the Théâtre Français.
+Night after night the proceedings ended in the ejection and arrest of
+forty or fifty spectators. Even to a mere outsider, an idle bystander
+of the boulevards, this complete exposure of the social, moral, and
+political hypocricies of a nation seemed exceptionally brutal. _Le
+Foyer_ and "Le Jardin" could only have been written by a man
+passionately devoted to the human ideal ("each as she may," as
+Gertrude Stein so beautifully puts it). _Les Affaires sont les
+Affaires_ is pure theatre, perhaps, but it might be considered the
+best play produced in France between Becque's _La Parisienne_ and
+Brieux's _Les Hannetons_.
+
+It is not surprising, on the whole, to find the critical tribe turning
+for relief from this somewhat unpleasant display of Gallic closet
+skeletons to the discreet exhibition of a few carefully chosen bones
+in the plays of Bernstein and Bataille, direct descendants of Scribe,
+Sardou, _et Cie_, but I may be permitted to indulge in a slight
+snicker of polite amazement when I discover these gentlemen applying
+their fingers to their noses in no very pretty-meaning gesture,
+directed at a grandson of Molière. For such is Georges Feydeau. His
+method is not that of the Seventeenth Century master, nor yet that of
+Mirbeau; nevertheless, aside from these two figures, Beaumarchais,
+Marivaux, Becque, Brieux at his best, and Maurice Donnay occasionally,
+there has not been a single writer in the history of the French
+theatre so inevitably _au courant_ with human nature. His form is
+frankly farcical and his plays are so funny, so enjoyable merely as
+_good shows_ that it seems a pity to raise an obelisk in the
+playwright's honour, and yet the fact remains that he understands the
+political, social, domestic, amorous, even cloacal conditions of the
+French better than any of his contemporaries, always excepting the
+aforementioned Mirbeau. In _On Purge Bébé_ he has written saucy
+variations on a theme which Rabelais, Boccaccio, George Moore, and
+Molière in collaboration would have found difficult to handle. It is
+as successful an experiment in bravado and bravura as Mr. Henry
+James's "The Turn of the Screw." And he has accomplished this feat
+with nimbleness, variety, authority, even (granting the subject)
+delicacy. Seeing it for the first time you will be so submerged in
+gales of uncontrollable laughter that you will perhaps not recognize
+at once how every line reveals character, how every situation springs
+from the foibles of human nature. Indeed in this one-act farce
+Feydeau, with about as much trouble as Zeus took in transforming his
+godship into the semblance of a swan, has given you a well-rounded
+picture of middle-class life in France with its external and internal
+implications.... And how he understands the buoyant French _grue_,
+unselfconscious and undismayed in any situation. I sometimes think
+that _Occupe-toi d'Amélie_ is the most satisfactory play I have ever
+seen; it is certainly the most delightful. I do not think you can see
+it in Paris again. The Nouveautés, where it was presented for over a
+year, has been torn down; an English translation would be an insult
+to Feydeau; nor will you find essays about it in the yellow volumes in
+which the French critics tenderly embalm their _feuilletons_; nor do I
+think Arthur Symons or George Moore, those indefatigable diggers in
+Parisian graveyards, have discovered it for their English readers.
+Reading the play is to miss half its pleasure; so you must take my
+word in the matter unless you have been lucky enough to see it
+yourself, in which case ten to one you will agree with me that one
+such play is worth a kettleful of boiled-over drama like _Le Voleur_,
+_Le Secret_, _Samson_, _La Vierge Folle_, _et cetera_, _et cetera_. In
+the pieces I have mentioned Feydeau, in representation, had the
+priceless assistance of a great comic artist, Armande Cassive. If we
+are to take Mr. Symons's assurance in regard to de Pachmann that he is
+the world's greatest pianist because he does one thing more perfectly
+than any one else, by a train of similar reasoning we might
+confidently assert that Mlle. Cassive is the world's greatest actress.
+
+When you ask a Frenchman to explain why he does not like Mirbeau (and
+you will find that Frenchmen invariably do not like him) he will shrug
+his shoulders and begin to tell you that Mirbeau was not good to his
+mother, or that he drank to excess, or that he did not wear a red,
+white, and blue coat on the Fourteenth of July, or that he did not
+stand for the French spirit as exemplified in the eating of snails on
+Christmas. In other words, he will immediately place himself in a
+position in which you may be excused for regarding him as a person
+whose opinion is worth nothing, whereas his ratiocinatory powers on
+subjects with which he is more in sympathy may be excellent. I know
+why he does not like Mirbeau. Mirbeau is the reason. In his life he
+was not accustomed to making compromises nor was he accustomed to
+making friends (which comes after all to the same thing). He did what
+he pleased, said what he pleased, wrote what he pleased. His armorial
+bearings might have been a cat upsetting a cream jug with the motto,
+"_Je m'en fous_." The author of "Le Jardin de Supplice" would not be
+in high favour anywhere; nevertheless I would willingly relinquish any
+claims I might have to future popularity for the privilege of having
+been permitted to sign this book.
+
+Feydeau is distinctly another story; his plays are more successful
+than any others given in Paris. They are so amusing that even while he
+is pointing the finger at your own particular method of living you are
+laughing so hard that you haven't time to see the application.... So
+the French critics have set him down as another popular figure, only a
+nobody born to entertain the boulevards, just as the American critics
+regard the performances of Irving Berlin with a steely supercilious
+impervious eye. The Viennese scorned Mozart because he entertained
+them. "A gay population," wrote the late John F. Runciman, "always a
+heartless master, holds none in such contempt as the servants who
+provide it with amusement."
+
+The same condition has prevailed in England until recently. A few
+seasons ago you might have found the critics pouring out their glad
+songs about Arthur Wing Pinero and Henry Arthur Jones. Bernard Shaw
+has, in a measure, restored the balance to the British theatre. He is
+not only a brilliant playwright; he is a brilliant critic as well.
+Foreseeing the fate of the under man in such a struggle he became his
+own literary huckster and by outcriticizing the other critics he
+easily established himself as the first English (or Irish) playwright.
+When he thus rose to the top, by dint of his own exertions, he had
+strength enough to carry along with him a number of other important
+authors. As a consequence we may regard the Pinero incident closed and
+in ten years his theatre will be considered as old-fashioned and as
+inadept as that of Robertson or Bulwer-Lytton.
+
+Having no Shaw in America, no man who can write brilliant prefaces and
+essays about his own plays until the man in the street is obliged
+perforce to regard them as literature, we find ourselves in the
+condition of benighted France. Dulness is mistaken for literary
+flavour; the injection of a little learning, of a little poetry
+(so-called) into a theatrical hackpiece, is the signal for a good deal
+of enthusiasm on the part of the journalists (there are two brilliant
+exceptions). Which of our playwrights are taken seriously by the
+pundits? Augustus Thomas and Percy MacKaye: Thomas the dean, and
+MacKaye the poet laureate. I have no intention of wrenching the laurel
+wreathes from these august brows. Let them remain. Each of these
+gentlemen has a long and honourable career in the theatre behind him,
+from which he should be allowed to reap what financial and honourary
+rewards he may be able. But I would not add one leaf to these
+wreathes, nor one crotchet to the songs of praise which vibrate around
+them. I turn aside from their plays in the theatre and in the library
+as I turn aside from the fictions of Pierre de Coulevain and Arnold
+Bennett.
+
+I love to fashion wreathes of my own and if two young men will now
+step forward to the lecturer's bench I will take delight in crowning
+them with my own hands. Will the young man at the back of the hall
+please page Avery Hopwood and Philip Moeller?... No response! They
+seem to have retreated modestly into the night. Nevertheless they
+shall not escape me!
+
+I speak of Mr. Hopwood first because he has been writing for our
+theatre for a longer period than has Mr. Moeller, and because his
+position, such as it is, is assured. Like Feydeau in France he has a
+large popular following; he has probably made more money in a few
+years than Mr. Thomas has made during his whole lifetime and the
+managers are always after him to furnish them with more plays with
+which to fill their theatres. For his plays do fill the theatres.
+_Fair and Warmer_, _Nobody's Widow_, _Clothes_, and _Seven Days_,
+would be included in any list of the successful pieces produced in New
+York within the past ten years. Two of these pieces would be near the
+very top of such a list. An utterly absurd allotment of actors is
+sufficient to explain the failures of _Sadie Love_ and _Our Little
+Wife_ and it might be well if some one should attempt a revival of one
+of his three serious plays, _This Woman and This Man_, in which
+Carlotta Nillson appeared for a brief space.
+
+This author, mainly through the beneficent offices of a gift of
+supernal charm, contrives to do in English very much what Feydeau does
+in French. It is his contention that you can smite the Puritans, even
+in the American theatre, squarely on the cheek, provided you are
+sagacious in your choice of weapon. In _Fair and Warmer_ he provokes
+the most boisterous and at the same time the most innocent laughter
+with a scene which might have been made insupportably vulgar. A
+perfectly respectable young married woman gets very drunk with the
+equally respectable husband of one of her friends. The scene is the
+mainstay, the _raison d'être_, of the play, and it furnishes the
+material for the better part of one act; yet young and old, rich and
+poor, philistine and superman alike, delight in it. To make such a
+situation irresistible and universal in its appeal is, it seems to me,
+undoubtedly the work of genius. What might, indeed should, have been
+disgusting, was not only in intention but in performance very funny.
+Let those who do not appreciate the virtuosity of this undertaking
+attempt to write as successful a scene in a similar vein. Even if they
+are able to do so, and I do not for a moment believe that there is
+another dramatic author in America who can, they will be the first to
+grant the difficulty of the achievement. With an apparently
+inexhaustible fund of fantasy and wit Mr. Hopwood passes his wand over
+certain phases of so-called smart life, almost always with the
+happiest results. With a complete realization of the independence of
+his medium he often ignores the realistic conventions and the
+traditional technique of the stage, but his touch is so light and
+joyous, his wit so free from pose, that he rarely fails to establish
+his effect. His pen has seldom faltered. Occasionally, however, the
+heavy hand of an uncomprehending stage director or of an aggressive
+actor has played havoc with the delicate texture of his fabric. There
+is no need here for the use of hammer or trowel; if an actress must
+seek aid in implements, let her rather rely on a soft brush, a lacy
+handkerchief, or a sparkling spangled fan.
+
+Philip Moeller has achieved distinction in another field, that of
+elegant burlesque, of sublimated caricature. His stage men and women
+are as adroitly distorted (the better to expose their comic
+possibilities) as the drawings of Max Beerbohm. Beginning with the
+Bible and the Odyssey (_Helena's Husband_ and _Sisters of Susannah_
+for the Washington Square Players) he has at length, by way of
+Shakespeare and Bacon (_The Roadhouse in Arden_) arrived at the
+Romantic Period in French literature and in _Madame Sand_, his first
+three-act play, he has established himself at once as a dangerous
+rival of the authors of _Cæsar and Cleopatra_ and _The Importance of
+Being Earnest_, both plays in the same _genre_ as Mr. Moeller's latest
+contribution to the stage. The author has thrown a very high light on
+the sentimental adventures of the writing lady of the early Nineteenth
+Century, has indeed advised us and convinced us that they were
+somewhat ridiculous. So they must have appeared even to her
+contemporaries, however seriously George took herself, her romances,
+her passions, her petty tragedies. A less adult, a less seriously
+trained mind might have fallen into the error of making a sentimental
+play out of George's affairs with Alfred de Musset, Dr. Pagello, and
+Chopin (Mr. Moeller contents himself with these three passions,
+selected from the somewhat more extensive list offered to us by
+history). Such an author would doubtless have written _Great
+Catherine_ in the style of _Disraeli_ and _Androcles and the Lion_
+after the manner of _Ben Hur_! Whether love itself is always a comic
+subject, as Bernard Shaw would have us believe, is a matter for
+dispute, but there can be no alternative opinion about the loves of
+George Sand. A rehearsal of them offers only laughter to any one but a
+sentimental school girl.
+
+The piece is conceived on a true literary level; it abounds in wit, in
+fantasy, in delightful situations, but there is nothing precious about
+its progress. Mr. Moeller has carefully avoided the traps expressly
+laid for writers of such plays. For example, the enjoyment of _Madame
+Sand_ is in no way dependent upon a knowledge of the books of that
+authoress, De Musset, and Heine, nor yet upon an acquaintance with the
+music of Liszt and Chopin. Such matters are pleasantly and lightly
+referred to when they seem pertinent, but no insistence is laid upon
+them. Occasionally our author has appropriated some phrase originally
+spoken or written by one of the real characters, but for that he can
+scarcely be blamed. Indeed, when one takes into consideration the
+wealth of such material which lay in books waiting for him, it is
+surprising that he did not take more advantage of it. In the main he
+has relied on his own cleverness to delight our ears for two hours
+with brilliant conversation.
+
+There is, it should be noted, in conclusion, nothing essentially
+American about either of these young authors. Both Mr. Hopwood and
+Mr. Moeller might have written for the foreign stage. Several of Mr.
+Hopwood's pieces, indeed, have already been transported to foreign
+climes and there seems every reason for belief that Mr. Moeller's
+comedy will meet a similarly happy fate.
+
+  _November 29, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+De Senectute Cantorum
+
+    _"All'età di settanta
+      Non si ama, nè si canta."_
+
+                        Italian proverb.
+
+
+
+
+De Senectute Cantorum
+
+
+"I am not sure," writes Arthur Symons in his admirable essay on Sarah
+Bernhardt, "that the best moment to study an artist is not the moment
+of what is called decadence. The first energy of inspiration is gone;
+what remains is the method, the mechanism, and it is that which alone
+one can study, as one can study the mechanism of the body, not the
+principle of life itself. What is done mechanically, after the heat of
+the blood has cooled, and the divine accidents have ceased to happen,
+is precisely all that was consciously skilful in the performance of an
+art. To see all this mechanism left bare, as the form of a skeleton is
+left bare when age thins the flesh upon it is to learn more easily all
+that is to be learnt of structure, the art which not art but nature
+has hitherto concealed with its merciful covering."
+
+Mr. Symons, of course, had an actress in mind, but his argument can be
+applied to singers as well, although it is safest to remember that
+much of the true beauty of the human voice inevitably departs with the
+youth of its owner. Still style in singing is not noticeably affected
+by age and an artist who possesses or who has acquired this quality
+very often can afford to make lewd gestures at Father Time. If good
+singing depended upon a full and sensuous tone, such artists as
+Ronconi, Victor Maurel, Max Heinrich, Ludwig Wüllner, and Maurice
+Renaud would never have had any careers at all. It is obvious that any
+true estimate of their contribution to the lyric stage would put the
+chief emphasis on style, and this is usually the explanation for
+extended success on the opera or concert stage, although occasionally
+an extraordinary and exceptional singer may continue to give pleasure
+to her auditors, despite the fact that she has left middle age behind
+her, by the mere lovely quality of the tone she produces.
+
+In the history of opera there may be found the names of many singers
+who have maintained their popularity and, indeed, a good deal of their
+art, long past fifty, and there is recorded at least one instance in
+which a singer, after a long absence from the theatre, returned to the
+scene of her earlier triumphs with her powers unimpaired, even
+augmented. I refer, of course, to Henrietta Sontag, born in 1805, who
+retired from the stage of the King's Theatre in London in 1830 in her
+twenty-fifth year and who returned twenty years later in 1849. She
+had, in the meantime, become the Countess Rossi, but although she had
+abandoned the stage her reappearance proved that she had not remained
+idle during her period of retirement. For she was one of those artists
+in whom early "inspiration" counted for little and "method" for much.
+She was, indeed, a mistress of style. She came back to the public in
+_Linda di Chaminoux_ and H. F. Chorley ("Thirty Years' Musical
+Recollections") tells us that "all went wondrously well. No magic
+could restore to her voice an upper note or two which Time had taken;
+but the skill, grace, and precision with which she turned to account
+every atom of power she still possessed,--the incomparable steadiness
+with which she wrought out her composer's intentions--she carried
+through the part, from first to last, without the slightest failure,
+or sign of weariness--seemed a triumph. She was greeted--as she
+deserved to be--as a beloved old friend come home again in the late
+sunnier days.
+
+"But it was not at the moment of Madame Sontag's reappearance that we
+could advert to all the difficulty which added to the honour of its
+success.--She came back under musical conditions entirely changed
+since she left the stage--to an orchestra far stronger than that which
+had supported her voice when it was younger; and to a new world of
+operas.--Into this she ventured with an intrepid industry not to be
+overpraised--with every new part enhancing the respect of every real
+lover of music.--During the short period of these new performances at
+Her Majesty's Theatre, which was not equivalent to two complete Opera
+seasons, not merely did Madame Sontag go through the range of her old
+characters--Susanna, Rosina, Desdemona, Donna Anna, and the like--but
+she presented herself in seven or eight operas which had not existed
+when she left the stage--Bellini's _Sonnambula_, Donizetti's _Linda_,
+_La Figlia del Reggimento_, _Don Pasquale_; _Le Tre Nozze_, of Signor
+Alary, _La Tempesta_, by M. Halévy--the last two works involving what
+the French call 'creation,' otherwise the production of a part never
+before represented.--In one of the favourite characters of her
+predecessor, the elder artist beat the younger one hollow.--This was
+as Maria, in Donizetti's _La Figlia_, which Mdlle. Lind may be said to
+have brought to England, and considered as her special property....
+With myself, the real value of Madame Sontag grew, night after
+night--as her variety, her conscientious steadiness, and her adroit
+use of diminished powers were thus mercilessly tested. In one respect,
+compared with every one who had been in my time, she was alone, in
+right, perhaps of the studies of her early days--as a singer of
+Mozart's music."
+
+It was after these last London seasons that Mme. Sontag undertook an
+American tour. She died in Mexico.
+
+The great Mme. Pasta's ill-advised return to the stage in 1850 (when
+she made two belated appearances in London) is matter for sadder
+comment. Chorley, indeed, is at his best when he writes of it, his pen
+dipped in tears, for none had admired this artist in her prime more
+passionately than he. Here was a particularly good opportunity to
+study the bare skeleton of interpretative art; the result is one of
+the most striking passages in all literature:
+
+"Her voice, which at its best, had required ceaseless watching and
+practice, had been long ago given up by her. Its state of utter ruin
+on the night in question passes description.--She had been neglected
+by those who, at least, should have presented her person to the best
+advantage admitted by Time.--Her queenly robes (she was to sing some
+scenes from _Anna Bolena_) in nowise suited or disguised her figure.
+Her hair-dresser had done some tremendous thing or other with her
+head--or rather had left everything undone. A more painful and
+disastrous spectacle could hardly be looked on.--There were artists
+present, who had then, for the first time, to derive some impression
+of a renowned artist--perhaps, with the natural feeling that her
+reputation had been exaggerated.--Among these was Rachel--whose bitter
+ridicule of the entire sad show made itself heard throughout the whole
+theatre, and drew attention to the place where she sat--one might even
+say, sarcastically enjoying the scene. Among the audience, however,
+was another gifted woman, who might far more legitimately have been
+shocked at the utter wreck of every musical means of expression in the
+singer--who might have been more naturally forgiven, if some humour of
+self-glorification had made her severely just--not worse--to an old
+_prima donna_;--I mean Madame Viardot.--Then, and not till then, she
+was hearing Madame Pasta.--But Truth will always answer to the appeal
+of Truth. Dismal as was the spectacle--broken, hoarse, and destroyed
+as was the voice--the great style of the singer spoke to the great
+singer. The first scene was Ann Boleyn's duet with Jane Seymour. The
+old spirit was heard and seen in Madame Pasta's _Sorgi!_ and the
+gesture with which she signed to her penitent rival to rise. Later,
+she attempted the final mad scene of the opera--that most complicated
+and brilliant among the mad scenes on the modern musical stage--with
+its two _cantabile_ movements, its snatches of recitative, and its
+_bravura_ of despair, which may be appealed to as an example of vocal
+display, till then unparagoned, when turned to the account of frenzy,
+not frivolity--perhaps as such commissioned by the superb creative
+artist.--By that time, tired, unprepared, in ruin as she was, she had
+rallied a little. When--on Ann Boleyn's hearing the coronation music
+of her rival, the heroine searches for her own crown on her
+brow--Madame Pasta turned in the direction of the festive sounds, the
+old irresistible charm broke out;--nay, even in the final song, with
+its _roulades_, and its scales of shakes, ascending by a semi-tone,
+the consummate vocalist and tragedian, able to combine form with
+meaning--the moment of the situation, with such personal and musical
+display as form an integral part of operatic art--was indicated: at
+least to the apprehension of a younger artist.--'You are right!' was
+Madame Viardot's quick and heartfelt response (her eyes were full of
+tears) to a friend beside her--'You are right! It is like the
+_Cenacolo_ of Da Vinci at Milan--a wreck of a picture, but the
+picture is the greatest picture in the world!'"
+
+The great Mme. Viardot herself, whose intractable voice and noble
+stage presence inevitably remind one of Mme. Pasta, took no chances
+with fate. The friend of Alfred de Musset, the model for George Sand's
+"Consuelo," the "creator" of Fidès in _Le Prophète_, and the singer
+who, in the revival of _Orphée_ at the Théâtre Lyrique in 1859,
+resuscitated Gluck's popularity in Paris, retired from the opera stage
+in 1863 at the age of 43, shortly after she had appeared in _Alceste!_
+(She sang in concert occasionally until 1870 or later.) Thereafter she
+divided her time principally between Baden and Paris and became the
+great friend of Turgeniev. His very delightful letters to her have
+been published. Idleness was abhorrent to this fine woman and in her
+middle and old age she gave lessons, while singers, composers, and
+conductors alike came to her for help and advice. She died in 1910 at
+the age of 89. Her less celebrated brother, Manuel Garcia (less
+celebrated as a singer; as a teacher he is given the credit for having
+restored Jenny Lind's voice. Among his other pupils Mathilde Marchesi
+and Marie Tempest may be mentioned), had died in 1906 at the age of
+101. Her sister, Mme. Malibran, died very young, in the early
+Nineteenth Century, before, in fact, Mme. Viardot had made her début.
+
+Few singers have had the wisdom to follow Mme. Viardot's excellent
+example. The great Jenny Lind, long after her voice had lost its
+quality, continued to sing in oratorio and concert. So did Adelina
+Patti. Muriel Starr once told me of a parrot she encountered in
+Australia. The poor bird had arrived at the noble age of 117 and was
+entirely bereft of feathers. Flapping his stumpy wings he cried
+incessantly, "I'll fly, by God, I'll fly!" So, many singers, having
+lost their voices, continue to croak, "I'll sing, by God, I'll sing!"
+The Earl of Mount Edgcumbe, himself a man of considerable years when
+he published his highly diverting "Musical Reminiscences," gives us
+some extraordinary pictures of senility on the stage at the close of
+the Eighteenth Century. There was, for example, the case of Cecilia
+Davis, the first Englishwoman to sustain the part of prima donna and
+in that situation was second only to Gabrielli, whom she even rivalled
+in neatness of execution. Mount Edgcumbe found Miss Davies in
+Florence, unengaged and poor. A concert was arranged at which she
+appeared with her sister. Later she returned to England ... too old to
+secure an engagement. "This unfortunate woman is now (in 1834) living
+in London, in the extreme of old age, disease, and poverty," writes
+the Earl. He also speaks of a Signora Galli, of large and masculine
+figure and contralto voice, who frequently filled the part of second
+man at the Opera. She had been a principal singer in Handel's
+oratorios when conducted by himself. She afterwards fell into extreme
+poverty, and at the age of about seventy (!!!!), was induced to come
+forward to sing again at the oratorios. "I had the curiosity to go,
+and heard her sing _He was despised and rejected of men_ in _The
+Messiah_. Of course her voice was cracked and trembling, but it was
+easy to see her school was good; and it was a pleasure to observe the
+kindness with which she was received and listened to; and to mark the
+animation and delight with which she seemed to hear again the music in
+which she had formerly been a distinguished performer. The poor old
+woman had been in the habit of coming to me annually for a trifling
+present; and she told me on that occasion that nothing but the
+severest distress should have compelled her so to expose herself,
+which after all, did not answer to its end, as she was not paid
+according to her agreement. She died shortly after." In 1783 the Earl
+heard a singer named Allegranti in Dresden, then at the height of her
+powers. Later she returned to England and reappeared in Cimarosa's
+_Matrimonio Segreto_. "Never was there a more pitiable attempt: she
+had scarcely a thread of voice remaining, nor the power to sing a note
+in tune: her figure and acting were equally altered for the worse, and
+after a few nights she was obliged to retire and quit the stage
+altogether." The celebrated Madame Mara, after a long sojourn in
+Russia, suddenly returned to England and was announced for a benefit
+performance at the King's Theatre after everybody had forgotten her
+existence. "She must have been at least seventy; but it was said that
+her voice had miraculously returned, and was as good as ever. But when
+she displayed those wonderfully revived powers, they proved, as might
+have been expected, lamentably deficient, and the tones she produced
+were compared to those of a _penny trumpet_. Curiosity was so little
+excited that the concert was ill attended ... and Madame Mara was
+heard no more. I was not so lucky (or so unlucky) as to hear these her
+last notes, as it was early in the winter, and I was not in town. She
+returned to Russia, and was a great sufferer by the burning of Moscow.
+After that she lived at Mitlau, or some other town near the Baltic,
+where she died at a great age, not many years ago."
+
+Here is Michael Kelly's account of the same event: "With all her great
+skill and knowledge of the world, Madame Mara was induced, by the
+advice of some of her mistaken friends, to give a public concert at
+the King's Theatre, in her seventy-second year, when, in the course of
+nature her powers had failed her. It was truly grievous to see such
+transcendent talents as she once possessed, so sunk--so fallen. I used
+every effort in my power to prevent her committing herself, but in
+vain. Among other arguments to draw her from her purpose, I told her
+what happened to Monbelli, one of the first tenors of his day, who
+lost all his well-earned reputation and fame, by rashly performing the
+part of a lover, at the Pergola Theatre, at Florence, in his
+seventieth year, having totally lost his voice. On the stage, he was
+hissed; and the following lines, lampooning his attempt, were chalked
+on his house-door, as well as upon the walls of the city:--
+
+    _'All' età di settanta
+      Non si ama, nè si canta.'"_
+
+W. T. Parke, forty years principal oboe player at Covent Garden
+Theatre, is kinder to Madame Mara in his "Musical Memoirs," but it
+must be taken into account that he is kinder to every one else, too.
+There is little of the acrimonious or the fault-finding note in his
+pages. This is his version of the affair: "That extraordinary singer
+of former days, Madame Mara, who had passed the last eighteen years in
+Russia, and who had lately arrived in England, gave a concert at the
+King's Theatre on the 6th of March (1820), which highly excited the
+curiosity of the musical public. On that occasion she sang some of her
+best airs; and though her powers were greatly inferior to what they
+were in her zenith, yet the same pure taste pervaded her performance.
+Whether vanity or interest stimulated Mara at her time of life to that
+undertaking, it would be difficult to determine; but whichsoever had
+the ascendency, her reign was short; for by singing one night
+afterwards at the vocal concert, the veil which had obscured her
+judgment was removed, and she retired to enjoy in private life those
+comforts which her rare talent had procured for her."
+
+Parke also speaks of a Mrs. Pinto, "the once celebrated Miss Brent,
+the original Mandane in Arne's _Artaxerxes_," who appeared in 1785 at
+the age of nearly seventy in Milton's _Mask of Comus_ at a benefit for
+a Mr. Hull, "the respectable stage-manager of Covent Garden Theatre."
+She was to sing the song of Sweet Echo and as Parke was to play the
+responses to her voice on the oboe he repaired to her house for
+rehearsal. "Although nearly seventy years old, her voice possessed the
+remains of those qualities for which it had been so much
+celebrated,--power, flexibility, and sweetness. On the night _Comus_
+was performed she sung with an unexpected degree of excellence, and
+was loudly applauded. This old lady, as a singer, gave me the idea of
+a fine piece of ruins, which though considerably dilapidated, still
+displayed some of its original beauties."
+
+The celebrated Faustina, whose quarrel with Cuzzoni is as famous in
+the history of music as the war between Gluck and Piccinni, was less
+daring. Dr. Burney visited her when she was seventy-two years old and
+asked her to sing. "Alas, I cannot," she replied, "I have lost all my
+faculties."
+
+La Camargo, the favourite dancer of Paris in the early Eighteenth
+Century, the inventor, indeed of the short ballet skirt, and the
+possessor of many lovers, retired from the stage in 1751 with a large
+fortune, besides a pension of fifteen hundred francs. Thenceforth she
+led a secluded life. She was an assiduous visitor to the poor of her
+parish and she kept a dozen dogs and an angora cat which she
+overwhelmed with affection. In that quaint book, "The Powder Puff," by
+Franz Blei, you may find a most charming description of a call paid to
+the lady in 1768 in her little old house in the Rue St. Thomas du
+Louvre, by Duclos, Grimm, and Helvetius, who had come in bantering
+mood to ask her whom, in her past life, she had loved best. Her reply
+touched these men, who took their leave. "Helvetius told Camargo's
+story to his wife; Grimm made a note of it for his Court Journal; and
+as for Duclos, it suggested some moral reflections to him, for when,
+two years later, Mlle. Marianne Camargo was carried to her grave, he
+remarked: 'It is quite fitting to give her a white pall like a
+virgin.'"
+
+Sophie Arnould, one of the most celebrated actresses and singers of
+the Eighteenth Century, died in poverty at the age of 63 and there is
+no record of her burial place. She had been the friend of Voltaire,
+Rousseau, d'Alembert, Diderot, Helvetius, and the Baron d'Holbach. She
+had "created" Gluck's _Iphigénie en Aulide_ and the composer had said
+of her, "If it had not been for the voice and elocution of Mlle.
+Arnould, my _Iphigénie_ would never have been performed in France." In
+her youth she had interested not only Marie Antoinette but also the
+King, and she had been the object of Mme. de Pompadour's suspicion
+and Mme. du Barry's rage. Garrick declared her a better actress than
+Clairon. She was as famous for her wit as for her singing and acting.
+When Mme. Laguerre appeared drunk in _Iphigénie en Tauride_ she
+exclaimed, "Why this is _Iphigénie en Champagne_!" Indeed, she made so
+many remarks worthy of preservation that shortly after her death in
+1802, a book called "Arnoldiana," devoted to her epigrams, was
+issued.... Nevertheless, this lady was hissed at the age of 36, when,
+after a short absence from the stage she reappeared as Iphigénie in
+1776. She was neither old nor ugly and if her voice may have lost
+something her nineteen years of stage life in Paris might have weighed
+against that. On one occasion, according to La Harpe, when she had the
+line to sing, "You long for me to be gone," the audience applauded
+vociferously. To protect Sophie, Marie Antoinette sat in a box on
+several nights and stemmed the storm of disapproval, but in the end
+even the presence of the queen herself was insufficient to quell the
+hissing. One sad story completes the picture. In 1785, when her
+financial troubles were beginning, her two sons, who bore her no love,
+called for money. She had none to give them. "There are two horses
+left in the stable," she said. "Take those." They rode away on the
+horses.
+
+Latin audiences are notoriously unfaithful to their stage favourites.
+In "The Innocents Abroad" Mark Twain tells us of the bad manners of an
+Italian audience. The singer he mentions is Erminia Frezzolini, born
+at Orvieto in 1818. She sang both in England and America. Chorley said
+of her: "She was an elegant, tall woman, born with a lovely voice, and
+bred with great vocal skill (of a certain order); but she was the
+first who arrived of the 'young Italians'--of those who fancy that
+driving the voice to its extremities can stand in the stead of
+passion. But she was, nevertheless, a real singer, and her art stood
+her in stead for some years after nature broke down. When she had left
+her scarce a note of her rich and real soprano voice to scream with,
+Madame Frezzolini was still charming." She died in Paris, November 5,
+1884. Now for Mark Twain:
+
+"I said I knew nothing against the upper classes from personal
+observation. I must recall it. I had forgotten. What I saw their
+bravest and their fairest do last night, the lowest multitude that
+could be scraped out of the purlieus of Christendom would blush to do,
+I think. They assembled by hundreds, and even thousands, in the great
+Theatre of San Carlo to do--what? Why simply to make fun of an old
+woman--to deride, to hiss, to jeer at an actress they once worshipped,
+but whose beauty is faded now, and whose voice has lost its former
+richness. Everybody spoke of the rare sport there was to be. They said
+the theatre would be crammed because Frezzolini was going to sing. It
+was said she could not sing well now, but then the people liked to see
+her, anyhow. And so we went. And every time the woman sang they hissed
+and laughed--the whole magnificent house--and as soon as she left the
+stage they called her on again with applause. Once or twice she was
+encored five and six times in succession, and received with hisses
+when she appeared, and discharged with hisses and laughter when she
+had finished--then instantly encored and insulted again! And how the
+high-born knaves enjoyed it! White-kidded gentlemen and ladies laughed
+till the tears came, and clapped their hands in very ecstasy when that
+unhappy old woman would come meekly out for the sixth time, with
+uncomplaining patience, to meet a storm of hisses! It was the
+cruellest exhibition--the most wanton, the most unfeeling. The singer
+would have conquered an audience of American rowdies by her brave,
+unflinching tranquillity (for she answered encore after encore, and
+smiled and bowed pleasantly, and sang the best she possibly could, and
+went bowing off, through all the jeers and hisses, without ever losing
+countenance or temper); and surely in any other land than Italy her
+sex and her helplessness must have been an ample protection for
+her--she could have needed no other. Think what a multitude of small
+souls were crowded into that theatre last night!"
+
+English audiences, on the other hand, are notoriously friendly to
+their old favourites. When Dr. Hanslick, the Viennese critic, visited
+England and heard Sims Reeves singing before crowded houses as he had
+been doing for forty or fifty years, he remarked, "It is not easy to
+win the favour of the English public; to lose it is quite impossible."
+
+Mme. Grisi made her last appearance in London in 1866 at the theatre
+she had left twenty years previously, Her Majesty's. The opera was
+_Lucrezia Borgia_. At the end of the first act she miscalculated the
+depth of the apron and the descending curtain left her outside on her
+knees. She had stiffness in her joints and was unable to rise without
+assistance.... This situation must have been very embarassing to a
+singer who previously had been an idol of the public. In the
+passionate duet with the tenor she made an unsuccessful attempt to
+reach the A natural. Notwithstanding the fact that she was well
+received and that she got through with the greater part of the opera
+with credit, her impressario, J. H. Mapleson, relates in his "Memoirs"
+that after the final curtain had fallen she rushed to tell him that it
+was all over and that she would never appear again. In "Student and
+Singer" Charles Santley writes of the occasion: "I had been singing at
+the Crystal Palace concert in the afternoon, and after dining there I
+went up to the theatre to see a little of the performance. I felt very
+sorry for Grisi that she had been induced to appear again; it was a
+sad sight for any one who had known her in her prime, and even long
+past it."
+
+However, even English audiences can be cold. John E. Cox, in his
+"Musical Recollections," recalls an earlier occasion when Grisi sang
+at the Crystal Palace without much success (July 31, 1861): "On
+retiring from the orchestra, after a peculiarly cold reception--as
+unkind as it was inconsiderate, seeing what the career of this
+remarkable woman had been--there was not a single person at the foot
+of the orchestra to receive or to accompany her to her retiring room!
+I could imagine what her feelings at that moment must have been--she
+who had in former years been accustomed to be thronged, wherever she
+appeared, and to be the recipient of adulation--often as exaggerated
+as it was fulsome--but who was now literally deserted. With
+Grisi--although I had been once or twice introduced to her--I never
+had any personal acquaintance. I could not, however, resist the
+impulse of preceding her, without obtruding myself on her notice, and
+opening the door of the retiring room for her, which was situated at
+some considerable distance from the orchestra. Her look as I did this,
+and she passed out of sight, is amongst the most painful of my
+'Recollections.'"
+
+German audiences are usually kind to their favourites. In America we
+adopt neither the attitude of the English and Germans, nor yet that of
+the Italians and French. We simply stay away from the theatre. Mark
+Twain has put it succinctly, "When a singer has lost his voice and a
+jumper his legs, those parties fail to draw."
+
+Benjamin Lumley in his "Reminiscences of the Opera," quoting an
+anonymous friend, relates a touching story regarding Catalani, who was
+born in 1779 and who retired from the stage in 1831. When Jenny Lind
+visited Paris in the spring of 1849 she learned to her astonishment
+that Catalani was in the French capital. The old singer, who resided
+habitually in Florence, had come to Paris with her daughter who, as
+the widow of a Frenchman, was obliged to go through certain legal
+forms before taking possession of her share of her husband's property.
+Through a friend of both ladies it was arranged that the two should
+meet at a dinner at the home of the Marquis of Normansby, the English
+ambassador to the Tuscan court, but the Swedish singer could not
+restrain her impatience and before that event she set out one forenoon
+for Mme. Catalani's apartment in the Rue de la Paix and sent in her
+name by a servant. The old singer hastened out to greet her
+distinguished visitor with obvious delight. She had known nothing of
+Mlle. Lind's presence in Paris and had feared that such a chance would
+never befall her, much as she had longed to see the celebrated singer
+who had excited the English public in a way which recalled her own
+past triumphs and who rivalled her in her purity and her charity. They
+talked together for an hour.... At the dinner the Marchioness of
+Normansby considerately refrained from asking Jenny Lind to sing,
+because no one is allowed to refuse such an invitation made by a
+representative of royalty. Catalani, however, had no such scruples.
+She went up to the Nightingale and begged her to sing, adding,
+"_C'est la vieille Catalini qui desire vous entendre chanter, avant de
+mourir!_" This appeal was irresistible. Jenny Lind sat down to the
+piano and sang _Non credea mirarti_ and one or two other airs,
+including _Ah! non giunge_. Catalani is described as sitting on an
+ottoman in the centre of the room, rocking her body to and fro with
+delight and sympathy, murmuring, "_Ah la bella cosa che la musica,
+quando si fà di quella maniera!_" and again "_Ah! la carissima! quanto
+bellissima!_" A dinner at Catalani's apartment followed, but a few
+days later it became known that the old singer was ill, an illness
+which proved fatal. She had, however, heard the Swedish Nightingale
+sing "_avant de mourir_."
+
+William Gardiner visited Madame Catalani in 1846. "I was surprised at
+the vigour of Madame Catalani," he says, "and how little she has
+altered since I saw her in Derby in 1828. I paid her a compliment on
+her good looks. 'Ah,' said she, 'I'm sixty-six!' She has lost none of
+that commanding expression which gave her such dignity on the stage.
+She is without a wrinkle, and appears to be no more than forty. Her
+breadth of chest is still remarkable: it is this which endowed her
+with the finest voice that ever sang. Her speaking voice and dramatic
+air are still charming, and not in the least impaired."
+
+Is Christine Nilsson still alive? I think so. She was born August 20,
+1843. In Clara Louise Kellogg's very entertaining, but not always
+trustworthy, "Memoirs" there is an interesting reference to this
+singer in her later career. Dates, unfortunately, are not furnished.
+"I was present," declares Mme. Kellogg, "on the night ... when she
+practically murdered the high register of her voice. She had five
+upper notes the quality of which was unlike any other I ever heard and
+that possessed a peculiar charm. The tragedy happened during a
+performance of _The Magic Flute_ in London.... Nilsson was the Queen
+of the Night, one of her most successful early rôles. The second aria
+in _The Magic Flute_ is more famous and less difficult than the first
+aria, and also, more effective. Nilsson knew well the ineffectiveness
+of the ending of the first aria in the two weakest notes of a
+soprano's voice, A natural and B flat. I never could understand why a
+master like Mozart should have chosen to use them as he did. There is
+no climax to the song. One has to climb up hard and fast and then stop
+short in the middle. It is an appalling thing to do and that night
+Nilsson took those two notes at the last in _chest tones_. 'Great
+heavens!' I gasped, 'what is she doing? What is the woman thinking
+of!' Of course I knew she was doing it to get volume and vibration and
+to give that trying climax some character. But to say that it was a
+fatal attempt is to put it mildly. She absolutely killed a certain
+quality in her voice there and then and she _never recovered it_. Even
+that night she had to cut out the second great aria. Her beautiful
+high notes were gone forever." As I have said, the date of this
+incident, which, so far as I know, is not recorded elsewhere, is not
+mentioned, but Christine Nilsson sang in New York in the early
+Eighties and continued to sing until 1891, the year of her final
+appearance in London.
+
+Adelina Patti, born the same year as Nilsson but six months before
+(February 10, 1843; according to some records, which by no means go
+undisputed, a quartet of famous singers came into the world this year.
+The other two were Ilma de Murska and Pauline Lucca) made many
+farewell tours of this country ... one too many in 1903-4, when she
+displayed the _beaux restes_ of her voice. She is living at present in
+retirement at Craig-y-Nos in Wales. Her greatest rival, Etelka
+Gerster, too, is alive, I believe.
+
+Lilli Lehmann, one of the oldest of the living great singers, was
+born May 13, 1848. She was a member of the famous casts which
+introduced many of the Wagner works to New York. Her last appearances
+in opera here were made, I think, in the late Nineties, but she has
+sung here since in concert and in Germany she has frequently assisted
+at the performances of the Mozart festivals at Salzburg and has even
+sung in _Norma_ and _Götterdämmerung_ within recent years! Her head is
+now crowned with white hair and her noble appearance and magnificent
+style in singing have doubtless stood her in good stead at these
+belated performances, which probably were disappointing, judged as
+vocal exhibitions.
+
+Lillian Nordica had a long career. She was born May 12, 1859, and made
+her operatic début in Brescia in _La Traviata_ in 1879. She continued
+to sing up to the time of her death in Batavia, Java, May 10, 1914.
+Indeed she was then undertaking a concert tour of the world at the age
+of 55! But the artist, who in the Nineties had held the Metropolitan
+Opera House stage with honour in the great dramatic rôles, had very
+little to offer in her last years. Never a great musician, defects in
+style began to make themselves evident as her vocal powers decreased.
+Her season at the Manhattan Opera House in 1907-8 was quickly and
+unpleasantly terminated. A subsequent single appearance as Isolde at
+the Metropolitan in the winter of 1909-10 was even less successful.
+The voice had lost its resonance, the singer her appeal. Her
+magnificent courage and indomitable ambition urged her on to the end.
+
+Two singers whose voices have been miraculously preserved, who have
+indeed suffered little from the ravages of time, are Marcella Sembrich
+and Nellie Melba. Both of these singers, however, have consistently
+refrained from misusing their voices (if one may except the one
+occasion on which Mme. Melba attempted to sing Brünnhilde in
+_Siegfried_ with disastrous results). Mme. Melba (according to Grove's
+Dictionary, which, like all other books devoted to the subject of
+music, is frequently inaccurate) was born in Australia, May 19, 1859.
+Therefore she was 28 years old when she made her début in Brussels as
+Gilda on October 12, 1887. She has used her voice carefully and well
+and still sings in concert and opera at the age of 59. With the
+advance of age, indeed, her voice began to take on colour. When she
+sang here in opera at the Manhattan Opera House in 1906-7 she was in
+her best vocal estate. Her voice, originally rather pale, had become
+mellow and rich, although it is possible it had lost some of its old
+remarkable agility. When last I listened to her in concert, a few
+years ago at the Hippodrome, it seemed to me that I had never before
+heard so beautiful a voice, and yet Mme. Melba sang in the first
+performance of opera I ever attended (Chicago Auditorium; _Faust_,
+February 22, 1899).
+
+According to H. T. Finck, Caruso once said, "When you hear that an
+artist is going to retire, don't you believe it, for as long as he
+keeps his voice he will sing. You may depend upon that." Sometimes,
+indeed, longer. Mme. Melba made a belated and unfortunate attempt to
+sing Marguerite in _Faust_ with the Chicago Opera Company, Monday
+evening, February 4, 1918, at the Lexington Theatre, New York. She
+sang with some art and style; her tone was still pure and her
+wonderful enunciation still remained a feature of her performance but
+scarcely a shadow of the beautiful voice I can remember so well was
+left. As if to atone for vocal deficiencies the singer made histrionic
+efforts such as she had never deemed necessary during the height of
+her career. Her meeting with Faust in the Kermesse scene was
+accomplished with modesty that almost became fright. She nearly danced
+the jewel song and embraced the tenor with passion in the love duet.
+In the church scene, overcome with terror at the sight of
+Méphistophélès, she flung her prayer book across the stage.... Her
+appearance was almost shocking and the first lines of the part of
+Marguerite, "_Non monsieur, je ne suis demoiselle, ni belle_" had a
+merciless application. However, the audience received her with
+kindness, more with a certain sort of enthusiasm. She reappeared again
+in the same opera on Thursday evening, February 14, 1918, but on this
+occasion I did not hear her.
+
+Marcella Sembrich was born February 15, 1858. She made her début in
+Athens in _I Puritani_, June 8, 1877, and she made her New York début
+in _Lucia_ October 24, 1883, at the beginning of the first season of
+the Metropolitan Opera House. After a long absence she returned to New
+York in 1898 as Rosina in _Il Barbiere_. After that year she sang
+pretty steadily at the Metropolitan until February 6, 1909, when, at
+the age of 51 (or lacking nine days of it), she bid farewell to the
+New York opera stage in acts from several of her favourite operas. She
+subsequently sang in a few performances of opera in Europe and was
+heard in song recital in America. When she left the opera house she
+had no rival in vocal artistry; and she had so satisfactorily solved
+the problems of style in singing certain kinds of songs that she also
+surveyed the field of song recital from a mountain top.... But such a
+singer as Mme. Sembrich, who made her appeal through the expression of
+the milder emotions, who never, indeed, attempted to touch dramatic
+depths, even style, in the end, will not assist. Magnificent Lilli
+Lehmann might make a certain effect in _Götterdämmerung_ so long as
+she had a leg to stand on or a note to croak, but an adequate delivery
+of _Der Nussbaum_ or _Wie Melodien_ demands a vocal control which a
+singer past middle age is not always sure of possessing.... After a
+long retirement, Mme. Sembrich gave a concert at Carnegie Hall,
+November 21, 1915. The house was crowded and the applause at the
+beginning must almost have unnerved the singer, who walked slowly
+towards the front of the platform as the storm burst and then bowed
+her head again and again. Her program on this occasion was not one of
+her best. She had not chosen familiar songs in which to return to her
+public. This may in a measure account for her lack of success in
+always calling forth steady tones. However, on the whole, her voice
+sounded amazingly fresh. Her high notes especially rang true and
+resonant as ever. Her middle voice showed wear. Her style remained
+impeccable, unrivalled.... She announced, following this concert, a
+series of four recitals in a small hall and actually appeared at one
+of them. This time I did not hear her, but I am told that her voice
+refused to respond to her wishes. Nor was the hall filled. The
+remaining concerts were abandoned. "Mme. Sembrich has never been a
+failure and she is too old to begin now!" she is reported to have said
+to a friend.
+
+Emma Calvé's date of birth is recorded as 1864 in some of the musical
+dictionaries. This would make her 53 years old. Her singing of the
+_Marseillaise_ a year ago at the Allies Bazaar at the Grand Central
+Palace proved to me that her retirement from the Opera was premature.
+Her performances at the Manhattan Opera House in 1906-7 were
+memorable, vocally superb. Her Carmen was out of drawing dramatically,
+but her Anita and her Santuzza remained triumphs of stage craft.
+
+Emma Eames, born August 13, 1867, is three years younger than Mme.
+Calvé. She made her début as Juliette, March 13, 1889. She retired
+from the opera stage in 1907-8, although she has sung since then a few
+times in concert. Her last appearances at the Opera were made in
+dramatic rôles, Donna Anna, Leonora (in _Trovatore_), and Tosca, in
+contradistinction to the lyric parts in which she gained her early
+fame. That she was entirely successful in compassing the breach cannot
+be said in all justice. Yet there was a certain distinction in her
+manner, a certain acid quality in her voice, that gave force to these
+characterizations. Certainly, however, no one would ever have compared
+her Donna Anna favourably with her Countess in _Figaro_. Her
+performance of _Or sai chi l'onore_ was deficient in breadth of style
+and her lack of breath control at this period gave uncertainty to her
+execution.
+
+Life teaches us, through experience, that no rule is infallible, but
+insofar as I am able to give a meaning to these rambling biographical
+notes, collected, I may as well admit, more to interest my reader than
+to prove anything, it is the meaning, sounded with a high note of
+truth, by Arthur Symons, in the paragraph quoted at the beginning of
+this essay. Style is a rare quality in a singer. With it in his
+possession an artist may dare much for a long time. Without it he
+exists as long as those qualities which are perfectly natural to him
+exist. A voice fades, but a manner of applying that voice (even when
+there is practically no voice to apply) to an artistic problem has an
+indefinite term of life.
+
+Yvette Guilbert once told me that crossing the Atlantic with Duse on
+one occasion she had asked the Italian actress if she were going to
+include _La Dame aux Camélias_ in her American repertory. "I am too
+old to play Marguerite ..." was the sad response. "She was right,"
+said Guilbert, in relating the incident, "she was too old; she was
+born too old ... in spirit. Now when I am sixty-three I shall begin to
+impersonate children. I grow younger every year!"
+
+  _September 12, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+Impressions in the Theatre
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+The Land of Joy
+
+     _"Dancing is something more than an amusement in Spain. It
+     is part of that solemn ritual which enters into the whole
+     life of the people. It expresses their very spirit."_
+
+                        Havelock Ellis.
+
+
+An idle observer of theatrical conditions might derive a certain
+ironic pleasure from remarking the contradiction implied in the
+professed admiration of the constables of the playhouse for the
+unconventional and their almost passionate adoration for the
+conventional. We constantly hear it said that the public cries for
+novelty, and just as constantly we see the same kind of acting, the
+same gestures, the same Julian Mitchellisms and George Marionisms and
+Ned Wayburnisms repeated in and out of season, summer and winter.
+Indeed, certain conventions (which bore us even now) are so deeply
+rooted in the soil of our theatre that I see no hope of their being
+eradicated before the year 1999, at which date other conventions will
+have supplanted them and will likewise have become tiresome.
+
+In this respect our theatre does not differ materially from the
+theatres of other countries except in one particular. In Europe the
+juxtaposition of nations makes an interchange of conventions possible,
+which brings about slow change or rapid revolution. Paris, for
+example, has received visits from the Russian Ballet which almost
+assumed the proportions of Tartar invasions. London, too, has been
+invaded by the Russians and by the Irish. The Irish playwrights,
+indeed, are continually pounding away at British middle-class
+complacency. Germany, in turn, has been invaded by England (we regret
+that this sentence has only an artistic and figurative significance),
+and we find Max Reinhardt well on his way toward giving a complete
+cycle of the plays of Shakespeare; a few years ago we might have
+observed Deutschland groveling hysterically before Oscar Wilde's
+_Salome_, a play which, at least without its musical dress, has not, I
+believe, even yet been performed publicly in London. In Italy, of
+course, there are no artistic invasions (nobody cares to pay for them)
+and even the conventions of the Italian theatre themselves, such as
+the _Commedia del' Arte_, are quite dead; so the country remains as
+dormant, artistically speaking, as a rag rug, until an enthusiast like
+Marinetti arises to take it between his teeth and shake it back into
+rags again.
+
+Very often whisperings of art life in the foreign theatre (such as
+accounts of Stanislavski's accomplishments in Moscow) cross the
+Atlantic. Very often the husks of the realities (as was the case with
+the Russian Ballet) are imported. But whispers and husks have about as
+much influence as the "New York Times" in a mayoralty campaign, and as
+a result we find the American theatre as little aware of world
+activities in the drama as a deaf mute living on a pole in the desert
+of Sahara would be. Indeed any intrepid foreign investigator who
+wishes to study the American drama, American acting, and American
+stage decoration will find them in almost as virgin a condition as
+they were in the time of Lincoln.
+
+A few rude assaults have been made on this smug eupepsy. I might
+mention the coming of Paul Orleneff, who left Alla Nazimova with us to
+be eventually swallowed up in the conventional American theatre. Four
+or five years ago a company of Negro players at the Lafayette Theatre
+gave a performance of a musical revue that boomed like the big bell in
+the Kremlin at Moscow. Nobody could be deaf to the sounds. Florenz
+Ziegfeld took over as many of the tunes and gestures as he could buy
+for his _Follies_ of that season, but he neglected to import the one
+essential quality of the entertainment, its style, for the
+exploitation of which Negro players were indispensable. For the past
+two months Mimi Aguglia, one of the greatest actresses of the world,
+has been performing in a succession of classic and modern plays (a
+repertory comprising dramas by Shakespeare, d'Annunzio, and Giacosa)
+at the Garibaldi Theatre, on East Fourth Street, before very large and
+very enthusiastic audiences, but uptown culture and managerial acumen
+will not awaken to the importance of this gesture until they read
+about it in some book published in 1950....
+
+All of which is merely by way of prelude to what I feel must be
+something in the nature of lyric outburst and verbal explosion. A few
+nights ago a Spanish company, unheralded, unsung, indeed almost
+unwelcomed by such reviewers as had to trudge to the out-of-the-way
+Park Theatre, came to New York, in a musical revue entitled _The Land
+of Joy_. The score was written by Joaquín Valverde, _fils_, whose
+music is not unknown to us, and the company included La Argentina, a
+Spanish dancer who had given matinees here in a past season without
+arousing more than mild enthusiasm. The theatrical impressarii, the
+song publishers, and the Broadway rabble stayed away on the first
+night. It was all very well, they might have reasoned, to read about
+the goings on in Spain, but they would never do in America. Spanish
+dancers had been imported in the past without awakening undue
+excitement. Did not the great Carmencita herself visit America twenty
+or more years ago? These impressarii had ignored the existence of a
+great psychological (or more properly physiological) truth: you cannot
+mix Burgundy and Beer! One Spanish dancer surrounded by Americans is
+just as much lost as the great Nijinsky himself was in an English
+music hall, where he made a complete and dismal failure. And so they
+would have been very much astonished (had they been present) on the
+opening night to have witnessed all the scenes of uncontrollable
+enthusiasm--just as they are described by Havelock Ellis, Richard
+Ford, and Chabrier--repeated. The audience, indeed, became hysterical,
+and broke into wild cries of _Ole! Ole!_ Hats were thrown on the
+stage. The audience became as abandoned as the players, became a part
+of the action.
+
+You will find all this described in "The Soul of Spain," in
+"Gatherings from Spain," in Chabrier's letters, and it had all been
+transplanted to New York almost without a whisper of preparation,
+which is fortunate, for if it had been expected, doubtless we would
+have found the way to spoil it. Fancy the average New York first-night
+audience, stiff and unbending, sceptical and sardonic, welcoming this
+exhibition! Havelock Ellis gives an ingenious explanation for the fact
+that Spanish dancing has seldom if ever successfully crossed the
+border of the Iberian peninsula: "The finest Spanish dancing is at
+once killed or degraded by the presence of an indifferent or
+unsympathetic public, and that is probably why it cannot be
+transplanted, but remains local." Fortunately the Spaniards in the
+first-night audience gave the cue, unlocked the lips and loosened the
+hands of us cold Americans. For my part, I was soon yelling _Ole!_
+louder than anybody else.
+
+The dancer, Doloretes, is indeed extraordinary. The gipsy fascination,
+the abandoned, perverse bewitchery of this female devil of the dance
+is not to be described by mouth, typewriter, or quilled pen. Heine
+would have put her at the head of his dancing temptresses in his
+ballet of _Méphistophéla_ (found by Lumley too indecent for
+representation at Her Majesty's Theatre, for which it was written; in
+spite of which the scenario was published in the respectable "Revue de
+Deux Mondes"). In this ballet a series of dancing celebrities are
+exhibited by the female Méphistophélès for the entertainment of her
+victim. After Salome had twisted her flanks and exploited the prowess
+of her abdominal muscles to perfunctory applause, Doloretes would have
+heated the blood, not only of Faust, but of the ladies and gentlemen
+in the orchestra stalls, with the clicking of her heels, the clacking
+of her castanets, now held high over head, now held low behind her
+back, the flashing of her ivory teeth, the shrill screaming, electric
+magenta of her smile, the wile of her wriggle, the passion of her
+performance. And close beside her the sinuous Mazantinita would flaunt
+a garish tambourine and wave a shrieking fan. All inanimate objects,
+shawls, mantillas, combs, and cymbals, become inflamed with life, once
+they are pressed into the service of these señoritas, languorous and
+forbidding, indifferent and sensuous. Against these rude gipsies the
+refined grace and Goyaesque elegance of La Argentina stand forth in
+high relief, La Argentina, in whose hands the castanets become as
+potent an instrument for our pleasure as the violin does in the
+fingers of Jascha Heifetz. Bilbao, too, with his thundering heels and
+his tauromachian gestures, bewilders our highly magnetized senses.
+When, in the dance, he pursues, without catching, the elusive
+Doloretes, it would seem that the limit of dynamic effects in the
+theatre had been reached.
+
+Here are singers! The limpid and lovely soprano of the comparatively
+placid Maria Marco, who introduces figurations into the brilliant
+music she sings at every turn. One indecent (there is no other word
+for it) chromatic oriental phrase is so strange that none of us can
+ever recall it or forget it! And the frantically nervous Luisita
+Puchol, whose eyelids spring open like the cover of a Jack-in-the-box,
+and whose hands flutter like saucy butterflies, sings suggestive
+popular ditties just a shade better than any one else I know of.
+
+But _The Land of Joy_ does not rely on one or two principals for its
+effect. The organization as a whole is as full of fire and purpose as
+the original Russian Ballet; the costumes themselves, in their
+blazing, heated colours, constitute the ingredients of an orgy; the
+music, now sentimental (the adaptability of Valverde, who has lived in
+Paris, is little short of amazing; there is a vocal waltz in the style
+of Arditi that Mme. Patti might have introduced into the lesson scene
+of _Il Barbiere_; there is another song in the style of George M.
+Cohan--these by way of contrast to the Iberian music), now pulsing
+with rhythmic life, is the best Spanish music we have yet heard in
+this country. The whole entertainment, music, colours, costumes,
+songs, dances, and all, is as nicely arranged in its crescendos and
+decrescendos, its prestos and adagios as a Mozart finale. The close of
+the first act, in which the ladies sweep the stage with long ruffled
+trains, suggestive of all the Manet pictures you have ever seen, would
+seem to be unapproachable, but the most striking costumes and the
+wildest dancing are reserved for the very last scene of all. There
+these bewildering señoritas come forth in the splendourous envelope of
+embroidered Manila shawls, and such shawls! Prehistoric African roses
+of unbelievable measure decorate a texture of turquoise, from which
+depends nearly a yard of silken fringe. In others mingle royal purple
+and buff, orange and white, black and the kaleidoscope! The revue, a
+sublimated form of zarzuela, is calculated, indeed, to hold you in a
+dangerous state of nervous excitement during the entire evening, to
+keep you awake for the rest of the night, and to entice you to the
+theatre the next night and the next. It is as intoxicating as vodka,
+as insidious as cocaine, and it is likely to become a habit, like
+these stimulants. I have found, indeed, that it appeals to all classes
+of taste, from that of a telephone operator, whose usual artistic
+debauch is the latest antipyretic novel of Robert W. Chambers, to that
+of the frequenter of the concert halls.
+
+I cannot resist further cataloguing; details shake their fists at my
+memory; for instance, the intricate rhythms of Valverde's elaborately
+syncopated music (not at all like ragtime syncopation), the thrilling
+orchestration (I remember one dance which is accompanied by drum taps
+and oboe, nothing else!), the utter absence of tangos (which are
+Argentine), and habaneras (which are Cuban), most of the music being
+written in two-four and three-four time, and the interesting use of
+folk-tunes; the casual and very suggestive indifference of the
+dancers, while they are not dancing, seemingly models for a dozen
+Zuloaga paintings, the apparently inexhaustible skill and variety of
+these dancers in action, winding ornaments around the melodies with
+their feet and bodies and arms and heads and castanets as coloratura
+sopranos do with their voices. Sometimes castanets are not used;
+cymbals supplant them, or tambourines, or even fingers. Once, by some
+esoteric witchcraft, the dancers seemed to tap upon their arms. The
+effect was so stupendous and terrifying that I could not project
+myself into that aloof state of mind necessary for a calm dissection
+of its technique.
+
+What we have been thinking of all these years in accepting the
+imitation and ignoring the actuality I don't know; it has all been
+down in black and white. What Richard Ford saw and wrote down in 1846
+I am seeing and writing down in 1917. How these devilish Spaniards
+have been able to keep it up all this time I can't imagine. Here we
+have our paradox. Spain has changed so little that Ford's book is
+still the best to be procured on the subject (you may spend many a
+delightful half-hour with the charming irony of its pages for
+company). Spanish dancing is apparently what it was a hundred years
+ago; no wind from the north has disturbed it. Stranger still, it
+depends for its effect on the acquirement of a brilliant technique.
+Merely to play the castanets requires a severe tutelage. And yet it is
+all as spontaneous, as fresh, as unstudied, as vehement in its appeal,
+even to Spaniards, as it was in the beginning. Let us hope that Spain
+will have no artistic reawakening.
+
+Aristotle and Havelock Ellis and Louis Sherwin have taught us that the
+theatre should be an outlet for suppressed desires. So, indeed, the
+ideal theatre should. As a matter of fact, in most playhouses (I will
+generously refrain from naming the one I visited yesterday) I am
+continually suppressing a desire to strangle somebody or other, but
+after a visit to the Spaniards I walk out into Columbus Circle
+completely purged of pity and fear, love, hate, and all the rest. It
+is an experience.
+
+  _November 3, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+A Note on Mimi Aguglia
+
+     _"Art has to do only with the creation of beauty, whether it
+     be in words, or sounds, or colour, or outline, or rhythmical
+     movement; and the man who writes music is no more truly an
+     artist than the man who plays that music, the poet who
+     composes rhythms in words no more truly an artist than the
+     dancer who composes rhythms with the body, and the one is no
+     more to be preferred to the other, than the painter is to be
+     preferred to the sculptor, or the musician to the poet, in
+     those forms of art which we have agreed to recognize as of
+     equal value."_
+
+                        Arthur Symons.
+
+
+The only George Jean, "witty, wise, and cruel," and the "amaranthine"
+Louis Sherwin, who understands better than anybody else how to plunge
+the rapier into the vulnerable spot and twist it in the wound, making
+the victim writhe, have been having some fun with the art of acting
+lately, or to be exact, with the art of actors. Now actor-baiting is
+no new game; as a winter sport it is as popular as making jokes about
+mothers-in-law, decrying the art of Bouguereau or Howard Chandler
+Christy, or discussing the methods of Mr. Belasco. Ever so long ago
+(and George Henry Lewes preceded him) George Moore wrote an article
+called "Mummer Worship," holding the players up to ridicule, but
+George really adores the theatre and even acting, goes to the
+playhouse constantly, and writes a bad play himself every few years.
+None of these has achieved success on the stage. The list includes
+_Martin Luther_, written with a collaborator, _The Strike at
+Arlingford_, _The Bending of the Bough_ (Moore's version of a play by
+Edwin Martyn), a dramatization of "Esther Waters," _Elizabeth Cooper_,
+and the fragment, _The Apostle_, on which "The Brook Kerith," was
+based. Now he is at work turning the novel back into another play....
+When the Sunday editor of a newspaper is at his wit's end he
+invariably sends a competent reporter to collect data for a symposium
+on one of two topics, Is the author or the player more important? or
+Does the stage director make the actor? The amount of amusement this
+reporter can derive in gathering indignant replies from mountebanks
+and scribblers is only limited by his own sense of humour. Even the
+late Sir Henry Irving felt compelled on more than one occasion to
+defend his "noble calling."
+
+The actor, when he slaps back, usually overlooks the point at issue,
+but sometimes he has something to say over which we may well ponder.
+Witness, for example, the following passage, quoted from that justly
+celebrated compendium of personal opinions and broad-shaft wit called
+"Nat Goodwin's Book": "The average author and manager of today are
+prone to advertise themselves as conspicuously as the play (as if the
+public cared a snap who wrote the play or who 'presents'). I doubt if
+five per cent of the public know who wrote 'The Second Mrs.
+Tanqueray,' 'In Mizzoura,' or 'Richelieu,' but they know their stage
+favourites. I wonder how many mantels are adorned with pictures of the
+successful dramatist and those who 'present' and how many there are on
+which appear Maude Adams, Dave Warfield, Billie Burke, John Drew,
+Bernhardt, Duse, and hundreds of other distinguished players."
+
+It is principally urged against the claims of acting as an art that a
+young person without previous experience or training can make an
+immediate (and sometimes lasting) effect upon the stage, whereas in
+the preparation for any other art (even the interpretative arts) years
+of training are necessary. This premise is full of holes; nevertheless
+George Moore, and Messrs. Nathan and Sherwin all cling to it. It is
+true that almost any young girl, moderately gifted with charm or
+comeliness, may make an instantaneous impression on our stage,
+especially in the namby-pamby rôles which our playwrights usually give
+her to play. But she is soon found out. She may still attract
+audiences (as George Barr McCutcheon and Alma Tadema still attract
+audiences) but the discerning part of the public will take no joy in
+seeing her. Charles Frohman said (and he ought to know) that the
+average life of a female star on the American stage was ten years; in
+other words, her career continued as long as her youth and physical
+charms remained potent.
+
+We have easily accounted for the unimportant actors, the rank and
+file, but what about those who immediately claim positions which they
+hold in spite of their lack of previous training? These are rarer. At
+the moment, indeed, I cannot think of any. For while genius often
+manifests itself early in a career, the great actors, as a rule, have
+struggled for many years to learn the rudiments of their art before
+they have given indisputable proof of their greatness, or before they
+have been recognized. "Real acting," according to Percy Fitzgerald,
+"is a science, to be studied and mastered, as other sciences are
+studied and mastered, by long years of training." They may not have
+had the strenuous Conservatoire and Théâtre Français training of Sarah
+Bernhardt. As a matter of fact, indeed, the actor may far better learn
+to handle his tools by manipulating them before an audience, than by
+practicing with them for too long a time in the closet. The technique
+of violin playing can best be acquired before the _virtuoso_ appears
+in public, although no amount of training in itself will make a great
+violinist, but the basic elements of acting, grace, diction, etc., can
+just as well be acquired behind the footlights and so many great
+actors have acquired them, as many of the greatest have ignored them.
+There can be no hard and fast rules laid down for this sort of thing.
+Can we thank nine months with Mme. Marchesi for the instantaneous
+success and subsequent brilliant career of Mme. Melba? Against this
+training offset the years and years of road playing and the more years
+of study at home in retirement to account for the career of Mrs.
+Fiske. The Australian soprano was born with a naturally-placed and
+flexible voice. Her shake is said to have been perfection when she was
+a child; her scale was even; her intonation impeccable. She had very
+little to learn except the rôles in the operas she was to sing and her
+future was very clearly marked from the night she made her début as
+Gilda in _Rigolettò_. Mme. Patti was equally gifted. Mme. Pasta and
+Mme. Fremstad, on the other hand, toiled very slowly towards fame. The
+former singer was an absolute failure when she first appeared in
+London and it took several years of hard work to make her the greatest
+lyric artist of her day. The great Jenny Lind retired from the stage
+completely defeated, only to return as the most popular singer of her
+time. Mischa Elman has told me he never practices; Leo Ornstein, on
+the other hand, spends hours every day at the piano. Mozart sprang,
+full-armed with genius, into the world. He began composing at the age
+of four. No training was necessary for him, but Beethoven and Wagner
+developed slowly. In the field of writers there are even more happy
+examples. Hundreds of boys have spent years in theme and literature
+courses in college preparing in vain for a future which was never to
+be theirs, while other youths with no educations have taken to writing
+as a cat takes to cat-nip. Should we assume that the annual output of
+Professor Baker's class at Harvard produces better playwrights than
+Molière or Shakespeare, neither of whom enjoyed Professor Baker's
+lectures, nor, I think I am safe in conjecturing, anything like them?
+
+What, after all, constitutes training? For a creative or
+interpretative genius mere existence seems to be sufficient. Joseph
+Conrad, Nicholas Rimsky-Korsakov, and Patrick MacGill all were sailors
+for many years before they began to write. We owe "Youth" and the
+first section of _Scheherazade_ to this accident. MacGill also had the
+privilege of digging potatoes; he writes about it in "The Rat-pit."
+Mrs. Patrick Campbell learned enough about how to move about and how
+to speak in the country houses she frequented before she began her
+professional career to enable her immediately to take a position of
+importance on the stage. It does not seem necessary, indeed, that the
+training for any career should be prescribed or systematic. Some men
+get their training one way and some another. A school of acting may be
+of the greatest benefit to A, while B will not profit by it. Some
+actors are ruined by stock companies; others are improved by them. The
+geniuses in this interpretative art as in all the other interpretative
+and creative arts, seem to rise above obstructions, and to make
+themselves felt, whatever difficulties are put in their way.
+
+Some great actors, like some great musicians and authors, create out
+of their fulness. They cannot explain; they do not need to study;
+they create by instinct. Others, like Beethoven and Olive Fremstad,
+work and rework their material in the closet until it approaches
+perfection, when they expose it. To say that there are bad actors
+following in the footsteps of both these types of geniuses is to be
+axiomatic and trite. It would be a foregone conclusion. Just as there
+are musicians who write as easily as Mozart but who have nothing to
+say, so there are other musicians who write and rewrite, work and
+rework, study and restudy, and yet what they finally offer the public
+has not the quality or the force or the inspiration of a common
+gutter-ballad.
+
+It has also been urged in print that as naturalness is the goal of the
+actor he should never have to strive for it. The names of Frank
+Reicher and John Drew are often mentioned as those of men who "play
+themselves" on the stage. A most difficult thing to do! Also an
+unfortunate choice of names. Each of these artists has undergone a
+long and arduous apprenticeship in order to achieve the natural method
+which has given him eminence in his career. Indeed, of all the
+qualities of the actor this is the least easy to acquire.
+
+Actors are often condemned because they are not versatile. Versatility
+is undoubtedly an admirable quality in an actor, valuable, especially
+to his manager, but hardly an essential one. An artist is not
+required to do more than one thing well. Vladimir de Pachmann
+specializes in Chopin playing, but Arthur Symons once wrote that "he
+is the greatest living pianist, because he can play certain things
+better than any other pianist can play anything." Should we not allot
+similar approval to the actor or actress who makes a fine effect in
+one part or in one kind of part? I should not call Ellen Terry a
+versatile actress, but I should call her a great artist. Marie Tempest
+is not versatile, unless she should be so designated for having made
+equal successes on the lyric and dramatic stages, but she is one of
+the most satisfying artists at present appearing before our public.
+Mallarmé was not versatile; Cézanne was not versatile; nor was Thomas
+Love Peacock. Mascagni, assuredly, is not versatile. The da Vincis and
+Wagners are rare figures in the history of creative art just as the
+Nijinskys and Rachels are rare in the history of interpretative art.
+
+Someone may say that the great actor dies while the play goes
+thundering on through the ages on the stage and in everyman's library.
+This very point, indeed, is made by Mr. Lewes. But this, alas, is the
+reverse of the truth. We have competent and immensely absorbing
+records of the lives and art of David Garrick, Mrs. Siddons, Ristori,
+Clairon, Rachel, Charlotte Cushman, Edwin Booth, and other prominent
+players, while most of the plays in which they appeared are not only
+no longer actable, but also no longer readable. The brothers de
+Goncourt, for example, wrote an account of Clairon which is a book of
+the first interest, while I defy any one to get through two pages of
+most of the fustian she was compelled to act! The reason for this is
+very easily formulated. Great acting is human and universal. It is
+eternal in its appeal and its memory is easily kept alive while
+playwrighting is largely a matter of fashion, and appeals to the mob
+of men and women who never read and who are more interested in police
+news than they are in poetry. George Broadhurst or Henry Bernstein or
+Arthur Wing Pinero, or others like them, have always been the popular
+playwrights; a few names like Sophocles, Terence, Molière,
+Shakespeare, and Ibsen come rolling down to us, but they are precious
+and few.
+
+A great actor, indeed, can put life into perfectly wooden material. In
+the case of Sarah Bernhardt, who was the creator, the actress or
+Sardou? In the case of Henry Irving, who was the creator, the actor or
+the authors of _The Bells_ and _Faust_ (not, in this instance,
+Goethe)? Is Langdon Mitchell's version of "Vanity Fair" sufficiently
+a work of art to exist without the co-operation of Mrs. Fiske? When
+Duse electrified her audiences in such plays as _The Second Mrs.
+Tanqueray_ and _Fedora_, were the dramatists responsible for the
+effect? Arthur Symons says of her in the latter play, "A great
+actress, who is also a great intelligence, is seen accepting it, for
+its purpose, with contempt, as a thing to exercise her technical skill
+upon." One reads of Mrs. Siddone that she could move a roomful of
+people to tears merely by repeating the word "hippopotamus" with
+varying stress. Should we thank the behemoth for this miracle?
+
+Any one who understands, great acting knows that it is illumination.
+There are those who are born to throw light on the creations of the
+poets, just as there are others born to be poets. These interpreters
+give a new life to the works of the masters, Æschylus, Congreve,
+Tchekhov. When, as more frequently happens, they are called upon to
+play mediocre parts it is with their own personal force, their
+atmospheric aura that they create something more than the author
+himself ever intended or dreamed of. How could Joseph Jefferson play
+_Rip Van Winkle_ for thirty years (or longer) with scenery in tatters
+and a company of mummers which Corse Payton would have scorned? Was
+it because of the greatness of the play? If that were true, why is not
+some one else performing this drama today to large audiences? Has any
+one read the Joseph Jefferson acting version of _Rip Van Winkle_? Who
+wrote it? Don't you think it rather extraordinary that a play which
+apparently has given so much pleasure, and in which Jefferson was
+hailed as a great actor by every contemporary critic of note, as is in
+itself so little known? It is not extraordinary. It was Jefferson's
+performance of the title rôle which gave vitality to the play.
+
+Of course, there are few actors who have this power, few great actors.
+What else could you expect? A critic might prove that playwriting was
+not an art on the majority of the evidence. Almost all the music
+composed in America could be piled up to prove that music was not an
+art. Should we say that there is no art of painting because the
+Germans have no great painters?
+
+At present, however, it is quite possible for any one in New York with
+car or taxi-cab fare to see one of the greatest of living actresses.
+She is not playing on Broadway. This actress has never been to
+dramatic school; she has not had the advantages of Alla Nazimova, who
+has worked with at least one fine stage director. She was simply born
+a genius, that is all; she has perfected her art by appearing in a
+great variety of parts, the method of Edwin Booth. Most of these parts
+happen to be in masterpieces of the drama. She is not unaccustomed to
+playing _Zaza_ one evening and d'Annunzio's _Francesca da Rimini_ the
+next. Her repertory further includes _La Dame aux Camélias_, _Hamlet_,
+_Romeo and Juliet_, _La Figlia di Iorio_, Giuseppe Giacosa's _Come le
+Foglie_, Sicilian folk-plays, and plays by Arturo Giovannitti. When I
+first saw Mimi Aguglia she was little more than a crude force, a great
+struggling light, that sometimes illuminated, nay often blinded, but
+which shone in unequal flashes. Experience has made of her an actress
+who is almost unfailing in her effect. If you asked her about the
+technique of her art she would probably smile (as Mozart and Schubert
+might have done before her); if you asked her about her method she
+would not understand you ... but she understands the art of acting.
+
+Watch her, for instance, in the second act of _Zaza_, in the scene in
+which the music hall singer discovers that her lover has a wife and
+child. No heroics, no shrieks, no conventional posturings and
+shruggings and sobbing ... something far worse she exposes to us, a
+nameless terror. She stands with her back against a table, nonchalant
+and smilingly defiant, unwilling to return to the music hall with her
+former partner, but pleasantly jocular in her refusal. Stung into
+anger, he hurls his last bomb. Zaza is smoking. As she listens to the
+cruel words the corner of her mouth twitches, the cigarette almost
+falls. That is all. There is a moment's silence unbroken save by the
+heartbeats of her spectators. Even the babies which mothers bring in
+abundance to the Italian theatre are quiet. With that esoteric
+magnetism with which great artists are possessed she holds the
+audience captive by this simple gesture. I could continue to point out
+other astounding details in this impersonation, but not one of them,
+perhaps, would illustrate Aguglia's art as does this one. If no
+training is necessary to produce effects of this kind, I would
+pronounce acting the most holy of the arts, for then, surely, it is a
+direct gift from God.
+
+  _September 5, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+The New Isadora
+
+    _"We shift and bedeck and bedrape us,
+      Thou art noble and nude and antique;"_
+
+                        Swinburne's "Dolores."
+
+
+I have a fine memory of a chance description flung off by some one at
+a dinner in Paris; a picture of the youthful Isadora Duncan in her
+studio in New York developing her ideals through sheer will and
+preserving the contour of her feet by wearing carpet slippers. The
+latter detail stuck in my memory. It may or may not be true, but it
+could have been, _should_ have been true. The incipient dancer keeping
+her feet pure for her coming marriage with her art is a subject for
+philosophic dissertation or for poetry. There are many poets who would
+have seized on this idea for an ode or even a sonnet, had it occurred
+to them. Oscar Wilde would have liked this excuse for a poem ... even
+Robert Browning, who would have woven many moral strophes from this
+text.... It would have furnished Mr. George Moore with material for
+another story for the volume called "Celibates." Walter Pater might
+have dived into some very beautiful, but very conscious, prose with
+this theme as a spring-board. Huysmans would have found this
+suggestion sufficient inspiration for a romance the length of
+"Clarissa Harlowe." You will remember that the author of "En Route"
+meditated writing a novel about a man who left his house to go to his
+office. Perceiving that his shoes have not been polished he stops at a
+boot-black's and during the operation he reviews his affairs. The
+problem was to make 300 pages of this!... Lombroso would have added
+the detail to his long catalogue in "The Man of Genius" as another
+proof of the insanity of artists. Georges Feydeau would have found
+therein enough matter for a three-act farce and d'Annunzio for a
+poetic drama which he might have dedicated to "Isadora of the
+beautiful feet." Sermons might be preached from the text and many
+painters would touch the subject with reverence. Manet might have
+painted Isadora with one of the carpet slippers half depending from a
+bare, rosy-white foot.
+
+There are many fables concerning the beginning of Isadora's career.
+One has it that the original dance in bare feet was an accident....
+Isadora was laving her feet in an upper chamber when her hostess
+begged her to dance for her other guests. Just as she was she
+descended and met with such approval that thenceforth her feet
+remained bare. This is a pretty tale, but it has not the fine ring of
+truth of the story of the carpet slippers. There had been bare-foot
+dancers before Isadora; there had been, I venture to say, discinct
+"Greek dancers." Isadora's contribution to her art is spiritual; it is
+her feeling for the idea of the dance which isolates her from her
+contemporaries. Many have overlooked this essential fact in attempting
+to account for her obvious importance. Her imitators (and has any
+other interpretative artist ever had so many?) have purloined her
+costumes, her gestures, her steps; they have put the music of
+Beethoven and Schubert to new uses as she had done before them; they
+have unbound their hair and freed their feet; but the essence of her
+art, the _spirit_, they have left in her keeping; they could not well
+do otherwise.
+
+Inspired perhaps by Greek phrases, by the superb collection of Greek
+vases in the old Pinakotheck in Munich, Isadora cast the knowledge she
+had gleaned of the dancer's training from her. At least she forced it
+to be subservient to her new wishes. She flung aside her memory of the
+entrechat and the pirouette, the studied technique of the ballet; but
+in so doing she unveiled her own soul. She called her art the
+renaissance of the Greek ideal but there was something modern about
+it, pagan though it might be in quality. Always it was pure and
+sexless ... always abstract emotion has guided her interpretations.
+
+In the beginning she danced to the piano music of Chopin and Schubert.
+Eleven years ago I saw her in Munich in a program of Schubert
+_impromptus_ and Chopin _preludes_ and _mazurkas_. A year or two later
+she was dancing in Paris to the accompaniment of the Colonne
+Orchestra, a good deal of the music of Gluck's _Orfeo_ and the very
+lovely dances from _Iphigénie en Aulide_. In these she remained
+faithful to her original ideal, the beauty of abstract movement, the
+rhythm of exquisite gesture. This was not sense echoing sound but
+rather a very delightful confusion of her own mood with that of the
+music.
+
+So a new grace, a new freedom were added to the dance; in her later
+representations she has added a third quality, strength. Too, her
+immediate interpretations often suggest concrete images.... A
+passionate patriotism for one of her adopted countries is at the root
+of her fiery miming of the _Marseillaise_, a patriotism apparently as
+deep-rooted, certainly as inflaming, as that which inspired Rachel in
+her recitation of this hymn during the Paris revolution of 1848. In
+times of civil or international conflagration the dancer, the actress
+often play important rôles in world politics. Malvina Cavalazzi, the
+Italian _ballerina_ who appeared at the Academy of Music during the
+Eighties and who married Charles Mapleson, son of the impressario,
+once told me of a part she had played in the making of United Italy.
+During the Austrian invasion the Italian flag was _verboten_. One
+night, however, during a representation of opera in a town the name of
+which I have forgotten, Mme. Cavalazzi wore a costume of green and
+white, while her male companion wore red, so that in the _pas de deux_
+which concluded the ballet they formed automatically a semblance of
+the Italian banner. The audience was raised to a hysterical pitch of
+enthusiasm and rushed from the theatre in a violent mood, which
+resulted in an immediate encounter with the Austrians and their
+eventual expulsion from the city.
+
+Isadora's pantomimic interpretation of the _Marseillaise_, given in
+New York before the United States had entered the world war, aroused
+as vehement and excited an expression of enthusiasm as it would be
+possible for an artist to awaken in our theatre today. The audiences
+stood up and scarcely restrained their impatience to cheer. At the
+previous performances in Paris, I am told, the effect approached the
+incredible.... In a robe the colour of blood she stands enfolded; she
+sees the enemy advance; she feels the enemy as it grasps her by the
+throat; she kisses her flag; she tastes blood; she is all but crushed
+under the weight of the attack; and then she rises, triumphant, with
+the terrible cry, _Aux armes, citoyens!_ Part of her effect is gained
+by gesture, part by the massing of her body, but the greater part by
+facial expression. In the anguished appeal she does not make a sound,
+beyond that made by the orchestra, but the hideous din of a hundred
+raucous voices seems to ring in our ears. We see Félicien Rops's
+_Vengeance_ come to life; we see the _sans-culottes_ following the
+carts of the aristocrats on the way to execution ... and finally we
+see the superb calm, the majestic flowing strength of the Victory of
+Samothrace.... At times, legs, arms, a leg or an arm, the throat, or
+the exposed breast assume an importance above that of the rest of the
+mass, suggesting the unfinished sculpture of Michael Angelo, an
+aposiopesis which, of course, served as Rodin's inspiration.
+
+In the _Marche Slav_ of Tschaikovsky Isadora symbolizes her conception
+of the Russian moujik rising from slavery to freedom. With her hands
+bound behind her back, groping, stumbling, head-bowed, knees bent, she
+struggles forward, clad only in a short red garment that barely covers
+her thighs. With furtive glances of extreme despair she peers above
+and ahead. When the strains of _God Save the Czar_ are first heard in
+the orchestra she falls to her knees and you see the peasant
+shuddering under the blows of the knout. The picture is a tragic one,
+cumulative in its horrific details. Finally comes the moment of
+release and here Isadora makes one of her great effects. She does not
+spread her arms apart with a wide gesture. She brings them forward
+slowly and we observe with horror that they have practically forgotten
+how to move at all! They are crushed, these hands, crushed and
+bleeding after their long serfdom; they are not hands at all but
+claws, broken, twisted piteous claws! The expression of frightened,
+almost uncomprehending, joy with which Isadora concludes the march is
+another stroke of her vivid imaginative genius.
+
+In her third number inspired by the Great War, the _Marche Lorraine_
+of Louis Ganne, in which is incorporated the celebrated _Chanson
+Lorraine_, Isadora with her pupils, symbolizes the gaiety of the
+martial spirit. It is the spirit of the cavalry riding gaily with
+banners waving in the wind; the infantry marching to an inspired
+tune. There is nothing of the horror of war or revolution in this
+picture ... only the brilliancy and dash of war ... the power and the
+glory!
+
+Of late years Isadora has danced (in the conventional meaning of the
+word) less and less. Since her performance at Carnegie Hall several
+years ago of the _Liebestod_ from _Tristan_, which Walter Damrosch
+hailed as an extremely interesting experiment, she has attempted to
+express something more than the joy of melody and rhythm. Indeed on at
+least three occasions she has danced a Requiem at the Metropolitan
+Opera House.... If the new art at its best is not dancing, neither is
+it wholly allied to the art of pantomime. It would seem, indeed, that
+Isadora is attempting to express something of the spirit of sculpture,
+perhaps what Vachell Lindsay describes as "moving sculpture." Her
+medium, of necessity, is still rhythmic gesture, but its development
+seems almost dream-like. More than the dance this new art partakes of
+the fluid and unending quality of music. Like any other new art it is
+not to be understood at first and I confess in the beginning it said
+nothing to me but eventually I began to take pleasure in watching it.
+Now Isadora's poetic and imaginative interpretation of the symphonic
+interlude from César Franck's _Redemption_ is full of beauty and
+meaning to me and during the whole course of its performance the
+interpreter scarcely rises from her knees. The neck, the throat, the
+shoulders, the head and arms are her means of expression. I thought of
+Barbey d'Aurevilly's phrase, "_Elle avait l'air de monter vers Dieu
+les mains toutes pleines de bonnes oeuvres._"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Isadora's teaching has had its results but her influence has been
+wider in other directions. Fokine thanks her for the new Russian
+Ballet. She did indeed free the Russians from the conventions of the
+classic ballet and but for her it is doubtful if we should have seen
+_Scheherazade_ and _Cléopâtre_. _Daphnis et Chloe_, _Narcisse_, and
+_L'Aprèsmidi d'un Faune_ bear her direct stamp. This then, aside from
+her own appearances, has been her great work. Of her celebrated school
+of dancing I cannot speak with so much enthusiasm. The defect in her
+method of teaching is her insistence (consciously or unconsciously) on
+herself as a model. The seven remaining girls of her school dance
+delightfully. They are, in addition, young and beautiful, but they are
+miniature Isadoras. They add nothing to her style; they make the same
+gestures; they take the same steps; they have almost, if not quite,
+acquired a semblance of her spirit. They vibrate with intention; they
+have force; but constantly they suggest just what they are ...
+imitations. When they dance alone they often make a very charming but
+scarcely overpowering effect. When they dance with Isadora they are
+but a moving row of shadow shapes of Isadora that come and go. Her own
+presence suffices to make the effect they all make together.... I have
+been told that when Isadora watches her girls dance she often weeps,
+for then and then only she can behold herself. One of the griefs of an
+actor or a dancer is that he can never see himself. This oversight of
+nature Isadora has to some extent overcome.
+
+Those who like to see pretty dancing, pretty girls, pretty things in
+general will not find much pleasure in contemplating the art of
+Isadora. She is not pretty; her dancing is not pretty. She has been
+cast in nobler mould and it is her pleasure to climb higher mountains.
+Her gesture is titanic; her mood generally one of imperious grandeur.
+She has grown larger with the years--and by this I mean something more
+than the physical meaning of the word, for she is indeed heroic in
+build. But this is the secret of her power and force. There is no
+suggestion of flabbiness about her and so she can impart to us the
+soul of the struggling moujik, the spirit of a nation, the figure on
+the prow of a Greek bark.... And when she interprets the
+_Marseillaise_ she seems indeed to feel the mighty moment.
+
+  _July 14, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+Margaret Anglin Produces
+_As You Like It_
+
+
+Of all the comedies of Shakespeare _As You Like It_ is the one which
+has attracted to itself the most attention from actresses. No feminine
+star but what at one time or another has a desire to play Rosalind.
+Bernard Shaw says, "Who ever failed or could fail as Rosalind?" and I
+am inclined to think him right, though opinions differ. It would seem,
+however, that Rosalind is to the dramatic stage what Mimi in _La
+Bohème_ is to the lyric, a rôle in which a maximum of effect can be
+gotten with a minimum of effort.
+
+Opinions differ however. Stung to fury by Mrs. Kendal's playing of the
+part, George Moore says somewhere, "Mrs. Kendal nurses children all
+day and strives to play Rosalind at night. What infatuation, what
+ridiculous endeavour! To realize the beautiful woodland passion and
+the idea of the transformation a woman must have sinned, for only
+through sin may we learn the charm of innocence. To play Rosalind a
+woman must have had more than one lover, and if she has been made to
+wait in the rain and has been beaten she will have done a great deal
+to qualify herself for the part." Still another critic considers the
+rôle a difficult one. He says: "With the exception of Lady Macbeth no
+woman in Shakespeare is so much in controversy as Rosalind. The
+character is thought to be almost unattainable. An ideal that is lofty
+but at the same time vague seems to possess the Shakespeare scholar,
+accompanied by the profound conviction that it never can be fulfilled.
+Only a few actresses have obtained recognition as Rosalind, chief
+among them being Mrs. Pritchard, Peg Woffington, Mrs. Dancer, Dora
+Jordan, Louisa Nesbitt, Helen Faucit, Ellen Tree, Adelaide Neilson,
+Mrs. Scott-Siddons and Miss Mary Anderson."
+
+Of those who have recently played Rosalind perhaps Mary Anderson, Ada
+Rehan, Henrietta Crosman and Julia Marlowe will remain longest in the
+memory, although Marie Wainwright, Mary Shaw, Mrs. Langtry and Julia
+Neilson are among a long list of those who have tried the part. Miss
+Rehan appeared in the rôle when Augustin Daly revived the comedy at
+Daly's Theatre, December 17, 1889. We are told that an effort was made
+in this production to emphasize the buoyant gaiety of the piece. The
+scenery displayed the woods embellished in a springtime green, and
+the acting did away as much as possible with any of the underlying
+melancholy which flows through the comedy.
+
+William Winter frankly asserts--perhaps not unwittingly giving a
+staggering blow to the art of acting in so doing--that the reason
+Rosalind is not more often embodied "in a competent and enthralling
+manner is that her enchanting quality is something that cannot be
+assumed--it must be possessed; it must exist in the fibre of the
+individual, and its expression will then be spontaneous. Art can
+accomplish much, but it cannot supply the inherent captivation that
+constitutes the puissance of Rosalind. Miss Rehan possesses that
+quality, and the method of her art was the fluent method of natural
+grace."
+
+Fie and a fig for Mr. Moore's theory about being beaten and standing
+in the rain, implies Mr. Winter!
+
+To Mr. Winter I am also indebted for a description of Mary Anderson in
+_As You Like It_: "Miss Anderson, superbly handsome as Rosalind,
+indicated that beneath her pretty swagger, nimble satire and silver
+playfulness Rosalind is as earnest of Juliet--though different in
+temperament and mind--as fond as Viola and as constant as Imogen."
+
+Miss Marlowe's Rosalind, somewhat along the same lines as Miss
+Anderson's, and Miss Crosman's, a hoydenish, tomboy sort of creature,
+first cousin to Mistress Nell and the young lady of _The Amazons_,
+should be familiar to theatregoers of the last two decades.
+
+Last Monday evening Margaret Anglin exposed her version of the comedy.
+As might have been expected, it has met with some unfavourable
+criticism. Preconceived notions of Rosalind are as prevalent as
+preconceived notions of Hamlet. And yet if _As You Like It_ had been
+produced Monday night as a "new fantastic comedy," just as _Prunella_
+was, for instance, I am inclined to think that everybody who dissented
+would have been at Miss Anglin's charming heels.
+
+The scenery has been given undue prominence both by the management and
+by the writers for the newspapers. Its most interesting feature is the
+arrangement by which it is speedily changed about. There were no long
+waits caused by the settings of scenes during the acts. To say,
+however, that it has anything to do with the art of Gordon Craig is to
+speak nonsense. The scenes are painted in much the same manner as that
+to which we are accustomed and inured. There is a certain haze over
+the trees, caused partially by the tints and partially by the
+lighting, which produces a rather charming effect, but the outlines of
+the trees are quite definite; no impressionism here.
+
+The acting is quite a different matter. _As You Like It_ is one of the
+most modern in spirit of the Shakespeare plays. This air of modernity
+is still further emphasized by the fact that the play, for the most
+part, is written in prose. I feel certain that Bernard Shaw derived
+part of his inspiration for _Man and Superman_ from _As You Like It_.
+Only in Shakespeare's play Ann Whitefield (Rosalind) pursues Octavius
+(Orlando) instead of Jack Tanner. I am inclined to believe that Shaw's
+psychology in this instance is the more sound. It seems incredible
+that a girl so witty, so beautiful, and so intelligent as Rosalind
+should waste so much time on that sentimental, uncomprehending
+creature known as Orlando. Every line of Orlando should have sounded
+the knell of his fate in her ears. However, it must be remembered that
+Orlando was young and good-looking, and that, at least in the play,
+men of the right stamp seemed to be scarce. Of course, it is out of
+Touchstone that Shaw has evolved his Jack Tanner.
+
+Whether Miss Anglin had this idea in mind or not when she produced the
+comedy I have no means of ascertaining. It is not essential to my
+point. At least she has emphasized it, and she has done the most
+intelligent stage directing that I have observed in the performance of
+a Shakespeare play for many a long season. There is consistency in the
+acting. Rosalind, Jaques, Touchstone, Celia, Oliver, the dukes,
+Charles, Sylvius, the whole lot, in fact, are natural in method and
+manner. There is no striving for the fantastic. Let that part of the
+comedy take care of itself, undoubtedly suggested Miss Anglin.
+
+Jaques, finely portrayed by Fuller Mellish, delivers that arrant bit
+of nonsense "The Seven Ages of Man" in such a manner as a man might
+tell a rather serious story in a drawing room. "The Seven Ages of
+Man," of course, is just as much of an aria as _La Donna e Mobile_. It
+always awakens applause, but this time the applause was deserved. Mr.
+Mellish emphasized the cynical side of the rôle. He smiled in and out
+of season, and his most "melancholy" remarks were delivered in such a
+manner as to indicate that they were not too deeply felt. Jaques was a
+little bored with the forest and his companions, but he would have
+been quite in his element at Mme. Récamier's. Such was the impression
+that Fuller Mellish gave. Bravo, Mr. Mellish, for an impression!
+
+Similarly the Touchstone of Sidney Greenstreet. We are accustomed to
+more physically attractive Touchstones, fools with finer bodies, and
+yet this keen-minded, stout person spoke his lines with such pertness
+and spontaneity that they rarely failed of their proper effect. As for
+Orlando, it seemed to me that Pedro de Cordoba was a little too
+rhetorical at times to fit in with the spirit of the performance, but
+Orlando at times does not fit into the play. For instance, when he
+utters those incredible lines:
+
+    "If ever you have looked on better days,
+    If ever been where bells have knolled to church,
+    If ever sat at any good man's feast,
+    If ever from your eyelids wiped a tear...."
+
+I do not know whether Miss Anglin is a disciple of George Moore or
+William Winter in her acting of Rosalind. How she acquired her charm
+is not for us to seek into. It is only for us to credit her with
+having it in great plenty. A charming natural manner which made the
+masquerading lady seem more than a fantasy. Her warning to Phebe,
+
+"Sell when you can; you are not for all markets,"
+
+was delicious in its effect. I remember no Rosalind who wooed her
+Orlando so delightfully. For Rosalind, as Woman the Pursuer, driven
+forward by the Life Force, is convincingly Miss Anglin's conception--a
+conception which fits the comedy admirably.
+
+As to the objections which have been raised to Miss Anglin's
+assumption of the masculine garments without any attempt at
+counterfeiting masculinity, I would ask my reader, if she be a woman,
+what she would do if she found it necessary to wear men's clothes. If
+she were not an actress she would undoubtedly behave much as she did
+in women's, suppressing unnecessary and telltale gestures as much as
+possible, but not trying to imitate mannish gestures which would
+immediately stamp her an impostor. There is no internal evidence in
+Shakespeare's play to prove that Rosalind was an actress. She might
+have appeared in private theatricals at the palace, but even that is
+doubtful. Consequently when she donned men's clothes it became evident
+to her that many men are effeminate in gesture and those that are do
+not ordinarily affect mannish movements. Her most obvious concealment
+was to be natural--quite herself. This, I think, is one of the most
+interesting and well-thought-out points of Miss Anglin's
+interpretation.
+
+  _March 20, 1914._
+
+
+
+
+The Modern Composers at a Glance
+
+
+
+
+The Modern Composers at a Glance
+
+An Impertinent Catalogue
+
+
+IGOR STRAVINSKY: Paul Revere rides in Russia.
+
+CYRIL SCOTT: A young man playing Debussy in a Maidenhead villa.
+
+BALILLA PRATELLA: Pretty noises in funny places.
+
+ENGELBERT HUMPERDINCK: His master's voice.
+
+LEO ORNSTEIN: A small boy upsetting a push-cart.
+
+GIACOMO PUCCINI: Pinocchio in a passion.
+
+ERIK SATIE: A mandarin with a toy pistol firing into a wedding cake.
+
+PAUL DUKAS: A giant eating bonbons.
+
+RICCARDO ZANDONAI: Brocade dipped in garlic.
+
+ERICH KORNGOLD: The white hope.
+
+ARNOLD SCHOENBERG: Six times six is thirty-six--and six is ninety-two!
+
+MAURICE RAVEL: Tomorrow ... and tomorrow ... and tomorrow....
+
+CLAUDE DEBUSSY: Chantecler crows _pianissimo_ in whole tones.
+
+RICHARD STRAUSS: An ostrich _not_ hiding his head.
+
+SIR EDWARD ELGAR: The footman leaves his accordion in the bishop's
+carriage.
+
+ITALO MONTEMEZZI: Three Kings--but no aces.
+
+PERCY ALDRIDGE GRAINGER: An effete Australian chewing tobacco.
+
+  _August 8, 1917_.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[Footnote 1: One evidence of this is that his works are eagerly sought
+after and treated tenderly by the second-hand book-sellers. Some of
+them command fancy prices.]
+
+[Footnote 2: For an account of Péladan see my essay on Erik Satie in
+"Interpreters and Interpretations."]
+
+[Footnote 3: You will find an account of Balzac's interesting theory
+regarding names and letters, which may well have had a direct
+influence on Edgar Saltus, in Saltus's "Balzac," p. 29 _et seq._ For a
+precisely contrary theory turn to "The Naming of Streets" in Max
+Beerbohm's "Yet Again."]
+
+[Footnote 4: "Wit and Wisdom from Edgar Saltus" by G. F. Monkshood and
+George Gamble, and "The Cynic's Posy," a collection of epigrams, the
+majority of which are taken from Saltus, may be brought forward in
+evidence.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Certain books by Edgar Saltus have been announced from
+time to time but have never appeared; these include: "Annochiatura,"
+"Immortal Greece," "Our Lady of Beauty," "Cimmeria," "Daughters of
+Dream," "Scaffolds and Altars," "Prince Charming," and "The Crimson
+Curtain."]
+
+[Footnote 6: Houghton, Mifflin and Co,; 1884. Reprinted 1887 and
+1890.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Houghton, Mifflin and Co.; 1885. Reprinted by the Belford
+Co.]
+
+[Footnote 8: George J. Coombes; 1886. Reprinted by Brentano's.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Scribner and Welford; 1887. Revised edition, Belford,
+Clarke and Co.; 1889.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Brentano's; 1887.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Benjamin and Bell; 1887.]
+
+[Footnote 12: Belford Co.; 1888.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Belford, Clarke and Co.; 1888.]
+
+[Footnote 14: Belford Co.; 1889.]
+
+[Footnote 15: Belford Co.; 1889.]
+
+[Footnote 16: Belford, Clarke and Co.; 1889.]
+
+[Footnote 17: Belford Co.; 1890.]
+
+[Footnote 18: Belford Co.; 1891.]
+
+[Footnote 19: Belford Co.; 1891. Reprinted by Mitchell Kennerley;
+1906.]
+
+[Footnote 20: P. F. Collier; 1892; "Written especially for 'Once a
+Week Library.'"]
+
+[Footnote 21: Morrill, Higgins and Co;. 1893. Reprinted by Mitchell
+Kennerley; 1906.]
+
+[Footnote 22: F. Tennyson Neely; 1893.]
+
+[Footnote 23: Tudor Press: 1894.]
+
+[Footnote 24: The Transatlantic Publishing Co.; 1895.]
+
+[Footnote 25: Ainslee; 1903.]
+
+[Footnote 26: A. Wessels Co.; 1905.]
+
+[Footnote 27: Mitchell Kennerley; 1906.]
+
+[Footnote 28: J. B. Lippincott Co.; 1906.]
+
+[Footnote 29: Mitchell Kennerley; 1907.]
+
+[Footnote 30: Mitchell Kennerley; 1907.]
+
+[Footnote 31: Mitchell Kennerley; 1909.]
+
+[Footnote 32: Pulitzer Publishing Co.; 1912.]
+
+[Footnote 33: In an essay entitled "The Great American Composer" in my
+book, "Interpreters and Interpretations."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+Index
+
+
+Abbott, Emma, 220
+
+Academy of Arts and Letters, 80, 225, 227
+
+Acting, 111, 113, 119, 120, 272, 283, 293 _et seq._
+
+Adam, Villiers de l'Isle, 48, 49
+
+Adams, Maude, 295
+
+Adams, Oscar Fay, 38
+
+Æschylus, 103, 303
+
+Agrippina, 69
+
+Aguglia, Mimi, 284, 304, _et seq._
+
+Ainslee's Magazine, 75
+
+Alary, Signor, 248
+
+Alboni, Marietta, 169
+
+Alchemy, 76
+
+Allegranti, Maddalena, 254, 255
+
+Alma Tadema, 296
+
+Alvary, Max, 99
+
+Anderson, Mary, 319, 320
+
+Anfossi, Pasquale, 169
+
+Anglin, Margaret, 321 _et seq._
+
+d'Annunzio, G., 284, 305
+
+Apaches, 126, 135, 138, 140, 141 _et seq._, 182
+
+Apthorp, W. F., 99, 168
+
+Arabanek, 164
+
+Archilei, 94
+
+Arditi, Luigi, 288
+
+Argentina, La, 284, 287
+
+Argus, The, 54
+
+Aristotle, 291
+
+Arne, 257
+
+Arnould, Sophie, 82, 96, 259 _et seq._
+
+Astor, J. J., 227
+
+Atilla, 79
+
+Audran, 216
+
+Augustus, 69, 70
+
+d'Aurevilly, Barbey, 43, 63, 66, 87, 315
+
+Ayres, Frederick, 200
+
+
+Bach, 24, 28, 150, 199
+
+Badarzewska, Thécla, 23
+
+Baedeker, 58
+
+Bag-pipe, 135, 136, 137
+
+Bahamas, 136
+
+Baker, J. Duncan, 211
+
+Baker, Prof., 298
+
+Bakst, Leon, 16
+
+Bal des Gravilliers, 141 _et seq._
+
+Balfe, Michael William, 27, 165
+
+Bal musette, 125, 134 _et seq._
+
+Balzac, 43, 50, 55, 56, 57, 63, 76, 86, 187, 225
+
+Banti, Brigitta, 93, 164
+
+Bara, Theda, 80
+
+Barnabee, Henry Clay, 221
+
+Barnet, R. A., 216
+
+Barrison, Mabel, 219
+
+Barry, Mme. du, 260
+
+Bassoonists, 157
+
+Bataille, Henry, 228, 230, 232
+
+Bates, Katherine Lee, 38
+
+Battistini, 102
+
+Baudelaire, Charles, 43, 52, 131
+
+Baumgarten, C. F., 171
+
+Bayes, Nora, 110
+
+Beardsley, Aubrey, 45
+
+Becque, Henry, 230
+
+Beerbohm, Max, 45, 50, 177, 238
+
+Beethoven, 24, 27, 28, 32, 98, 150, 151, 170, 175, 200, 219, 298, 300
+
+Bégué, Bernard, 156
+
+Belasco, David, 294
+
+Bel canto, 97, 101, 105
+
+Belford's Magazine, 37
+
+Bell, Digby, 222
+
+Bellini, Vincenzo, 24, 25, 77, 79, 97, 100, 101, 114, 175, 248, 267,
+  270, 273
+
+Bel-Marduk, 82
+
+Bergström, Hjalmar, 90
+
+Berlin, Irving, 25, 222, 234
+
+Berlioz, Hector, 27, 104
+
+Bernacchi, Antonio, 99
+
+Bernhardt, Sarah, 106, 222, 227, 245, 295, 297, 302
+
+Bernstein, Henry, 228, 230, 232, 302
+
+Bible, The, 67
+
+Bichara, 15
+
+Bilbao, 287
+
+Billington, Mrs., 172
+
+Bizet, Georges, 108, 113, 275
+
+Blanche, Jacques, 183, 184
+
+Blei, Franz, 69, 78, 259
+
+Böcklin, Arnold, 89
+
+Bonci, Alessandro, 102
+
+Booth, Edwin, 111, 302, 305
+
+Bouguereau, 61, 293
+
+Bourget, Paul, 76
+
+Boyden, Frank L., 203
+
+Boynton, Henry Walcott, 38
+
+Brahma, 82
+
+Brahms, 25, 274
+
+Brann-Brini, Mlle., 164
+
+Branscombe, Gena, 200, 202
+
+Brenon, Algernon St. John, 162
+
+Bretón, Tomás, 113
+
+Brian, Donald, 217
+
+Brice, Fannie, 110
+
+Brieux, 230
+
+Brignoli, Pasquale, 155
+
+Broadhurst, George, 302
+
+Bromley, Eliza, 74
+
+Brothers of the Book, 85
+
+Browning, Robert, 307
+
+Bunn, Alfred, 165
+
+Burke, Billie, 295
+
+Burney, Dr., 258
+
+Butler, Samuel, 21
+
+Byzance, 80
+
+
+Cabanel, 61
+
+Cæsar, Julius, 69
+
+Caffarelli, 95, 96, 112
+
+Cahill, Marie, 110
+
+Cairns, William B., 38
+
+Caligula, 51, 69, 79
+
+Calvé, Emma, 106, 275
+
+Camargo, 258, 259
+
+Campanari, Giuseppe, 161, 162
+
+Campbell, Mrs. Patrick, 299
+
+Caracalla, 79
+
+Carestini, Giovanni, 95, 96
+
+Carmencita, 285
+
+Carnegie Hall, 25
+
+Carré, Albert, 133
+
+Carreño, Teresa, 153
+
+Caruso, Enrico, 272
+
+Cassive, Armande, 232
+
+Catalani, Angelica, 93, 265 _et seq._
+
+Cato, 69
+
+Cats, 59, 69, 77, 102, 127, 131, 132, 233, 258, 259, 298
+
+Cavalazzi, Malvina, 310
+
+Cesare Borgia, 79
+
+Cézanne, 301
+
+Chabrier, Emmanuel, 285
+
+Chadwick, George W., 197, 199, 212
+
+Chambers, Robert W., 290
+
+Chaliapine, Feodor, 114, 155
+
+Charpentier, Gustave, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 173
+
+Cherubini, 98
+
+Cherubino's question, 54
+
+Chinese plays, 103
+
+Chopin, 23, 26, 55, 112, 239, 240, 301, 310
+
+Chorley, Henry Fothergill, 98, 169, 247, 249, 261
+
+Christ, 58, 67, 185, 191, 192
+
+Christianity, 57, 68, 82, 83
+
+Christy, Howard Chandler, 293
+
+Churchill, Lady Randolph, 185
+
+Cimarosa, Domenico, 255
+
+Cinderella, 137
+
+Cicisbeism, 82
+
+Clairon, 96, 260, 302
+
+Classical music, 23
+
+Claudius, 69
+
+Cleopatra, 82
+
+Cline, Maggie, 107
+
+Coerne, L. A., 199, 202
+
+Cohan, George M., 288
+
+Colles, Ramsay, 39
+
+Colonne Orchestra, 310
+
+Coloratura singing, 103, 104
+
+Columbia University, 43
+
+Comstock, Anthony, 59
+
+Condamine, Robert de la, 183
+
+Congreve, 303
+
+Conrad, Joseph, 299
+
+Conried, Henrich, 161, 162
+
+Converse, Frederick, 212
+
+Cooking, 26, 50, 78, 129, 130, 149 _et seq._
+
+Cordoba, Pedro de, 324
+
+Corneille, 104
+
+Costa, Michael, 163
+
+Cou-Cou Restaurant, 125 _et seq._, 183
+
+Courts of Love, 65, 82
+
+Cox, J. E., 165, 173, 264
+
+Cox, Kenyon, 62
+
+Craig, Gordon, 321
+
+Critics, 24, 26, 30, 33, 34, 96, 97, 99, 100, 105, 111, 115, 228, 234
+
+Crosman, Henrietta, 319, 321
+
+Crowest, Frederick, 163, 164
+
+Current Literature, 39
+
+Cushman, Charlotte, 302
+
+Cuzzoni, Francesca, 95, 258
+
+
+Daly, Augustin, 319
+
+Daly, Dan, 222
+
+Damrosch, Walter, 157, 314
+
+Dancing, 112, 113, 137 _et seq._, 281 _et seq._, 307 _et seq._
+
+Dante, 76
+
+Darby, W. D., 200
+
+Davis, Cecilia, 253
+
+Davis, Jessie Bartlett, 221
+
+Davis, Owen, 93
+
+Debussy, Claude, 30, 33, 96, 113, 116, 117, 118, 119, 121, 200, 315, 329
+
+Decoration, Interior, 11 _et seq._
+
+Delacroix, 19
+
+Delibes, Léo, 108, 113
+
+Deslys, Gaby, 222
+
+Destinn, Emmy, 114, 155
+
+Devi, Ratan, 109
+
+Dickens, Charles, 187
+
+Dolmetsch, Arnold, 192
+
+Doloretes, 286, 287, 288
+
+Donizetti, Gaetano, 61, 79, 88, 97, 101, 108, 113, 114, 166, 173, 247,
+  248, 249, 250, 251, 263
+
+Doubleday, 203
+
+Dreiser, Theodore, 202, 203
+
+Dresser, Paul, 202, 203
+
+Dressler, Marie, 222
+
+Drew, John, 111, 295, 300
+
+Duclos, 259
+
+Duff-Gordon, Lady, 222
+
+Dukas, Paul, 104, 113, 114, 329
+
+Dumas, Alexandre, _fils_, 106, 205
+
+Duncan, Isadora, 307 _et seq._
+
+Duse, Eleanora, 277, 295, 303
+
+Dussek, Johann Ludwig, 171
+
+Dyer, Edward, 209
+
+
+
+Eames, Emma, 275
+
+Earle, Virginia, 219
+
+Ehrhard, Auguste, 55
+
+Elgar, Sir Edward, 329
+
+Elizabethan plays, 51, 103
+
+Ellis, Havelock, 281, 285, 286, 291
+
+Ellis, Melville, 222
+
+Elman, Mischa, 298
+
+Elson, L. C., 198, 199
+
+Elssler, Fanny, 55
+
+Eltinge, Julian, 96
+
+Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 43
+
+Euripides, 103
+
+Evertson, Admiral Kornelis, 42
+
+
+
+Fall, Leo, 216
+
+Fame, 42
+
+Farinelli, 95
+
+Farwell, Arthur, 200, 202
+
+Faustina, 95, 96, 258
+
+Fawcett, Edgar, 66
+
+Février, Henry, 113, 115, 118, 119, 120
+
+Feydeau, Georges, 129, 229, 230, 231, 232, 233, 236, 237, 308
+
+Finck, H. T., 24, 25, 30, 32, 58, 95, 99, 153, 272
+
+Fischer, Johann Christian, 161
+
+Fiske, Mrs., 297, 303
+
+Fitzgerald, Percy, 296
+
+Flaubert, Gustave, 66, 76, 87
+
+Folk-song, 30, 33, 100, 106, 109, 152
+
+Follies, The, 16, 222, 223
+
+Foote, Arthur, 199, 202
+
+Ford, Richard, 285, 291
+
+Formes, Karl, 164
+
+Forum, The, 87
+
+Foster, Stephen, 29, 33, 152
+
+Fox, Della, 217, 218, 219
+
+Fox, Helen Kelsey, 208
+
+Fragonard, 18
+
+France, Anatole, 68, 185, 193
+
+Franck, César, 151, 315
+
+Franz, Robert, 23, 26, 93, 111
+
+Fremstad, Olive, 108, 156, 298, 300
+
+Freud, 50
+
+Frezzolini, Erminia, 261 _et seq._
+
+Frohman, Charles, 85, 296
+
+
+Gadski, Johanna, 155
+
+Galli, Signora, 254
+
+Galli-Curci, Amelita, 101, 102, 104, 114
+
+Gamble, George, 39, 54
+
+Ganne, Louis, 313
+
+Garcia, Manuel, 160
+
+Garcia, Manuel, _fils_, 252
+
+Garden, Mary, 84, 114 _et seq._, 131, 133, 155
+
+Gardiner, William, 267
+
+Garrick, David, 96, 260, 302
+
+Gautier, Théophile, 46, 58, 87, 131, 190, 225
+
+German music, 150
+
+Gerome, 61
+
+Gerster, Etelka, 269
+
+Giacosa, 284, 305
+
+Giardini, Felice de, 164
+
+Gibbons, Grinling, 19
+
+Gilbert, W. S., 107, 216, 221
+
+Giovannitti, Arturo, 305
+
+Gipsy, 100, 286
+
+Gizziello, 95
+
+Glaser, Lulu, 219
+
+Gluck, 29, 30, 96, 108, 135, 170, 232, 258, 259, 260, 310
+
+Goncourt, Brothers de, 302
+
+Goodrich, A. J., 199, 202
+
+Goodwin, Nat, 295
+
+Gosse, Edmund, 179
+
+Gounod, 117, 151, 272, 273
+
+Gourmont, Remy de, 48, 229
+
+Goya, 59, 287
+
+Grainger, Percy, 30, 330
+
+Grau, Maurice, 161
+
+Greek Plays, 103
+
+Greenstreet, Sidney, 324
+
+Greenwich Village, 16
+
+Gregory, Lady, 192
+
+Grétry, 170
+
+Grieg, Edvard, 93
+
+Grimm, 259
+
+Grisi, Giulia, 166, 263 _et seq._
+
+Grove, Sir George, 171, 202, 271
+
+Guilbert, Yvette, 107, 113, 114, 277
+
+
+Hadley, Henry, 197, 212
+
+Hadrian, 69
+
+Hale, Philip, 33
+
+Halévy, Jacques, 248
+
+Hall, Pauline, 219
+
+Handel, George Frederick, 25, 95, 97, 102, 113, 119, 172, 254
+
+Hanslick, Eduard, 102, 263
+
+Harris, Charles K., 202
+
+Harris, Frank, 55, 189, 190
+
+Hartmann, Eduard von, 43, 56, 60
+
+Hawthorne vases, 18
+
+Hay, Reverend John Stuart, 72
+
+Haydn, 28
+
+Heidelberg, 43
+
+Heifetz, Jascha, 287
+
+Heine, Heinrich, 82, 240, 286, 287
+
+Heinrich, Max, 107, 155, 246
+
+Helen of Troy, 82
+
+Heliogabolus, 68, 69, 72
+
+Héloïse, 82
+
+Helvetius, 259
+
+Henderson, W. J., 33, 115
+
+Herbert, Victor, 155, 216
+
+Hergesheimer, Joseph, 44, 153
+
+Herodotus, 86
+
+Hertz, Alfred, 155
+
+Hervieu, Paul, 228
+
+Heyse, Paul, 67
+
+Hichens, Robert, 75, 81
+
+Higginson, Thomas Wentworth, 38
+
+Hirsch, Charles-Henry, 141
+
+Hirsch, Louis A., 222
+
+Hoff, Edwin, 221
+
+Hollins, Mabel, 219
+
+Homer, 76, 86
+
+Hopper, De Wolf, 107, 221
+
+Hopwood, Avery, 101, 236 _et seq._
+
+Horace, 76
+
+Howells, W. D., 74, 191
+
+Hubbard, Elbert, 39, 48
+
+Hughes, Rupert, 198, 199
+
+Hugo, Victor, 52, 55, 76, 87, 105
+
+Humperdinck, Engelbert, 24, 29, 173, 329
+
+Huneker, James, 33, 38, 55, 153, 154, 164, 173
+
+Huss, Henry Holden, 199, 202
+
+Huysmans, J. K., 43, 53, 70, 76, 80, 87, 151, 191, 308
+
+
+Ibsen, 302
+
+Incest, 60, 74, 84
+
+d'Indy, Vincent, 200
+
+Irving, Sir Henry, 294, 302
+
+Irwin, May, 110
+
+Ivan the Terrible, 79
+
+
+Jackson, Holbrook, 44, 63
+
+James, Henry, 59, 68, 231
+
+Janis, Elsie, 110, 222
+
+Jansen, Marie, 219, 222
+
+Jefferson, Joseph, 303, 304
+
+Jehovah, 82
+
+Jensen, Adolph, 24
+
+Jew, 58, 71, 152
+
+Joachim, Joseph, 156
+
+Jolson, Al, 110, 222
+
+Jones, Henry Arthur, 234
+
+Joseffy, Rafael, 155
+
+Judic, 220
+
+Jupiter, 82
+
+
+Kaiser, The, 79
+
+Kapila, 57
+
+Keane, Doris, 13
+
+Kellogg, Clara Louise, 166, 268, 269
+
+Kellow, Lottie A., 203, 204
+
+Kelly, Michael, 159, 160, 161, 170, 256
+
+Kendal, Mrs., 318
+
+Kenton, Edna, 41, 53
+
+Ker, Ann, 74
+
+Kern, Jerome, 23, 222
+
+Korngold, Erich, 329
+
+Koven, Reginald de, 216, 221
+
+Krehbiel, H. E., 100, 153, 155
+
+Krishna, 83
+
+
+Labatt, 104
+
+Lablache, Luigi, 163
+
+Laforgue, Jules, 43
+
+Laguerre, Mme., 260
+
+La Harpe, 260
+
+Lalo, Pierre, 33
+
+Lampridius, 70, 72
+
+Lavignac, Albert, 173
+
+Lecocq, Charles, 173, 216
+
+Lehar, Franz, 216
+
+Lehmann, Lilli, 100, 107, 155, 269, 270, 274
+
+Leoncavallo, Ruggiero, 32, 149
+
+Lesbian, 75
+
+Lessing, Madge, 219
+
+Levey, Ethel, 110
+
+Lewes, George Henry, 294, 301
+
+Lienau's, 154
+
+Lind, Jenny, 248, 253, 265 _et seq._, 298
+
+Lindsay, Vachell, 314
+
+Lippincott's Magazine, 63
+
+Lisle, Leconte de, 57, 76
+
+Liszt, 25, 32, 240
+
+Lombard, Jean, 69
+
+Lombroso, 308
+
+Loomis, Harvey W., 200
+
+Louis XIV, 135, 137
+
+Louis XV, 12
+
+Love, 81, 82
+
+Loy, Mina, 188
+
+Lucca, Pauline, 269
+
+Lulli, 172
+
+Lumley, Benjamin, 162, 285, 286
+
+
+MacDowell, Edward, 25
+
+Macdonald, John Z., 208
+
+MacGill, Patrick, 299
+
+MacKaye, Percy, 235
+
+McCutcheon, George Barr, 296
+
+McIntosh, Nancy, 219
+
+Macy, John, 38
+
+Maeterlinck, Maurice, 117
+
+Mahler, Gustav, 28
+
+Male sopranos, 94
+
+Malibran, Maria, 164, 165, 166, 253
+
+Mallarmé, Stéphane, 43, 301
+
+Manet, 61, 289, 308
+
+Mapleson, J. H., 159, 284
+
+Mara, Gertrude Elisabeth, 255 _et seq._
+
+Marchesi, Mathilde, 102, 149, 252, 297
+
+Marco, Maria, 108, 288
+
+Marie Antoinette, 259, 260
+
+Marinetti, 282
+
+Mario, 102
+
+Marion, George, 28
+
+Marlowe, Julia, 319, 321
+
+Marnold, Jean, 32
+
+Marseillaise, 310 _et seq._
+
+Martyn, Edward, 192, 294
+
+Mary Magdalen, 66, 67, 68
+
+Mascagni, Pietro, 28, 275, 301
+
+Massenet, 27, 28, 116, 117, 119, 120, 151, 275
+
+Matisse, 19
+
+Maurel, Victor, 107, 120, 246
+
+May, Edna, 219
+
+Mayhew, Stella, 110
+
+Mazantinita, 287
+
+Mazarin, Mariette, 114
+
+Mazzoleni, 166
+
+Melba, Nellie, 102, 104, 107, 108, 114, 155, 156, 187, 271 _et seq._,
+  297
+
+Mellish, Fuller, 323
+
+Melody, 29, 93
+
+Mencken, H. L., 59, 65, 153, 197, 198, 202, 203, 212
+
+Mendelssohn, 23, 24, 26, 171, 202
+
+Mendès, Catulle, 43
+
+Meredith, George, 187
+
+Mérimée, Prosper, 58, 87, 131, 142
+
+Meyerbeer, Giacomo, 28, 29, 102, 157, 164, 252
+
+Michael Angelo, 227, 312
+
+Michelet, 76
+
+Milton, 257
+
+Mirbeau, Octave, 229, 230, 231, 232, 233
+
+Mitchell, Julian, 281
+
+Mitchell, Langdon, 303
+
+Modern Orchestra, 98
+
+Modulation, 30
+
+Moeller, Philip, 26, 236, 238 _et seq._
+
+Molière, 225, 230, 231, 298, 302
+
+Monbelli, 256
+
+Monkshood, G. F., 39, 54
+
+Montaigne, 150
+
+Montemezzi, Italo, 24, 330
+
+Montes, 189
+
+Monteverde, 102
+
+Montmartre, 126 _et seq._
+
+Monvel, Boutet de, 142
+
+Moore, George, 67, 134, 184 _et seq._, 231, 232, 294, 295, 307, 318,
+  320, 324
+
+Moors, The, 65
+
+Moreau, Gustave, 44, 61, 89, 191
+
+"Morrill, Higgins, and Co.," 71
+
+Moulin de la Galette, 133, 134
+
+Mount Edgcumbe, Earl of, 93, 94, 253, 254, 255
+
+Moussorgsky, 23, 152
+
+Mozart, 23, 24, 27, 28, 29, 31, 54, 88, 97, 101, 108, 119, 161, 173,
+  174, 205, 234, 248, 268, 269, 270, 275, 276, 289, 298, 300, 305
+
+Mullin, W. T., 204 _et seq._
+
+Murillo, 190
+
+Murphy, Agnes G., 155
+
+Murska, Ilma de, 269
+
+Musset, Alfred de, 239, 240, 252
+
+Musette, 135
+
+
+Nachbaur, Franz, 164
+
+Names, Theory of, 49, 50, 56, 76
+
+Napoleon, 79, 192
+
+Naldi, Giuseppe, 160
+
+Nathan, George Jean, 283, 295
+
+Nazimova, Alla, 283, 305
+
+Negro Players, 283
+
+Newman, Ernest, 32, 150
+
+Niemann, Albert, 164
+
+Nero, 69, 71, 72
+
+Nerval, Gérard de, 31
+
+New York Times, The, 233
+
+Nicolai, Carl, 173
+
+Nicolini, 95
+
+Nielsen, Alice, 219
+
+Nijinsky, Waslav, 112, 183, 285, 301
+
+Nillson, Carlotta, 237
+
+Nilsson, Christine, 268, 269
+
+Nordica, Lillian, 270
+
+
+Offenbach, 216, 219
+
+Opéra-Comique, Paris, 131
+
+Orleneff, Paul, 283, 305
+
+Ornstein, Leo, 30, 104, 121, 298, 329
+
+Oysters, American, 158
+
+
+Pacchierotti, 93, 94, 95
+
+Pachmann, Vladimir de, 301
+
+Paganini, 172
+
+Palmer, Delmar G., 210, 211
+
+Pan, Peter, 137
+
+Parke, W. T., 171, 172, 256, 257, 258
+
+Parker, Horatio W., 23, 197, 212
+
+Pasta, Giuditta, 97, 249 _et seq._
+
+Pater, Walter, 70, 72, 137, 190, 307
+
+Pattee, Fred Lewis, 38
+
+Patti, Adelina, 101, 102, 104, 115, 153, 253, 269, 288, 298
+
+Payton, Corse, 304
+
+Peacock, Thomas Love, 301
+
+Péladan, Josephin, 43
+
+Persian miniatures, 19
+
+Pessimism, 56, 60, 61, 65
+
+Petrarch, 76
+
+Pfitzner, Hans, 200
+
+Perfumes, 79
+
+Phelps, William Lyon, 38
+
+Phémé, 86
+
+Philip II, 79
+
+Philistine, The, 39
+
+Philosophy of Edgar Saltus, 54, 56
+
+Picasso, Pablo, 19, 183
+
+Piccinni, Niccola, 24, 258
+
+Pinero, Arthur Wing, 234, 295, 302, 303, 321
+
+Pinto, Mrs., 257
+
+Pischek, Johann, 173
+
+Pistocchi, Francesco, 99
+
+Plagiarism, 79
+
+Poe, Edgar Allan, 44, 87
+
+Pogliani, Giacomo, 157
+
+Poiret, Paul, 154, 222
+
+Poisons, 51, 52, 59, 64, 76
+
+Pollard, Percival, 48
+
+Pompadour, Mme. de, 260
+
+Ponchielli, Amilcare, 175
+
+Popular music, 23
+
+Porpora, 95, 96, 99
+
+Pougy, Liane de, 201
+
+Pratella, Balilla, 329
+
+Puccini, Giacomo, 24, 26, 29, 100, 103, 108, 113, 157, 173, 175, 318,
+  329
+
+Puchol, Luisita, 288
+
+Puente, del, 159
+
+Purcell, Henry, 152
+
+Puritanism, 65
+
+Pyrrhonist, 179
+
+
+Quincy, de, 31
+
+Quinlan, Gertrude, 219
+
+
+Rabusson, 63
+
+Rachel, 250, 301, 302, 310
+
+Radcliffe, Mrs., 74
+
+Raff, Joseph Joachim, 23
+
+Ragtime, 110, 152, 290
+
+Rankin, Phyllis, 219
+
+Ravel, Maurice, 200, 315, 329
+
+Realism in fiction, 56, 77, 88
+
+Realistic acting, 105, 111
+
+Reeves, Sims, 263
+
+Reger, Max, 27, 29
+
+Rehan, Ada, 319, 320
+
+Reicher, Frank, 300
+
+Reinhardt, Max, 282
+
+Renan, 76
+
+Renaud, Maurice, 107, 246
+
+Repplier, Agnes, 9, 38, 69
+
+Reszke, Jean de, 100
+
+Retz, Gille de, 80
+
+Rimbaud, Arthur, 43
+
+Rimsky-Korsakov, 157, 299, 315
+
+Ring, Blanche, 110
+
+Ristori, 302
+
+Rives, Mme. Amélie, 48
+
+Rodin, Auguste, 129, 227, 228, 312
+
+Rome, 70, 71
+
+Ronalds, Lorillard, 69
+
+Ronconi, Giorgio, 97, 98, 246
+
+Ronsard, 76
+
+Roosevelt, Theodore, 120, 209
+
+Rops, Félicien, 312
+
+Rorer, Mrs., 149
+
+Rossini, Gioacchino, 25, 26, 28, 31, 33, 61, 97, 101, 102, 103, 142,
+  149, 168, 169, 248, 273, 288
+
+Rostand, 228
+
+Rowland, Adele, 222
+
+Rübgam, 164
+
+Rubini, Giovanni Battista, 163
+
+Rubinstein, Anton, 24, 112
+
+Runciman, J. F., 32, 234
+
+Russell, Lillian, 160, 220
+
+Russian Ballet, 282, 288, 315
+
+Rutherford, John S., 63
+
+
+Sacré-Coeur, Church of, 126, 130
+
+Sagan, Princesse de, 84
+
+St. Giorgio, Signor, 159, 160
+
+St. Paul's School, 42
+
+Salieri, Antonio, 170
+
+Salome, 66, 67, 86, 287
+
+Saltus, Edgar, 37 _et seq._, 117, 154, 187, 191, 225
+
+Saltus, Francis, 42
+
+Sanborn, Pitts, 118
+
+Sand, George, 26, 239, 240, 252
+
+Sanderson, Julia, 217
+
+Santley, Charles, 158, 167, 174, 264
+
+Sappho, 76, 82
+
+Sardou, 302, 303
+
+Satan, 58, 78, 286, 287
+
+Satie, Erik, 30, 329
+
+Saturday Review, The, 18
+
+Savoyarde, restaurant, 125, 126, 130, 131
+
+Scharwenka, Xaver, 155
+
+Scheherazade, 82
+
+Schillings, Max, 150
+
+Schoenberg, Arnold, 30, 32, 121, 329
+
+Schopenhauer, 43, 56
+
+Schroeder, Edwin Albert, 71
+
+Schroeder-Devrient, Wilhelmine, 99
+
+Schubert, 24, 27, 28, 33, 170, 205, 305, 310
+
+Schumann, 111, 274
+
+Scott, Cyril, 29, 329
+
+Scotti, Antonio, 107
+
+Scriptores Historiæ Augustæ, 70
+
+Seidl, Anton, 155
+
+Sembrich, Marcella, 104, 107, 108, 114, 115, 153, 271, 273 _et seq._
+
+Senesino, 95
+
+Shakespeare, 73, 76, 98, 147, 284, 298, 302, 305, 318 _et seq._
+
+Sharp, Cecil J., 30, 109
+
+Shaw, George Bernard, 42, 234, 235, 239, 318, 322
+
+Shepherd, Arthur, 200
+
+Sherwin, Louis, 222, 291, 293, 295
+
+Shield, William, 171, 172
+
+Siddons, Mrs., 18, 302, 303
+
+Simonds, W. E., 38
+
+Singing, 93 _et seq._
+
+Smith, Harry B., 222
+
+Snob, 50
+
+Socrates, 117
+
+Solomon, 19, 80, 82
+
+Sonata form, 33
+
+Sontag, Henrietta, 246 _et seq._
+
+Sophocles, 103, 302
+
+Sorbonne, 43
+
+Sousa, John Philip, 202, 209, 216
+
+Southeim, 164
+
+Spain, 19, 59, 62, 94, 100, 106, 142, 189, 190, 281 _et seq._
+
+Spiritualism, 43
+
+Spohr, Louis, 24
+
+Stanislavski, 283
+
+Stanton, Theodore, 38
+
+Starr, Hattie, 202
+
+Starr, Muriel, 253
+
+Steger, 164
+
+Stein, Gertrude, 19, 79, 229
+
+Steinlen, 139
+
+Steinway, William, 154
+
+Stevenson, R. L., 58, 74
+
+Stigelli, 166
+
+Stillman-Kelley, Edgar, 199, 202
+
+Straus, Oskar, 216
+
+Strauss, Johann, 25, 139, 216
+
+Strauss, Richard, 25, 30, 31, 32, 33, 100, 104, 113, 114, 120, 175, 330
+
+Stravinsky, Igor, 32, 100, 104, 114, 121, 152, 329
+
+Stuck, Franz von, 89
+
+Style in Singing, 98, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 116, 117, 118, 119,
+  245, 246, 249, 250, 251, 270, 273, 274, 276
+
+Style in Writing, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 53, 55, 56
+
+Suetonius, 70, 72
+
+Sullivan, Sir Arthur, 107, 169, 216, 220, 221
+
+Swinburne, 76, 307
+
+Symonds, J. A., 72
+
+Symons, Arthur, 188, 232, 245, 293, 301, 303
+
+Synge, J. M., 103
+
+
+Tacitus, 72
+
+Taggart, Lucy L., 209
+
+Tamagno, Francesco, 120
+
+Tasso, 62
+
+Taste, 11 _et seq._
+
+Tchekhov, 303
+
+Tempest, Marie, 219, 252, 301
+
+Temps, Le, 18
+
+Terence, 302
+
+Terry, Ellen, 301
+
+Tetrazzini, Luisa, 102, 160
+
+Thèbes, Mme. de, 79
+
+Thomas, Ambroise, 173
+
+Thomas, Augustus, 235, 236, 295
+
+Thomas, Olive, 223
+
+Thomas, Theodore, 155
+
+Tiberius, 69
+
+Tichatschek, Joseph Aloys, 164
+
+Tilzer, Harry von, 202
+
+Tinney, Frank, 222
+
+Tissot, 67
+
+Toscanini, Arturo, 156
+
+Tradition, 24, 97, 281
+
+Troubetskoy, Prince, 157
+
+Tschaikovsky, 59, 312
+
+Turgeniev, 187, 252
+
+Twain, Mark, 261, 265
+
+
+Urban, Joseph, 222, 223
+
+
+Vagaries of genius, 55
+
+Vallière, Louise, de la, 13
+
+Valverde, Joaquín, 284 _et seq._
+
+Vaughn, Theresa, 219
+
+Verelst, Myndart, 56, 58
+
+Veiller, Bayard, 68
+
+Velasquez, 16, 190
+
+Verdi, Giuseppe, 120, 149, 173, 221, 270, 275, 298, 323
+
+Verlaine, Paul, 43
+
+Veronese, 16
+
+Versatility in acting, 300
+
+Vespasian, 69
+
+Viafora, 157
+
+Viardot, Pauline, 98, 250, 251, 252, 253
+
+Victory of Samothrace, The, 17, 312
+
+Vinci, Leonardo da, 190, 191, 301
+
+
+Wachtel, Theodor, 164
+
+Wagner, Richard, 23, 29, 32, 93, 96, 99, 100, 102, 104, 108, 113, 120,
+  150, 162, 173, 175, 270, 271, 274, 298, 301, 314
+
+Walter, Eugene, 68
+
+Walter, Gustav, 164
+
+Warfield, David, 295
+
+Wayburn, Ned, 281
+
+Weber, 27, 31, 98, 175
+
+Webster, 51
+
+Weckerlin, J. B., 169
+
+Weichsell, Carl, 172
+
+Weichsell, Charles, 172
+
+Weidley, David, 210
+
+Wendell, Barrett, 38
+
+Westminster Magazine, 39
+
+Whitmer, T. Carl, 200, 202
+
+Wilde, Oscar, 20, 43, 48, 55, 63, 64, 66, 70, 85, 86, 87, 187, 239,
+  282, 307
+
+Winter, William, 320, 324
+
+Wodehouse, P. G., 222
+
+Women, Saltus's opinion of, 73
+
+Wüllner, Ludwig, 246
+
+
+Yeats, W. B., 192
+
+Yohe, May, 219
+
+
+Zandonai, Riccardo, 329
+
+Zeus, 82
+
+Ziegfeld, Florenz, 283
+
+Zuloaga, 290
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES
+
+
+Variations in spelling, hyphenation, and punctuation have been
+retained from the original book except for the following changes:
+
+Table of Contents: Added listings for FOOTNOTES and INDEX.
+
+Page 32: Used oe for the oe ligature in "oeuvre bâtarde".
+
+Page 189: Changed "their's" to "theirs".
+
+Page 227: Added "Young" to the chapter title, "Two Young American
+Playwrights," to match the Table of Contents and section title.
+
+Page 259: Changed "Eightenth Century" to "Eighteenth Century".
+
+Page 303: "Mrs. Siddone" might be a typo for "Mrs. Siddons". Retained.
+
+Page 320: Capitalized "It" in "As You Like It" for consistency.
+
+Page 331: (Index) Changed "Aeschylus" to "Æschylus" to match text.
+
+Page 332: (Index) The reference for Bergström, Hjalmar, 90 was not found
+anywhere in the original book, and page 90 was a blank page.
+
+Page 332: (Index) Changed page ref. 122 to 222 for Bernhardt, Sarah.
+
+Page 332: (Index) Changed "Caesar, Julius," to "Cæsar, Julius," to
+match text.
+
+Page 338: (Index) Changed page ref. 176 to 76 for Michelet.
+
+Page 339: (Index) Changed "Péladin, Josephin" to "Péladan, Josephin"
+to match text.
+
+Page 341: (Index) Changed "Scriptores Historiae Augustae" to
+"Scriptores Historiæ Augustæ" to match text.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Merry-Go-Round, by Carl Van Vechten
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+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Merry-Go-Round, by Carl Van Vechten
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Merry-Go-Round
+
+Author: Carl Van Vechten
+
+Release Date: August 15, 2008 [EBook #26320]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MERRY-GO-ROUND ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Bryan Ness, Diane Monico, and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced
+from scanned images of public domain material from the Google Print
+project.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4"></a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<h1>The<br />
+Merry-Go-Round</h1>
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5"></a></span></p>
+
+<p class="figcenter" style="width: 150px;">
+<img src="images/image001.png" width="150" height="144" alt="" title="" />
+</p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+
+
+
+<div class='center'>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="books">
+<tr><td align='center'><i><big><b>BOOKS BY</b></big></i></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='center'><i><big><b>CARL VAN VECHTEN</b></big></i></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'>MUSIC AFTER THE GREAT WAR</td><td align='left'>1915</td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'>MUSIC AND BAD MANNERS</td><td align='left'>1916</td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'>INTERPRETERS AND INTERPRETATIONS</td><td align='left'>1917</td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'>THE MERRY-GO-ROUND</td><td align='left'>1918</td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'>THE MUSIC OF SPAIN</td><td align='left'>1918</td></tr>
+</table></div>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6"></a></span></p>
+
+
+
+
+<h1>The<br />
+Merry-Go-Round<br /></h1>
+
+<h2><i>Carl Van Vechten</i><br />
+<br />
+<br /></h2>
+
+
+<div class='center'>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary="title">
+<tr><td align='left'><i><b>"Tournez, tournez, bons chevaux de bois,</b></i></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><i><b>Tournez cent tours, tournez mille tours,</b></i></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><i><b>Tournez souvent et tournez toujours,</b></i></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><i><b>Tournez, tournez au sons de hautbois."</b></i></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='right'><span class="smcap"><b>Paul Verlaine</b></span></td></tr>
+</table></div>
+
+<p class="figcenter" style="width: 150px;">
+<img src="images/image002.png" width="150" height="114" alt="" title="" />
+<br />
+<br /></p>
+
+<h3>New York   Alfred A. Knopf</h3>
+
+<h4>MCMXVIII</h4>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7"></a></span></p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="center"><small>
+COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY<br />
+ALFRED A. KNOPF, <span class="smcap">Inc.</span><br />
+<br />
+PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA<br /></small></p>
+
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8"></a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="Contents" id="Contents"></a>Contents</h2>
+
+
+
+
+
+<div class='center'>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="toc">
+<tr><td align='left'>&nbsp;</td><td align='right'><span class="smcap">page</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">In Defence of Bad Taste</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_11">11</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Music and Supermusic</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_23">23</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Edgar Saltus</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_37">37</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The New Art of the Singer</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_93">93</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><i>Au Bal Musette</i></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_125">125</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Music and Cooking</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_149">149</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">An Interrupted Conversation</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_179">179</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Authoritative Work on American Music</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_197">197</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Old Days and New</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_215">215</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Two Young American Playwrights</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_227">227</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><i>De Senectute Cantorum</i></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_245">245</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Impressions in the Theatre</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 2em;">I&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <i>The Land of Joy</i></span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_281">281</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 2em;">II&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; A Note on Mimi Aguglia</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_298">298</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 2em;">III&nbsp;&nbsp; The New Isadora</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_307">307</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 2em;">IV&nbsp;&nbsp; Margaret Anglin Produces <i>As You Like It</i></span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_318">318</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Modern Composers at a Glance</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_329">329</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Footnotes</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_330">330</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Index</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_331">331</a></td></tr>
+</table></div>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9"></a></span></p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Some of these essays have appeared in "The
+Smart Set," "Reedy's Mirror," "Vanity Fair,"
+"The Chronicle," "The Theatre," "The Bellman,"
+"The Musical Quarterly," "Rogue," "The
+New York Press," and "The New York Globe."
+In their present form, however, they have undergone
+considerable redressing.</p></div>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="In_Defence" id="In_Defence"></a>In Defence of Bad Taste</h3>
+
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><i>"It is a painful thing, at best, to live up to one's
+bricabric, if one has any; but to live up to the bricabric
+of many lands and of many centuries is a strain
+which no wise man would dream of inflicting upon his
+constitution."</i></p>
+
+<p class="author">
+Agnes Repplier.<br />
+</p></div>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="In_Defence_of_Bad_Taste" id="In_Defence_of_Bad_Taste"></a>In Defence of Bad Taste</h2>
+
+
+<p>In America, where men are supposed to know
+nothing about matters of taste and where
+women have their dresses planned for them,
+the household decorator has become an important
+factor in domestic life. Out of an even hundred
+rich men how many can say that they have had
+anything to do with the selection or arrangement
+of the furnishings for their homes? In theatre
+programs these matters are regulated and due
+credit is given to the various firms who have supplied
+the myriad appeals to the eye; one knows
+who thought out the combinations of shoes, hats,
+and parasols, and one knows where each separate
+article was purchased. Why could not some
+similar plan of appreciation be followed in the
+houses of our very rich? Why not, for instance,
+a card in the hall something like the following:</p>
+
+<p>
+<i>This house was furnished and decorated according<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">to the taste of Marcel of the Dilly-Billy Shop</span></i><br />
+<br />
+or<br />
+<br />
+<i>We are living in the kind of house Miss Simone<br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span>
+<span style="margin-left: 2em;">O'Kelly thought we should live in. The</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 3em;">decorations are pure Louis XV and</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">the furniture is authentic.</span></i><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>It is not difficult, of course, to differentiate the
+personal from the impersonal. Nothing clings so
+ill to the back as borrowed finery and I have yet
+to find the family which has settled itself fondly
+and comfortably in chairs which were a part of
+some one else's aesthetic plan. As a matter of fact
+many of our millionaires would be more at home
+in an atmosphere concocted from the ingredients
+of plain pine tables and blanket-covered mattresses
+than they are surrounded by the frippery of China
+and the frivolity of France. If these gentlemen
+were fortunate enough to enjoy sufficient confidence
+in their own taste to give it a thorough test
+it is not safe to think of the extreme burden that
+would be put on the working capacity of the factories
+of the Grand Rapids furniture companies.
+We might find a few emancipated souls scouring
+the town for heavy refectory tables and divans into
+which one could sink, reclining or upright, with
+a perfect sense of ease, but these would be as rare
+as Steinway pianos in Coney Island.</p>
+
+<p>For Americans are meek in such matters. They
+credit themselves with no taste. They fear comparison.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span>
+If the very much sought-after Simone
+O'Kelly has decorated Mr. B.'s house Mr. M.
+does not dare to struggle along with merely his
+own ideas in furnishing his. He calls in an expert
+who begins, rather inauspiciously, by painting
+the dining-room salmon pink. The tables and
+chairs will be made by somebody on Tenth Street,
+exact copies of a set to be found in the Mus&eacute;e
+Carnavalet. The legs under the table are awkwardly
+arranged for diners but they look very
+well when the table is unclothed. The decorator
+plans to hang Mr. M.'s personal bedroom in pale
+plum colour. Mr. M. rebels at this. "I detest,"
+he remarks mildly, "all variants of purple."
+"Very well," acquiesces the decorator, "we
+will make it green." In the end Mr. M.'s worst
+premonitions are realized: the walls are resplendent
+in a striking shade of magenta. Along the edge
+of each panel of Chinese brocade a narrow band
+of absinthe velvet ribbon gives the necessary contrast.
+The furniture is painted in dull ivory with
+touches of gold and beryl and the bed cover is
+peacock blue. Four round cushions of a similar
+shade repose on the floor at the foot of the bed.
+The fat manufacturer's wife as she enters this
+triumph of decoration which might satisfy Louise
+de la Valli&egrave;re or please Doris Keane, is an <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span>anachronistic
+figure and she is aware of it. She prefers,
+on the whole, the brass bedsteads of the
+summer hotels. Mr. M. himself feels ridiculous.
+He never enters the room without a groan and a
+remark on the order of "Good God, what a
+colour!" His personal taste finds its supreme enjoyment
+in the Circassian walnut panelling, desk,
+and tables of the directors' room in the Millionaire's
+Trust and Savings Bank. "Rich and tasteful":
+how many times he has used this phrase to
+express his approval! In the mid-Victorian red
+plush of his club, too, he is comfortable.
+"Waiter, another whiskey and soda!"</p>
+
+<p>Mildred is expected home after her first year
+in boarding school. Her mother wishes to environ
+her, so to speak. Mildred is delicate in her tastes,
+so delicate that she scarcely ever expresses herself.
+Her mind and body are pure; her heart
+beats faster when she learns of distress. Voluptuousness,
+Venus, and Vice are all merely words to
+her. Mother does not explain this to the decorator.
+"My daughter is returning from school,"
+she says, "I want her room done." "What style
+of room?" "After all you are supposed to know
+that. I am engaging you to arrange it for me."
+"Your daughter, I take it, is a modern girl?"
+"You may assume as much." In despair for a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span>
+hint the decorator steals a look at a photograph
+of the miss, full-lipped, melting dark eyes, and
+blue-black hair. Sensing an houri he hangs the
+walls with a deep shade of Persian orange, over
+which flit tropical birds of emerald and azure;
+strange pomegranates bleed their seeds at regular
+intervals. The couch is an adaptation, in colour,
+of the celebrated <i>Sumurun</i> bed. The dressing
+table and the <i>chaise-longue</i> are of Chinese lacquer.
+A heavy bronze incense burner pours forth fumes
+of Bichara's <i>Scheherazade</i>. From the window
+frames, stifling the light, depend flame-coloured
+brocaded curtains embroidered in Egyptian
+enamelled beads. It is a triumph, this chamber,
+of <i>style Ballet Russe</i>. Diana is banished ...
+and shrinking Mildred, returning from school,
+finds her demure soul at variance with her surroundings.</p>
+
+<p>A man's house should be the expression of the
+man himself. All the books on the subject and
+even the household decorators themselves will tell
+you that. But, if the decoration of a house is to
+express its owner, it is necessary that he himself
+inspire it, which implies, of course, the possession
+of ideas, even though they be bad. And men in
+these United States are not expected to display
+mental anguish or pleasure when confronted by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span>
+colour combinations. In America one is constantly
+hearing young ladies say, "He's a man
+and so, of course, knows nothing about colour,"
+or "Of course a man never looks at clothes." It
+does not seem to be necessary to argue this point.
+One has only to remember that Veronese was a
+man; so was Velasquez. Even Paul Poiret and
+Leon Bakst belong to the sex of Adam. Nevertheless
+most Americans still consider it a little
+<i>eff&eacute;min&eacute;</i>, a trifle <i>declass&eacute;</i>, for a business man (allowances
+are sometimes made for poets, musicians,
+actors, and people who live in Greenwich Village),
+to make any references to colour or form. He
+may admire, with obvious emphasis on the women
+they lightly enclose, the costumes of the <i>Follies</i>
+but he is not permitted to exhibit knowledge of
+materials and any suddenly expressed desire on
+his part to rush into a shop and hug some bit of
+colour from the show window to his heart would be
+regarded as a symptom of madness.</p>
+
+<p>The audience which gives the final verdict on
+a farce makes allowances for the author; permits
+him the use of certain conventions. For example,
+he is given leave to introduce a hotel corridor into
+his last act with seven doors opening on a common
+hallway so that his characters may conveniently
+and persistently enter the wrong rooms.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span>
+It may be supposed that I ask for some such license
+from my audience. "How ridiculous," you may
+be saying, "I know of interior decorators who
+spend weeks in reading out the secrets of their
+clients' souls in order to provide their proper
+settings." There doubtless are interior decorators
+who succeed in giving a home the appearance
+of a well-kept hotel where guests may mingle comfortably
+and freely. I should not wish to deny
+this. But I do deny that soul-study is a requirement
+for the profession. If a man (or a woman)
+has a soul it will not be a decorator who will discover
+its fitting housing. Others may object,
+"But bad taste is rampant. Surely it is better
+to be guided by some one who knows than to surround
+oneself with rocking chairs, plaster casts
+of the Winged Victory, and photographs of various
+madonnas." I say that it is <i>not</i> better. It is
+better for each man to express himself, through his
+taste, as well as through his tongue or his pen,
+as he may. And it is only through such expression
+that he will finally arrive (if he ever can) at
+a condition of household furnishing which will say
+something to his neighbour as well as to himself.
+It is a pleasure when one leaves a dinner party to
+be able to observe "That is <i>his</i> house," just as it
+is a pleasure when one leaves a concert to remember<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span>
+that a composer has expressed himself and
+not the result of seven years study in Berlin or
+Paris.</p>
+
+<p>But Americans have little aptitude for self-expression.
+They prefer to huddle, like cattle, under
+unspeakable whips when matters of art are
+under discussion. They fear ridicule. As a consequence
+many of the richest men in this country
+never really live in their own homes, never are
+comfortable for a moment, although the walls are
+hung double with Fragonards and hawthorne
+vases stand so deep upon the tables that no space
+remains for the "Saturday Review" or "le
+Temps." And they never, never, never, will know
+the pleasure which comes while stumbling down a
+side street in London, or in the mouldy corners of
+the Venetian ghetto, or in the March&eacute; du Temple
+in Paris, or, heaven knows, in New York, on lower
+Fourth Avenue, or in Chinatown, or in a Russian
+brass shop on Allen Street, or in a big department
+store (as often there as anywhere) in finding
+just the lamp for just the table in just the corner,
+or in discovering a bit of brocade, perhaps the
+ragged remnant of a waistcoat belonging to an
+aristocrat of the Directorate, which will lighten
+the depths of a certain room, or a chair which
+goes miraculously with a desk already possessed,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span>
+or a Chinese mirror which one had almost decided
+did not exist. Nor will they ever experience the
+joy of sudden decision in front of a picture by
+Matisse, which ends in the sale of a Delacroix.
+Nor can they feel the thrill which is part of the
+replacing of a make-shift rug by <i>the</i> rug of rugs
+(let us hope it was Solomon's!).</p>
+
+<p>I know a lady in Paris whose salon presents a
+different aspect each summer. Do her Picassos
+go, a new Spanish painter has replaced them.
+Have you missed the Gibbons carving? Spanish
+church carving has taken its place. "And where
+are your Venetian embroideries?" "I sold them
+to the Marquise de V.... The money served to
+buy these Persian miniatures." This lady has
+travelled far. She is not experimenting in doubtful
+taste or bad art; she is not even experimenting
+in her own taste: she is simply enjoying different
+epochs, different artists, different forms of art,
+each in its turn, for so long as it says anything
+to her. Her house is not a museum. Space and
+comfort demand exclusion but she excludes nothing
+forever that she desires.... She exchanges.</p>
+
+<p>Taste at best is relative. It is an axiom that
+anybody else's taste can never say anything to
+you although you may feel perfectly certain that
+it is better than your own. If more of the money<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span>
+of the rich were spent in encouraging children to
+develop their own ideas in furnishing their own
+rooms it would serve a better purpose than it does
+now when it is dropped into the ample pockets of
+the professional decorators. Oscar Wilde wrote,
+"A colour sense is more important in the development
+of the individual than a sense of right
+and wrong." Any young boy or girl can learn
+something about such matters; most of them, if
+not shamed out of it, take a natural interest in
+their surroundings. You will see how true this
+is if you attempt to rearrange a child's room.
+Those who have bad taste, relatively, should literally
+be allowed to make their own beds. On the
+whole it is preferable to be comfortable in red and
+green velvet upholstery than to be beautiful and
+unhappy in a household decorator's gilded cage.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>September 3, 1915.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="Music" id="Music"></a>Music and Supermusic</h3>
+
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><i>"To know whether you are enjoying a piece of
+music or not you must see whether you find yourself
+looking at the advertisements of Pears' soap at the
+end of the program."</i></p>
+
+<p class="author">
+Samuel Butler.<br />
+</p></div>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="Music_and_Supermusic" id="Music_and_Supermusic"></a>Music and Supermusic</h2>
+
+
+<p>What is the distinction in the mind of
+Everycritic between good music and
+bad music, in the mind of Everyman
+between popular music and "classical" music?
+What is the essential difference between an air by
+Mozart and an air by Jerome Kern? Why is
+Chopin's <i>G minor nocturne</i> better music than
+Th&eacute;cla Badarzewska's <i>La Pri&egrave;re d'une Vierge</i>?
+Why is a music drama by Richard Wagner preferable
+to a music drama by Horatio W. Parker?
+What makes a melody distinguished? What
+makes a melody commonplace or cheap? Why
+do some melodies ring in our ears generation after
+generation while others enjoy but a brief popularity?
+Why do certain composers, such as Raff and
+Mendelssohn, hailed as geniuses while they were
+yet alive, soon sink into semi-obscurity, while
+others, such as Robert Franz and Moussorgsky,
+almost unrecognized by their contemporaries,
+grow in popularity? Are there no answers to
+these conundrums and the thousand others that
+might be asked by a person with a slight attack
+of curiosity?... No one <i>does</i> ask and assuredly
+no one answers. These riddles, it would seem, are<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span>
+included among the forbidden mysteries of the
+sphynx. The critics assert with authority and
+some show of erudition that the Spohrs, the
+Mendelssohns, the Humperdincks, and the Montemezzis
+are great composers. They usually admire
+the grandchildren of Old Lady Tradition but they
+neglect to justify this partiality. Nor can we
+trust the public with its favourite Piccinnis and
+Puccinis.... What then is the test of supermusic?</p>
+
+<p>For we know, as well as we can know anything,
+that there is music and supermusic. Rubinstein
+wrote music; Beethoven wrote supermusic (Mr.
+Finck may contradict this statement). Bellini
+wrote operas; Mozart wrote superoperas. Jensen
+wrote songs; Schubert wrote supersongs. The
+superiority of <i>Voi che sapete</i> as a vocal melody
+over <i>Ah! non giunge</i> is not generally contested;
+neither can we hesitate very long over the question
+whether or not <i>Der Leiermann</i> is a better song
+than <i>Lehn' deine Wang'</i>. Probably even Mr. Finck
+will admit that the <i>Sonata Appassionata</i> is finer
+music than the most familiar portrait (I think it
+is No. 22) in the <i>Kamennoi-Ostrow</i> set. But, if
+we agree to put Mozart, Bach, Beethoven, Schubert,
+and a few others on marmorean pedestals
+in a special Hall of Fame (and this is a compromise<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span>
+on my part, at any rate, as I consider much
+of the music written by even these men to be below
+any moderately high standard), what about the
+rest? Mr. Finck prefers Johann Strauss to
+Brahms, nay more to Richard himself! He has
+written a whole book for no other reason, it would
+seem, than to prove that the author of <i>Tod und
+Verkl&auml;rung</i> is a very much over-rated individual.
+At times sitting despondently in Carnegie Hall, I
+am secretly inclined to agree with him. Personally
+I can say that I prefer Irving Berlin's music to
+that of Edward MacDowell and I would like to
+have some one prove to me that this position is
+untenable.</p>
+
+<p>What is the test of supermusic? I have read
+that fashionable music, music composed in a style
+welcomed and appreciated by its contemporary
+hearers is seldom supermusic. Yet Handel wrote
+fashionable music, and so much other of the
+music of that epoch is Handelian that it is
+often difficult to be sure where George Frederick
+left off and somebody else began. Bellini wrote
+fashionable music and <i>Norma</i> and <i>La Sonnambula</i>
+sound a trifle faded although they are still occasionally
+performed, but Rossini, whose only desire
+was to please his public, (Liszt once observed
+"Rossini and Co. always close with 'I remain your<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span>
+very humble servant'"), wrote melodies in <i>Il
+Barbiere di Siviglia</i> which sound as fresh to us today as
+they did when they were first composed. And
+when this prodigiously gifted musician-cook turned
+his back to the public to write <i>Guillaume Tell</i> he
+penned a work which critics have consistently told
+us is a masterpiece, but which is as seldom performed
+today as any opera of the early Nineteenth
+Century which occasionally gains a hearing at all.
+Therefor we must be wary of the old men who tell
+us that we shall soon tire of the music of Puccini
+because it is fashionable.</p>
+
+<p>Popularity is scarcely a test. I have mentioned
+Mendelssohn. Never was there a more popular
+composer, and yet aside from the violin concerto
+what work of his has maintained its place in the
+concert repertory? Yet Chopin, whose name is
+seldom absent from the program of a pianist, was
+a god in his own time and the most brilliant woman
+of his epoch fell in love with him, as Philip Moeller
+has recently reminded us in his very amusing play.
+On the other hand there is the case of Robert
+Franz whose songs never achieved real popularity
+during his lifetime, but which are frequently,
+almost invariably indeed, to be found on song recital
+programs today and which are more and
+more appreciated. The critics are praising him,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span>
+the public likes him: they buy his songs. And
+there is also the case of Max Reger who was not
+popular, is not popular, and never will be popular.</p>
+
+<p>Can we judge music by academic standards?
+Certainly not. Even the hoary old academicians
+themselves can answer this question correctly if
+you put it in relation to any composer born before
+1820. The greatest composers have seldom
+respected the rules. Beethoven in his last sonatas
+and string quartets slapped all the pedants in the
+ears; yet I believe you will find astonishingly few
+rules broken by Mozart, one of the gods in the
+mythology of art music, and Berlioz, who broke
+all the rules, is more interesting to us today as a
+writer of prose than as a writer of music.</p>
+
+<p>Is simple music supermusic? Certainly not invariably.
+<i>Vedrai Carino</i> is a simple tune, almost
+as simple as a folk-song and we set great store
+by it; yet Michael William Balfe wrote twenty-seven
+operas filled with similarly simple tunes and
+in a selective draft of composers his number would
+probably be 9,768. The <i>Ave Maria</i> of Schubert
+is a simple tune; so is the <i>Meditation</i> from <i>Thais</i>.
+Why do we say that one is better than the other.</p>
+
+<p>Or is supermusic always grand, sad, noble, or
+emotional? There must be another violent head
+shaking here. The air from <i>Oberon, Ocean, thou<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span>
+mighty monster</i>, is so grand that scarcely a singer
+can be found today capable of interpreting it, although
+many sopranos puff and steam through it,
+for all the world like pinguid gentlemen climbing
+the stairs to the towers of Notre Dame. The
+<i>Fifth Symphony</i> of Beethoven is both grand and
+noble; probably no one will be found who will
+deny that it is supermusic, but Mahler's <i>Symphony
+of the Thousand</i> is likewise grand and noble, and
+futile and bombastic to boot. <i>Or sai chi l'onore</i>
+is a grand air, but <i>Robert je t'aime</i> is equally
+grand in intention, at least. <i>Der Tod und das
+M&auml;dchen</i> is sad; so is <i>Les Larmes</i> in <i>Werther</i>....
+But a very great deal of supermusic is neither
+grand nor sad. Haydn's symphonies are usually
+as light-hearted and as light-waisted as possible.
+Mozart's <i>Figaro</i> scarcely seems to have a care.
+Listen to Beethoven's <i>Fourth</i> and <i>Eighth Symphonies</i>,
+<i>Il Barbiere</i> again, <i>Die Meistersinger</i>....
+But do not be misled: Massenet's <i>Don Quichotte</i>
+is light music; so is Mascagni's <i>Lodoletta</i>....</p>
+
+<p>Is music to be prized and taken to our hearts
+because it is contrapuntal and complex? We frequently
+hear it urged that Bach (who was more or
+less forgotten for a hundred years, by the way)
+was the greatest of composers and his music is especially
+intricate. He is the one composer, indeed,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span>
+who can <i>never</i> be played with one finger!
+But poor unimportant forgotten Max Reger also
+wrote in the most complicated forms; the great
+Gluck in the simplest. Gluck, indeed, has even
+been considered weak in counterpoint and fugue.
+Meyerbeer, it is said, was also weak in counterpoint
+and fugue. Is he therefor to be regarded
+as the peer of Gluck? Is Mozart's <i>G minor Symphony</i>
+more important (because it is more complicated)
+than the same composer's, <i>Batti, Batti</i>?</p>
+
+<p>We learn from some sources that music stands
+or falls by its melody but what is good melody?
+According to his contemporaries Wagner's music
+dramas were lacking in melody. <i>Sweet Marie</i> is
+certainly a melody; why is it not as good a melody
+as <i>The Old Folks at Home</i>? Why is Musetta's
+waltz more popular than Gretel's? It is no better
+as melody. As a matter of fact there is, has
+been, and for ever will be war over this question
+of melody, because the point of view on the subject
+is continually changing. As Cyril Scott puts it
+in his book, "The Philosophy of Modernism": "at
+one time it (melody) extended over a few bars
+and then came to a close, being, as it were, a kind
+of sentence, which, after running for the moment,
+arrived at a full stop, or semicolon. Take this
+and compare it with the modern tendency: for that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span>
+modern tendency is to argue that a melody might
+go on indefinitely almost; there is no reason why
+it should come to a full stop, for it is not a sentence,
+but more a line, which, like the rambling incurvations
+of a frieze, requires no rule to stop
+it, but alone the will and taste of its engenderer."</p>
+
+<p>Or is harmonization the important factor?
+Folk-songs are not harmonized at all, and yet
+certain musicians, Cecil Sharp for example, devote
+their lives to collecting them, while others,
+like Percy Grainger, base their compositions on
+them. On the other hand such music as Debussy's
+<i>Iberia</i> depends for its very existence on its beautiful
+harmonies. The harmonies of Gluck are extremely
+simple, those of Richard Strauss extremely
+complex.</p>
+
+<p>H. T. Finck says somewhere that one of the
+greatest charms of music is modulation but the
+old church composers who wrote in the "modes"
+never modulated at all. Erik Satie seldom avails
+himself of this modern device. It is a question
+whether Leo Ornstein modulates. If we may take
+him at his word Arnold Schoenberg has a system
+of modulation. At least it is his very own.</p>
+
+<p>Are long compositions better than short ones?
+This may seem a silly question but I have read
+criticisms based on a theory that they were.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span>
+Listen, for example, to de Quincy: "A song, an
+air, a tune,&mdash;that is, a short succession of notes
+revolving rapidly upon itself,&mdash;how could that by
+possibility offer a field of compass sufficient for
+the development of great musical effects? The
+preparation pregnant with the future, the remote
+correspondence, the questions, as it were, which
+to a deep musical sense are asked in one passage,
+and answered in another; the iteration and ingemination
+of a given effect, moving through subtile
+variations that sometimes disguise the theme,
+sometimes fitfully reveal it, sometimes throw it out
+tumultuously to the daylight,&mdash;these and ten
+thousand forms of self-conflicting musical passion&mdash;what
+room could they find, what opening, for
+utterance, in so limited a field as an air or song?"
+After this broadside permit me to quote a verse
+of G&eacute;rard de Nerval:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0"><i>"Il est un air pour qui je donnerais</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Tout Rossini, tout Mozart, et tout Weber,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Un air tr&egrave;s-vieux, languissant et fun&egrave;bre,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Qui pour moi seul a des charmes secrets."</i><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>And now let us dispassionately, if possible, regard
+the evidence. Richard Strauss's <i>Alpine Symphony</i>,
+admittedly one of his weakest works and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>
+considered very tiresome even by ardent Straussians,
+plays for nearly an hour while any one can
+sing <i>Der Erlk&ouml;nig</i> in three minutes. Are short
+compositions better than long ones? Answer:
+<i>Love me and the World is Mine</i> is a short song
+(although it seldom sounds so) while Schubert's
+<i>C major Symphony</i> is called the "symphony of
+heavenly length."</p>
+
+<p>Is what is new better than what is old? Is
+what is old better than what is new? Schoenberg
+is new; is he therefor to be considered better than
+Beethoven? Stravinsky is new; is he therefor to
+be considered worse than Liszt?</p>
+
+<p>Is an opera better than a song? Compare
+<i>Pagliacci</i> and Strauss's <i>St&auml;ndchen</i>. Is a string
+quartet better than a piece for the piano? But
+I grow weary.... Under the circumstances it
+would seem that if you have any strong opinions
+about music you are perfectly entitled to them,
+for the critics do not agree and you will find many
+of them basing their criticism on some of the
+various hypotheses I have advanced. H. T. Finck
+tells us that the sonata form is illogical, forgetting
+perhaps that once it served its purpose; Jean
+Marnold dubbed <i>Armide</i> an <i>&#339;uvre b&acirc;tarde</i>; John
+F. Runciman called <i>Parsifal</i> "decrepit stuff,"
+while Ernest Newman assures us that it is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span>
+"marvellous"; Pierre Lalo and Philip Hale disagree
+on the subject of Debussy's <i>La Mer</i> while
+W. J. Henderson and James Huneker wrangle over
+Richard Strauss's <i>Don Quixote</i>.</p>
+
+<p>The clue to the whole matter lies in a short
+phrase: Imitative work is always bad. Music
+that tries to be something that something else has
+been may be thrown aside as worthless. It will
+not endure although it may sometimes please the
+zanies and jackoclocks of a generation. The
+critic, therefor, who comes nearest to the heart of
+the matter, is he who, either through instinct
+or familiarity with the various phenomena of
+music, is able to judge of a work's originality.
+There must be individuality in new music to make
+it worthy of our attention, and that, after all
+is all that matters. For the tiniest folk-song
+often persists in the hearts and minds of the people,
+often stirs the pulse of a musician, pursuing
+its tuneful way through two centuries, while a
+mighty thundering symphony of the same period
+may lie dead and rotting, food for the Niptus
+Hololencus and the Blatta Germanica. We still
+sing <i>The Old Folks At Home</i> and <i>Le Cycle du Vin</i>
+but we have laid aside <i>Di Tanti Palpiti</i>. Any
+piece of music possessing the certain magic power
+of individuality is of value, it matters not whether<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span>
+it be symphony or song, opera or dance. What
+most critics have forgotten is that in Music matter,
+form, and idea are one. In painting, in
+poetry the idea, the words, the form, may be separated;
+each may play its part, but in music there
+is no idea without form, no form without idea.
+That is what makes musical criticism difficult.</p>
+
+<p><span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>January 24, 1918.</i></span></p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="Edgar" id="Edgar"></a>Edgar Saltus</h3>
+
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i4"><i>"O no, we never mention him,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i4"><i>His name is never heard!"</i><br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i10">Old Ballad.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="Edgar_Saltus" id="Edgar_Saltus"></a>Edgar Saltus</h2>
+
+
+<p>To write about Edgar Saltus should be <i>vieux
+jeu</i>. The man is an American; he was
+born in 1858; he accomplished some of his
+best work in the Eighties and the Nineties, in the
+days when mutton-legged sleeves, whatnots,
+Rogers groups, cat-tails, peacock feathers, Japanese
+fans, musk-mellon seed collars, and big-wheeled
+bicycles were in vogue. He has written
+history, fiction, poetry, literary criticism, and
+philosophy, and to all these forms he has brought
+sympathy, erudition, a fresh point of view, and
+a radiant style. He has imagination and he understands
+the gentle art of arranging facts in
+kaleidoscopic patterns so that they may attract
+and not repel the reader. America, indeed, has
+not produced a round dozen authors who equal
+him as a brilliant stylist with a great deal to say.
+And yet this man, who wrote some of his best books
+in the Eighties and who is still alive, has been allowed
+to drift into comparative oblivion. Even
+his early reviewers shoved him impatiently aside
+or ignored him altogether; a writer in "Belford's
+Magazine" for July, 1888, says: "Edgar Saltus
+should have his name changed to Edgar Assaulted."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span>
+Soon he became a literary leper. The
+doctors and professors would have none of him.
+To most of them, nowadays, I suppose, he is only
+a name. Many of them have never read any of
+his books. I do not even remember to have seen
+him mentioned in the works of James Huneker
+and you will not find his name in Barrett Wendell's
+"A History of American Literature"
+(1901), "A Reader's History of American Literature"
+by Thomas Wentworth Higginson and
+Henry Walcott Boynton (1903), Katherine Lee
+Bates's "American Literature" (1898), "A
+Manual of American Literature," edited by Theodore
+Stanton (1909), William B. Cairns's "A
+History of American Literature" (1912), William
+Edward Simonds's "A Student's History of
+American Literature" (1909), Fred Lewis Pattee's
+"A History of American Literature Since
+1870" (1915), John Macy's "The Spirit of
+American Literature" (1913), or William Lyon
+Phelps's "The Advance of the English Novel"
+(1916). The third volume of "The Cambridge
+History of American Literature," bringing the
+subject up to 1900, has not yet appeared but I
+should be amazed to discover that the editors had
+decided to include Saltus therein. Curiously
+enough he is mentioned in Oscar Fay Adams's "A<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span>
+Dictionary of American Authors" (1901 edition)
+and, of all places, I have found a reference to
+him in one of Agnes Repplier's books.</p>
+
+<p>You will find few essays about the man or his
+work in current or anterior periodicals. There
+is, to be sure, the article by Ramsay Colles,
+entitled "A Publicist: Edgar Saltus," published
+in the "Westminster Magazine" for October,
+1904, but this essay could have won our author no
+adherents. If any one had the courage to wade
+through its muddy paragraphs he doubtless
+emerged vowing never to read Saltus. Besides
+only the novels are touched on. In 1903 G. F.
+Monkshood and George Gamble arranged a compilation
+from Saltus's work which they entitled
+"Wit and Wisdom from Edgar Saltus" (Greening
+and Co., London). The work is done without
+sense or sensitiveness and the prefatory essay
+is without salt or flavour of any sort. An
+anonymous writer in "Current Literature" for
+July, 1907, asks plaintively why this author has
+been permitted to remain in obscurity and quotes
+from some of the reviews. In "The Philistine"
+for October, 1907, Elbert Hubbard takes a hand
+in the game. He says, "Edgar Saltus is the best
+writer in America&mdash;with a few insignificant exceptions,"
+but he deplores the fact that Saltus<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span>
+knows nothing about the cows and chickens; only
+cities and gods seem to interest him. Still there
+is some atmosphere in this study, which is devoted
+to one book, "The Lords of the Ghostland." In
+the New York Public Library four of Saltus's
+books and one of his translations (about one-sixth
+of his published work) are listed. You may
+also find there in a series of volumes entitled "Nations
+of the World" his supplementary chapters
+bringing the books up to date. That is all.</p>
+
+<p>All these years, of course, Saltus has had his
+admiring circle,<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> people of intelligence, of whom,
+unfortunately, I cannot say that I was one.
+These, who have been content to read and admire
+without spreading the news, may well be inclined
+to regard my performance as repetitive and impertinent.
+Of these I must crave indulgence and
+of Saltus himself too. For he, knowing how well
+he has done his work, must sit like Buddha, ironic
+and indulgent, smiling on the poor benighted who
+have yet to approach his altars. Once, at least,
+he spoke: "A book that pleases no one may be
+poor. The book that pleases every one is detestable."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>I seem to remember to have heard his name all
+my life, but until recently I have not read one
+line concerning or by him. I find that my friends,
+many of whom are extensive readers, are in the
+same sad state of ignorance. There is an exception
+and that exception is responsible for my conversion.
+For six years, no less, Edna Kenton has
+been urging me to read Edgar Saltus. She has
+been gently insinuating but firm. None of us can
+struggle forever against fate or a determined
+woman. In the end I capitulated, purchased a
+book by Edgar Saltus at random, and read it
+... at one sitting. I sought for more. As most
+of his books are out of print and as the list in
+the Public Library conspicuously omits all but
+one of his best <i>opera</i> the matter presented difficulties.
+However, a little diligent search in the
+old book shops accomplished wonders. In less
+than two weeks I had dug up twenty-two titles
+and in less than two weeks I had read twenty-four;
+since then I have consumed the other four.
+There are few writers in American or any other
+literature who can survive such a test; there are
+few writers who have given me such keen pleasure.</p>
+
+<p>The events of his life, mostly remain shrouded
+in mystery. His comings and goings are not reported
+in the newspapers; he does not make public<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span>
+speeches; and his name is seldom, if ever, mentioned
+"among those present." That he has been
+married and has one daughter "Who's Who"
+proclaims, together with the few biographical details
+mentioned below. That is all. May we not
+herein find some small explanation for his apparent
+neglect? Many thousands of lesser men
+have lifted themselves to "literary" prominence
+by blowing their own tubas and striking their own
+crotals. Even in the case of a man of such manifest
+genius as George Bernard Shaw we may
+be permitted to doubt if he would be so well known,
+had he not taken the trouble to erect monuments
+to himself on every possible occasion in every
+possible location. Fame is a quaint old-fashioned
+body, who loves to be pursued. She seldom,
+if ever, runs after anybody except in her well-known
+r&ocirc;le of necrophile.</p>
+
+<p>Edgar Evertson Saltus was born in New York
+City June 8, 1858. He is a lineal descendant of
+Admiral Kornelis Evertson, the commander of the
+Dutch fleet, who captured New York from the English,
+August 9, 1673. Francis Saltus, the poet,
+was his brother. He enjoyed a cosmopolitan education
+which may be regarded as an important
+factor in the development of his tastes and ideas.
+From St. Paul's School in Concord he migrated to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span>
+the Sorbonne in Paris, and thence to Heidelberg
+and Munich, where he bathed in the newer Germanic
+philosophies. Finally he took a course of
+law at Columbia University. The influence of
+this somewhat heterogeneous seminary life is manifest
+in all his future writing. Beginning, no
+doubt, as a disciple of Emerson in New England,
+he fell under the spell of Balzac in Paris, of
+Schopenhauer and von Hartmann in Germany.
+Pages might be brought forward as evidence that
+he had a thorough classical education. His
+knowledge of languages made it easy for him to
+drink deeply at many fountain heads. If Oscar
+Wilde found his chief inspiration in Huysmans's
+"A Rebours," it is certain that Saltus also quaffed
+intoxicating draughts at this source. Indeed in
+one of his books he refers to Huysmans as his
+friend. It is further apparent that he is acquainted
+with the works of Barbey d'Aurevilly,
+Josephin P&eacute;ladan,<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> Baudelaire, Mallarm&eacute;, Verlaine,
+Arthur Rimbaud, Catulle Mend&egrave;s, and Jules
+Laforgue, especially the Laforgue of the "Moralit&eacute;s
+Legendaires." His kinship with these writers
+is near, but through this mixed blood run strains
+inherited from the early pagans, the mediaeval<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span>
+monks, the Germanic philosophers, and London of
+the Eighteen Nineties (although there is not one
+word about Saltus in Holbrook Jackson's book of
+the period), and perhaps, after all, his nearest literary
+relative was an American, Edgar Allan Poe,
+who bequeathed to him a garret full of strange
+odds and ends. But Saltus surpasses Poe in almost
+every respect save as a poet.</p>
+
+<p>Joseph Hergesheimer has expressed a theory to
+the effect that great art is always provincial, never
+cosmopolitan; that only provincial art is universal
+in its appeal. Like every other theory this one is
+to a large extent true, but Hergesheimer in his arbitrary
+summing up, has forgotten the fantastic.
+The fantastic in literature, in art of any kind, can
+never be provincial. The work of Poe is not provincial;
+nor is that of Gustave Moreau, an artist
+with whom Edgar Saltus can very readily be compared.
+If you have visited the Mus&eacute;e Moreau in
+Paris where, in the studio of the dead painter, is
+gathered together the most complete collection of
+his works, which lend themselves to endless inspection,
+you can, in a sense, reconstruct for yourself
+an idea of the works of Edgar Saltus. One finds
+therein the same unicorns, the same fabulous monsters,
+the same virgins on the rocks, the same exotic
+and undreamed of flora and fauna, the same<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span>
+mystic paganism, the same exquisitely jewelled
+workmanship. One can find further analogies in
+the Aubrey Beardsley of "Under the Hill," in the
+elaborate stylized irony of Max Beerbohm.
+Surely not provincials these, but just as surely
+artists.</p>
+
+<p>Moreover Saltus's style may be said to possess
+American characteristics. It is dashing and
+rapid, and as clear as the water in Southern seas.
+The man has a penchant for short and nervous
+sentences, but they are never jerky. They explode
+like so many firecrackers and remind one
+of the great national holiday!... Nevertheless
+Edgar Saltus should have been born in France.</p>
+
+<p>His essays, whether they deal with literary
+criticism, history, religion (which is almost an
+obsession with this writer), devil-worship, or cooking,
+are pervaded by that rare quality, charm.
+Somewhere he quotes a French aphorism:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"<i>Etre riche n'est pas l'affaire,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Toute l'affaire est de charmer</i>,"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>which might be applied to his own work. There
+is a deep and beneficent guile in the simplicity of
+his style, as limpid as a brook, and yet, as over a
+brook, in its overtones hover a myriad of sparkling<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span>
+dragon-flies and butterflies; in its depths lie
+a plethora of trout. He deals with the most obstruse
+and abstract subjects with such ease and
+grace, without for one moment laying aside the
+badge of authority, that they assume a mysterious
+fascination to catch the eye of the passerby.
+In his fictions he has sometimes cultivated a more
+hectic style, but that in itself constitutes one of
+the bases of its richness. Scarcely a word but
+evokes an image, a strange, bizarre image, often a
+complication of images. He is never afraid of
+the colloquial, never afraid of slang even, and he
+often weaves lovely patterns with obsolete or technical
+words. These lines, in which Saltus paid
+tribute to Gautier, he might, with equal justice,
+have applied to himself: "No one could torment
+a fancy more delicately than he; he had the gift of
+adjective; he scented a new one afar like a truffle;
+and from the Morgue of the dictionary he dragged
+forgotten beauties. He dowered the language of
+his day with every tint of dawn and every convulsion
+of sunset; he invented metaphors that were
+worth a king's ransom, and figures of speech that
+deserve the Prix Montyon. Then reviewing his
+work, he formulated an axiom which will go down
+with a nimbus through time: Whomsoever a
+thought however complex, a vision however apocalyptic,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span>
+surprises without words to convey it, is not
+a writer. The inexpressible does not exist." It
+is impossible to taste at this man's table. One
+must eat the whole dinner to appreciate its opulent
+inevitability. Still I may offer a few olives, a
+branch or two of succulent celery to those who
+have not as yet been invited to sit down. One of
+his ladies walks the Avenue in a gown the "color of
+fried smelts." Such figurative phrases as "Her
+eyes were of that green-grey which is caught in
+an icicle held over grass," "The sand is as fine as
+face powder, <i>nuance</i> Rachel, packed hard,"
+"Death, it may be, is not merely a law but a place,
+perhaps a garage which the traveller reaches on a
+demolished motor, but whence none can proceed
+until all old scores are paid," "The ocean resembled
+nothing so much as an immense blue syrup,"
+"She was a pale freckled girl, with hair the shade
+of Bavarian beer," "The sun rose from the ocean
+like an indolent girl from her bath," "Night, that
+queen who reigns only when she falls, shook out the
+shroud she wears for gown," are to be found on
+every page. Certain phrases sound good to him
+and are re-used: "Disappearances are deceptive,"
+"ruedelapaixian" (to describe a dress),
+"toilet of the ring" (lifted from the bull-fight in
+"Mr. Incoul's Misadventure" to do service in an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span>
+account of the arena games under Nero in "Imperial
+Purple"), but repetition of this kind is infrequent
+in his works and seemingly unnecessary.
+Ideas and phrases, endless chains of them, spurt
+from the point of his ardent pen. Standing on his
+magic carpet he shakes new sins out of his sleeve as
+a conjurer shakes out white rabbits and juggles
+words with an exquisite dexterity. He is, indeed,
+the <i>jongleur de notre &acirc;me</i>!</p>
+
+<p>From the beginning, his style has attracted the
+attention of the few and no one, I am sure, has
+ever written a three line review of a book by
+Saltus without referring to it. Mme. Am&eacute;lie
+Rives has quoted Oscar Wilde as saying to her one
+night at dinner, "In Edgar Saltus's work passion
+struggles with grammar on every page!" Percival
+Pollard has dubbed him a "prose paranoiac,"
+and Elbert Hubbard says, "He writes so well that
+he grows enamoured of his own style and is subdued
+like the dyer's hand; he becomes intoxicated
+on the lure of lines and the roll of phrases. He
+is woozy on words&mdash;locoed by syntax and prosody.
+The libation he pours is flavoured with euphues.
+It is all like a cherry in a morning Martini."
+A phrase which Remy de Gourmont uses
+to describe Villiers de l'Isle Adam might be applied
+with equal success to the author of "The Lords of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span>
+the Ghostland": "<i>L'id&eacute;alisme de Villiers &eacute;tait un
+v&eacute;ritable id&eacute;alisme verbal, c'est-&agrave;-dire qu'il croyait
+vraiment &agrave; la puissance &eacute;vocatrice des mots, &agrave;
+leur vertu magique.</i>" And we may listen to Saltus's
+own testimony in the matter: "It may be
+noted that in literature only three things count,
+style, style polished, style repolished; these
+imagination and the art of transition aid, but do
+not enhance. As for style, it may be defined as the
+sorcery of syllables, the fall of sentences, the use
+of the exact term, the pursuit of a repetition
+even unto the thirtieth and fortieth line. Grammar
+is an adjunct but not an obligation. No
+grammarian ever wrote a thing that was fit to
+read."</p>
+
+<p>At his worst&mdash;and his worst can be monstrous!&mdash;garbed
+fantastically in purple patches and
+gaudy rags, he wallows in muddy puddles of Burgundy
+and gold dust; even then he is unflagging
+and holds the attention in a vise. His women
+have eyes which are purple pools, their hair is
+bitten by combs, their lips are scarlet threads.
+Even the names of his characters, Roanoke Raritan,
+Ruis Ixar, Tancred Ennever, Erastus Varick,
+Gulian Verplank, Melancthon Orr, Justine Dunnellen,
+Roland Mistrial, Giselle Oppensheim, Yoda
+Jones, Stella Sixmuth, Violet Silverstairs, Sallie<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span>
+Malakoff, Shane Wyvell, Dugald Maule, Eden
+Menemon (it will be observed that he has a persistent,
+balefully procacious, perhaps, indeed,
+Freudian predilection for the letters U, V, and
+X),<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> are fantastic and fabulous ... sometimes
+almost frivolous. And here we may find our
+paradox. His sense of humour is abnormal,
+sometimes expressed directly by way of epigram
+or sly wording but may it not also occasionally
+express itself indirectly in these purple
+towers of painted velvet words, extravagant
+fables, and unbelievable characters he is so fond of
+erecting? Some of his work almost approaches
+the burlesque in form. He carries his manner to
+a point where he seems to laugh at it himself, and
+then, with a touch of poignant realism or a poetic
+phrase, he confounds the reader's judgment. The
+virtuosity of the performance is breath-taking!</p>
+
+<p>He is always the snob (somewhere he defends the
+snob in an essay): rich food ("half-mourning"
+[artichoke hearts and truffles], "filet of reindeer,"
+a cygnet in its plumage bearing an orchid in its
+beak, "heron's eggs whipped with wine into an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span>
+amber foam," "mashed grasshoppers baked in
+saffron"), rich clothes, rich people interest him.
+There is no poverty in his books. His creatures
+do not toil. They cut coupons off bonds. Sometimes
+they write or paint, but for the most part
+they are free to devote themselves exclusively to
+the pursuit of emotional experience, eating, reading,
+and travelling the while. And when they
+have finished dining they wipe their hands, wetted
+in a golden bowl, in the curly hair of a tiny serving
+boy. A character in "Madam Sapphira"
+explains this tendency: "A writer, if he happens
+to be worth his syndicate, never chooses a subject.
+The subject chooses him. He writes what
+he must, not what he might. That's the thing the
+public can't understand."</p>
+
+<p>There is always a preoccupation with ancient
+life, sometimes freely expressed as in "Imperial
+Purple," but more often suggested by plot, phrase,
+or scene. He kills more people than Caligula
+killed during the whole course of his bloody reign.
+Murders, suicides, and other forms of sudden death
+flash their sensations across his pages. Webster
+and the other Elizabethans never steeped themselves
+so completely in gore. In almost every book there
+is an orgy of death and he has been ingenious in
+varying its forms. The poisons of rafflesia,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span>
+muscarine, and orsere are introduced in his fictions;
+somewhere he devotes an essay to toxicology.
+Daggers with blades like needles, pistols, drownings,
+asphyxiations, play their r&ocirc;les ... and in
+one book there is a crucifixion!</p>
+
+<p>Again I find that Mr. Saltus has said his word
+on the subject: "In fiction as in history it is
+the shudder that tells. Hugo could find no higher
+compliment for Baudelaire than to announce that
+the latter had discovered a new one. For new
+shudders are as rare as new vices; antiquity has
+made them all seem trite. The apt commingling
+of the horrible and the trivial, pathos and ferocity,
+is yet the one secret of enduring work&mdash;a secret,
+parenthetically, which Hugo knew as no one else."</p>
+
+<p>His fables depend in most instances upon sexual
+abberrations, curious coincidences, fantastic happenings.
+Rapes and incests decorate his pages.
+He does not ask us to believe his monstrous
+stories; he compels us to. He carries us by
+means of the careless expenditure of many passages
+of somewhat ribald beauty, along with him,
+captive to his pervasive charm. We are constantly
+reminded, in endless, almost wearisome,
+imagery, of gold and purple, foreign languages,
+esoteric philosophies, foods the names of which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span>
+strike the ear as graciously as they themselves
+might strike the tongue. From Huysmans he has
+learned the formula for ravishing all our senses.
+Words are often used for their own sakes to call
+up images, colour flits across every page, across,
+indeed, every line. We taste, we smell, we see.
+There is the pomp and circumstance of the Roman
+Catholic ritual in these pages, the Roman Catholic
+ritual well supplied with mythical monsters, singing
+flowers, and blooming women. Strange scarlet
+and mulberry threads form the woof of these
+tapestries, threads pulled with great labour from
+all the art of the past. There is, in much of his
+work, an undercurrent of subtle sensuous erotic
+poison; in one of her stories Edna Kenton tells us
+that <i>chartreuse jaune</i> and bananas form such a
+poison. There is a suggestion of <i>chartreuse jaune</i>
+and bananas in much of the work of Edgar Saltus.</p>
+
+<p>He is constantly obsessed by the mysteries of
+love and death, the veils of Isis, the secrets of
+Moses. While others were delving in the American
+soil his soul sped afar; he is not even a cosmopolitan;
+he is a Greek, a Brahmin, a worshipper
+of Ishtar. There is a prodigious and prodigal
+display of genius in his work, savannahs of epigrams,
+forests of ideas, phrases enough to fill the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span>
+ocean.<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> There is enough material in the romances
+of Edgar Saltus to furnish all the cinema companies
+in America with scenarios for a twelve-month.</p>
+
+<p>Early in the Eighties a writer in "The Argus"
+referred to him as "the prose laureate of pessimism."
+His philosophy may be summed up in a
+few phrases: Nothing matters, Whatever will be
+is, Everything is possible, and Since we live today
+let us make the best of it and live in Paris. And
+through all the <i>opera</i> of Saltus, through the rapes
+and murders, the religious, philosophical, and social
+discussions, rings Cherubino's still unanswered
+question, <i>Che cosa e amor?</i> like a persistent refrain.</p>
+
+<p>After having said so much it seems unnecessary
+to add that I strongly advise the reader to go out
+and buy all the books of Edgar Saltus he can
+find (and to find many will require patience and
+dexterity, as most of them are out of print). To
+further aid him in the matter I have prepared a
+short catalogue and with his permission I will
+guide him gently through this new land. I have
+also added a list of publishers, together with the
+dates of publication, although I cannot, in some<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span>
+instances, vouch for their having been the original
+imprints. It may be noted that almost all his
+books have been reprinted in England.<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a></p>
+
+<p>"Balzac,"<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> signed Edgar Evertson Saltus (for
+a time he used his full name) is such good literary
+criticism and such good personal biography that
+one wishes the author had tried the form again.
+He did not save in his prefaces to his translations,
+his essay on Victor Hugo, and his short study of
+Oscar Wilde. In its miniature way, for the book
+is slight, "Balzac" is as good of its kind as James
+Huneker's "Chopin," Auguste Ehrhard's "Fanny
+Elssler," and Frank Harris's "Oscar Wilde." In
+style it is superior to any of these. It is a very
+pretty performance for a d&eacute;but and if it is out
+of print, as I think it is, some enterprising publisher
+should serve it to the public in a new edition.
+The two most interesting chapters, largely anecdotal
+but continuously illuminating, are entitled
+"The Vagaries of Genius," wherein one may find
+an infinitude of details concerning the manner in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span>
+which Balzac worked, and "The Chase for Gold,"
+but tucked in somewhere else is a charming digression
+about realism in fiction and the bibliography
+should still be of use to students. Saltus tells
+us that Balzac took all his characters' names from
+life, frequently from signs which he observed on the
+street. In this respect Saltus certainly has not
+followed him; in another he has been more imitative:
+I refer to the Balzacian trick of carrying
+people from one book to another.</p>
+
+<p>"The Philosophy of Disenchantment"<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> is an
+ingratiating account of the pessimism of Schopenhauer,
+a philosophy with which it would seem, Saltus
+is fully in accord. Two-thirds of the book is
+allotted to Schopenhauer, but the remainder is
+devoted to an exposition of the teachings of von
+Hartmann and a final essay, "Is Life an Affliction?"
+which query the author seems to answer in
+the affirmative. One of the best-known of the
+Saltus books, "The Philosophy of Disenchantment"
+is written in a clear, translucent style
+without the iridescence which decorates his later
+<i>opera</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"After-Dinner Stories from Balzac, done into
+English by Myndart Verelst (obviously E. S.)<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span>
+with an introduction by Edgar Saltus"<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a> contains
+four of the Frenchman's tales, "The Red Inn,"
+"Madame Firmiani," "The 'Grande Bret&egrave;che',"
+and "Madame de Beaus&eacute;ant." The introduction
+is written in Saltus's most beguiling manner and
+may be referred to as one of the most delightful
+short essays on Balzac extant. The dedication is
+to V. A. B.</p>
+
+<p>"The Anatomy of Negation"<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> is Saltus's best
+book in his earlier manner, which is as free from
+flamboyancy as early Gothic, and one of his most
+important contributions to our literature. The
+work is a history of antitheism from Kapila to
+Leconte de Lisle and, while the writer in a brief
+prefatory notice disavows all responsibility for
+the opinions of others, it can readily be felt that
+the book is a labour of love and that his sympathy
+lies with the iconoclasts through the centuries.
+The chapter entitled, "The Convulsions of the
+Church," a brief history of Christianity, is one of
+the most brilliant passages to be found in any of
+the works of this very brilliant writer. Indeed, if
+you are searching for the soul of Saltus you could
+not do better than turn to this chapter. Of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span>
+Jesus he says, "He was the most entrancing of
+nihilists but no innovator." Here is another excerpt:
+"Paganism was not dead; it had merely
+fallen asleep. Isis gave way to Mary; apotheosis
+was replaced by canonization; the divinities were
+succeeded by saints; and, Africa aiding, the
+Church surged from mythology with the Trinity
+for tiara." Again: "Satan was Jew from horn
+to hoof. The registry of his birth is contained in
+the evolution of Hebraic thought." Never was
+any book so full of erudition and ideas so easy to
+read, a fascinating <i>opus</i>, written by a true sceptic.
+Following the Baedeker system, adopted so
+amusingly by Henry T. Finck in his "Songs and
+Song Writers," this book should be triple-starred.</p>
+
+<p>"Tales before Supper, from Th&eacute;ophile Gautier
+and Prosper M&eacute;rim&eacute;e, told in English by Myndart
+Verelst and delayed with a proem by Edgar Saltus."<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a>
+Translation again. The stories are
+"Avatar" and "The Venus of Ille." The essay
+at the beginning is a very charming performance.
+This book is dedicated to E. C. R.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Incoul's Misadventure,"<a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a> Saltus's first
+novel, is also the best of his numerous fictions. It,
+too, should be triple-starred in any guide book<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span>
+through this <i>opus</i>-land. In it will be found, super-distilled,
+the very essence of all the best qualities
+of this writer. It is written with fine reserve;
+the story holds; the characters are unusually well
+observed, felt, and expressed. Irony shines
+through the pages and the final cadence includes a
+murder and a suicide. For the former, bromide
+of potassium and gas are utilized in combination;
+for the latter laudanum, taken hypodermically,
+suffices. There are scenes in Biarritz and Northern
+Spain which include a thrilling picture of a
+bull-fight. There is an interesting glimpse of the
+Paris Op&eacute;ra. There is a description of an epithumetic
+library which embraces many forbidden
+titles, (How that "baron of moral endeavour ... the
+professional hound of heaven," Anthony Comstock,
+would have gloated over these shelves!), a
+vibrant page about Goya, and another about a
+Thibetian cat. Many passages could be brought
+forward as evidence that Mr. Saltus loves the fire-side
+sphynx. The Mr. Incoul of the title gives one
+a very excellent idea of how inhuman a just man
+can be. There is not a single slip in the skilful
+delineation of this monster. The beautiful heroine
+vaguely shambles into a tapestried background.
+She is <i>moyen age</i> in her appealing weakness. The
+<i>jeune premier</i>, Lenox Leigh, is well drawn and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span>
+lighted. Time after time the author strikes subtle
+harmonies which must have delighted Henry
+James. Why is this book not dedicated to
+author of "The Turn of the Screw" rather than
+to "E. A. S."? The pages are permeated with
+suspense, horror, information, irony, and charm,
+about evenly distributed, all of which qualities are
+expressed in the astounding title (astounding after
+you have read the book). There is a white marriage
+in this tale, stipulated in the hymeneal bond.
+In 1877 Tschaikovsky made a similar agreement
+with the woman he married.</p>
+
+<p>"The Truth About Tristrem Varick"<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a> is written
+with the same restraint which characterizes the
+style of "Mr. Incoul's Misadventure," a restraint
+seldom to be encountered in Saltus's later fictions.
+One of the angles of the plot in which an irate
+father attempts to suppress a marriage by suggesting
+incest, bobs up twice again in his stories,
+for the last time nearly thirty years later in
+"The Monster." Irony is the keynote of the
+work, a keynote sounded in the dedication, "To
+my master, the philosopher of the unconscious,
+Eduard von Hartmann, this attempt in ornamental
+disenchantment is dutifully inscribed." The
+heroine, as frequently happens with Saltus heroines,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span>
+is veiled with the mysteries of Isis; we do
+not see the workings of her mind and so we can
+sympathize with Varick, who pursues her with
+persistent misunderstanding and arduous devotion
+through 240 pages. He attributes her aloofness
+to his father's unfounded charge against his
+mother and her father. When he learns that she
+has borne a child he suspects rape and, with a
+needle-like dagger that leaves no sign, he kills the
+man he believes to have seduced her. Then he
+goes to the lady to receive her thanks, only to learn
+that she loved the man he has killed. Varick
+gives himself into the hands of the police, confesses,
+and is delivered to justice, the lady gloating.
+A strikingly pessimistic tale, only less good
+than "Mr. Incoul." There is superb writing in
+these pages, many delightful passages. <i>La Cenerentola</i>
+and <i>Lucrezia Borgia</i> are mentioned in passing.
+Saltus has (or had) an exuberant fondness
+for Donizetti and Rossini. Here is a telling bit
+of art criticism (attributed to a character) descriptive
+of the Paris Salon: "There was a
+Manet or two, a Moreau and a dozen excellent
+landscapes, but the rest represented the apotheosis
+of mediocrity. The pictures which Gerome,
+Cabanel, Bouguereau, and the acolytes of these
+pastry-cooks exposed were stupid and sterile as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span>
+church doors." This required courage in 1888.
+One wonders where Kenyon Cox was at the time!
+Give this book at least two stars.</p>
+
+<p>"Eden"<a name="FNanchor_13_13" id="FNanchor_13_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a> is the third of Saltus's fictions and
+possibly the poorest of the three. Eden is the
+name of the heroine whose further name is Menemon.
+Stuyvesant Square is her original habitat
+but she migrates to Fifth Avenue. The tide is
+flowing South again nowadays. Her husband is
+almost too good, but nevertheless appearances
+seem against him until he explains that the lady
+with whom he has been seen in a cab is his daughter
+by a former marriage, and the young man who
+seems to have been making love to Eden is his son.
+Characteristic of Saltus is the use of the Spanish
+word for nightingale. There are no deaths, no
+suicides, no murders in these pages: a very
+eunuch of a book! A motto from Tasso, "<i>Perdute
+e tutto il tempo che in amor non si spende</i>" adorns
+the title page and the work is dedicated to
+"E&mdash;&mdash;H Amicissima."</p>
+
+<p>With "The Pace that Kills"<a name="FNanchor_14_14" id="FNanchor_14_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a> Saltus doffs his
+old coat and dons a new and gaudier garment.
+Possibly he owed this change in style to the influence
+of the London movement so interestingly <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span>described
+in Holbrook Jackson's "The Eighteen-Nineties."
+The book begins with abortion and
+ends with a drop over a ferry-boat into the icy
+East River. There is an averted strangulation of
+a baby and for the second time in a Saltus <i>opus</i> a
+dying millionaire leaves his fortune to the St.
+Nicholas Hospital. Was Saltus ballyhooing for
+this institution? The hero is a modern Don Juan.
+Alphabet Jones appears occasionally, as he does in
+many of the other novels. This Balzacian trick
+obsessed the author for a time. The book is
+dedicated to John S. Rutherford and bears as a
+motto on its title page this quotation from Rabusson:
+"<i>Pourquoi la mort? Dites, plut&ocirc;t, pourquoi
+la vie?</i>"</p>
+
+<p>In "A Transaction in Hearts"<a name="FNanchor_15_15" id="FNanchor_15_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a> the Reverend
+Christopher Gonfallon falls in love with his wife's
+sister, Claire. A New England countess, a subsidiary
+figure, suggests d'Aurevilly. This story
+originally appeared in "Lippincott's Magazine"
+and the editor who accepted it was dismissed. A
+year or so later a new editor published "The Picture
+of Dorian Gray." Still later Saltus tells me
+he met Oscar Wilde in London and the Irish poet
+asked him for news of the new editor. "He's quite
+well," answered Saltus. Wilde did not seem to be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span>
+pleased: "When your story appeared the editor
+was removed; when mine appeared I supposed he
+would be hanged. Now you tell me he is quite
+well. It is most disheartening." Saltus then
+asked Wilde why Dorian Gray was cut by his
+friends. Wilde turned it over. "I fancy they
+saw him eating fish with his knife."</p>
+
+<p>"A Transient Guest and other Episodes"<a name="FNanchor_16_16" id="FNanchor_16_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a> contains
+three short tales besides the title story:
+"The Grand Duke's Riches," an account of an
+ingenious robbery at the Brevoort, "A Maid of
+Athens," and "Fausta," a story of love, revenge,
+and death in Cuba. If the final cadence of the
+book is a dagger thrust the prelude is a subtle poison,
+rafflesia, a Sumatran plant, intended for the
+hero, Tancred Ennever, but consumed with fatal
+results by his faithful fox terrier, Zut Alors.
+The story is arresting and, as frequently happens
+in Saltus romances, a man finds himself no match
+for a woman. "A Transient Guest" is dedicated
+to K. J. M.</p>
+
+<p>The slender volume entitled "Love and Lore"<a name="FNanchor_17_17" id="FNanchor_17_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a>
+contains a short series of slight essays, interrupted
+by slighter sonnets, on subjects which, for the
+most part, Saltus has treated at greater length<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span>
+and with greater effect elsewhere. He makes a
+whimsical plea for a modern revival of the Court
+of Love and in "Morality in Fiction" he derides
+that Puritanism in American letters whose dark
+scourge H. L. Mencken still pursues with a cat-o'-nine-tails
+and a hand grenade. He gives us a fanciful
+set of rules for a novelist which, happily, he
+has ignored in his own fictions. The most interesting,
+personal, and charming chapter, although
+palpably derived from "The Philosophy of Disenchantment,"
+is that entitled "What Pessimism
+Is Not"; here again we are in the heart of the
+author's philosophy. Those who like to read
+books about the Iberian Peninsula can scarcely
+afford to miss "Fabulous Andalucia," in which an
+able brief for the race of Othello is presented:
+"Under the Moors, Cordova surpassed Baghdad.
+They wrote more poetry than all the other nations
+put together. It was they who invented rhyme;
+they wrote everything in it, contracts, challenges,
+treaties, treatises, diplomatic notes and messages
+of love. From the earliest khalyf down to Boabdil,
+the courts of Granada, of Cordova and of
+Seville were peopled with poets, or, as they were
+termed, with makers of Ghazels. It was they who
+gave us the dulcimer, the hautbois and the guitar;
+it was they who invented the serenade. We are<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span>
+indebted to them for algebra and for the canons of
+chivalry as well.... It was from them that came
+the first threads of light which preceded the
+Renaissance. Throughout mediaeval Europe they
+were the only people that thought." The book is
+dedicated to Edgar Fawcett, "perfect poet&mdash;perfect
+friend" and is embellished with a portrait
+of its author.</p>
+
+<p>"The Story Without a Name"<a name="FNanchor_18_18" id="FNanchor_18_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a> is a translation
+of "Une Histoire Sans Nom" of Barbey
+d'Aurevilly, and is preceded by one of Saltus's
+charming and atmospheric literary essays, the best
+on d'Aurevilly to be found in English. When this
+book first appeared, Mr. Saltus informs me, a reviewer,
+"who contrived to be both amusing and
+complimentary," said that Barbey d'Aurevilly was
+a fictitious person and that this vile story was
+Saltus's own vile work!</p>
+
+<p>"Mary Magdalen,"<a name="FNanchor_19_19" id="FNanchor_19_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a> on the whole disappointing,
+is nevertheless one of the important Saltus
+<i>opera</i>. The opening chapters, like Oscar
+Wilde's <i>Salome</i> (published two years later than
+"Mary Magdalen") owe much to Flaubert's
+"H&eacute;rodias." The dance on the hands is a detail<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span>
+from Flaubert, a detail which Tissot followed in
+his painting of Salome.... From the later chapters
+it is possible that Paul Heyse filched an idea.
+The turning point of his drama, <i>Maria von Magdala</i>,
+hinges on Judas's love for Mary and his
+jealousy of Jesus. Saltus develops exactly this
+situation. Heyse's play appeared in 1899, eight
+years after Saltus's novel. However, Saltus has
+protested to me that it is an idea that might have
+occurred to any one. "I put it in," he added, "to
+make the action more nervous." The book begins
+well with a description of Herod's court and Rome
+in Judea, but as a whole it is unsatisfactory.
+Once the plot develops Saltus seems to lose interest.
+He lazily quotes whole scenes from the
+Bible (George Moore very cleverly avoided this
+pitfall in "The Brook Kerith"). The early
+chapters suggest "Imperial Purple," which appeared
+a year later and upon which he may well
+have been at work at this time. There is a foreshadowing,
+too, of "The Lords of the Ghostland"
+in a very amusing and slightly cynical passage
+in which Mary as a child listens to Sephorah
+the sorceress tell legends and myths of Assyria and
+Egypt. Mary interrupts with "Why you mean
+Moses! You mean Noah!" just as a child of today,
+if confronted with the situations in the Greek<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span>
+dramas would attribute them to Bayard Veiller or
+Eugene Walter. Saltus is too much of a scholar
+to find much novelty in Christianity. But aside
+from this passage cynicism is lacking from this
+book, a quality which makes another story on the
+same theme, "Le Procurateur de Jud&eacute;e," one of
+the greatest short stories in any language.
+Mary's sins are quickly passed over and we come
+almost immediately to her conversion. Herod
+Antipas, with his "fan-shaped beard" and vacillating
+Pilate, quite comparable to a modern politician,
+are the most human and best-realized characters
+in a book which should have been greater
+than it is. "Mary Magdalen" is dedicated to
+Henry James.</p>
+
+<p>"The facts in the Curious Case of H. Hyrtl,
+esq."<a name="FNanchor_20_20" id="FNanchor_20_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a> is a slight yarn in the mellow Stevenson
+manner, with a kindly old gentleman as the messenger
+of the supernatural who provides the
+wherewithal for a marriage between an impoverished
+artist, who is painting Heliogabolus's feast
+of roses, and his sweet young thing. Quite a
+departure this from the usual Saltus manner;
+nevertheless there are two deaths, one by shock,
+the other in a railway accident. The plot depends<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span>
+on as many impossible entrances and exits
+as a Palais Royal farce and the reader is asked
+to believe in many coincidences. The book is dedicated
+to Lorillard Ronalds who, the author explains
+in a few French phrases, asked him to write
+something "<i>de tr&egrave;s pure et de tr&egrave;s chaste, pour une
+jeunesse, sans doute</i>." He adds that the story is
+a rewriting of a tale which had appeared twenty
+years earlier.</p>
+
+<p>"Imperial Purple"<a name="FNanchor_21_21" id="FNanchor_21_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a> marks the high-tide of
+Saltus's peculiar genius. The emperors of imperial
+decadent Rome are led by the chains of art
+behind the chariot wheels of the poet: Julius
+C&aelig;sar, whom Cato called "that woman," Augustus,
+Tiberius, Caligula, the wicked Agrippina, for
+whom Agnes Repplier named her cat, Claudius,
+Nero, Hadrian, Vespasian, down to the incredible
+Heliogabolus. Saltus, who has given us many
+vivid details concerning the lives of his predecessors,
+seemingly falters at this dread name, but only
+seemingly. More can be found about this extraordinary
+and perverse emperor in Lombard's
+"L'Agonie" and in Franz Blei's "The Powder
+Puff," but, although Saltus is brief, he evokes an
+atmosphere and a picture in a few short paragraphs.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span>
+The sheer lyric quality of this book has
+remained unsurpassed by this author. Indeed it is
+rare in all literature. Page after page that Walter
+Pater, Oscar Wilde, or J. K. Huysmans might
+have been glad to sign might be set before you.
+The man writes with invention, with sap, with
+urge. Our eyes are not clogged with foot-notes
+and references. It is plain that our author has
+delved in the "Scriptores Histori&aelig; August&aelig;,"
+that he has read Lampridius, Suetonius, and the
+others, but he does not strive to make us aware of
+it. The historical form has at last found a poet
+to render it supportable. Blood runs across the
+pages; gore and booty are the principal themes;
+and yet Beauty struts supreme through the horror.
+The author's sympathy is his password, a
+sympathy which he occasionally exposes, for he
+is not above pinning his heart to his sleeve, as, for
+example, when he says, "In spite of Augustus's
+boast, the city was not by any means of marble.
+It was filled with crooked little streets, with the
+atrocities of the Tarquins, with houses unsightly
+and perilous, with the moss and dust of ages; it
+compared with Alexandria as London compares
+with Paris; it had a splendour of its own, but a
+splendour that could be heightened." Here is a
+picture of squalid Rome: "In the subura, where<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span>
+at night women sat in high chairs, ogling the
+passer with painted eyes, there was still plenty of
+brick; tall tenements, soiled linen, the odor of
+Whitechapel and St. Giles. The streets were noisy
+with match-pedlars, with vendors of cake and
+tripe and coke; there were touts there too, altars
+to unimportant divinities, lying Jews who dealt in
+old clothes, in obscene pictures and unmentionable
+wares; at the crossings there were thimbleriggers,
+clowns and jugglers, who made glass balls appear
+and disappear surprisingly; there were doorways
+decorated with curious invitations, gossipy barber
+shops, where, through the liberality of politicians,
+the scum of a great city was shaved, curled and
+painted free; and there were public houses, where
+vagabond slaves and sexless priests drank the
+mulled wine of Crete, supped on the flesh of beasts
+slaughtered in the arena, or watched the Syrian
+women twist to the click of castanets." The account
+of the arena under Nero should not be
+missed, but it is too long to quote here. The
+book, which we give three stars, is dedicated to
+Edwin Albert Schroeder. Fortunately, of all Saltus's
+works, it is the most readily procurable.</p>
+
+<p>"Imperial Purple" has had a curious history.
+Belford, Clarke and Co., who hid their identity
+behind the "Morrill, Higgins" imprint, failed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span>
+shortly after they had issued the book. "Presently,"
+Mr. Saltus writes me, "a Chicago bibliofilou
+brought it out as the work of some one else
+and called it 'The Sins of Nero.'" Meanwhile
+Greening published it in London and finally
+Mitchell Kennerley reprinted it in New York.
+In 1911 Macmillan in London brought out "The
+Amazing Emperor Heliogabolus" by the Reverend
+John Stuart Hay of Oxford. In the preface
+to this book I found the following: "I have
+also the permission of Mr. E. E. Saltus of Harvard
+University (<i>sic</i>) to quote his vivid and beautiful
+studies on the Roman Empire and her customs.
+I am also deeply indebted to Mr. Walter
+Pater, Mr. J. A. Symonds, and Mr. Saltus for
+many a <i>tournure de phrase</i> and picturesque rendering
+of Tacitus, Suetonious, Lampridius, and the
+rest." The Reverend Doctor certainly helped
+himself to "Imperial Purple." Words, sentences,
+nay whole paragraphs appear without the formality
+of quotation marks, without any indication,
+indeed, save these lines in the preface, that they
+are not part of the Doctor's own imagination,
+unless one compares them with the style in which
+the rest of the book is written. "In one instance,"
+Mr. Saltus writes me, "he gave a paragraph
+of mine as his own. Later on he added,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span>
+'as we have already said' and repeated the paragraph.
+The plural struck me as singular."</p>
+
+<p>"Madam Sapphira"<a name="FNanchor_22_22" id="FNanchor_22_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a> is a vivid study in unchastened
+womanhood. We see but little of the
+lady in the 251 pages of this "Fifth Avenue
+Story"; her character is exposed to us through
+the experiences of her poor fool husband, who
+colloquially would be called a simp, by denizens of
+the Low World a boob. He redeems himself to
+some extent by sending Madam Sapphira a belated
+bouquet of cyanide of potassium. On the whole,
+though characters and phrases in his work might
+be brought forward to prove the contrary, Mr.
+Saltus obviously has a low opinion of women and
+thinks that men do better without them. The
+greater part of the time he appears to agree with
+Posthumus:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Could I find out<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The woman's part in me! For there's no motion<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That tends to vice in man but I affirm<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">It is the woman's part; be it lying, note it<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The woman's; flattering, hers; deceiving, hers;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Lust and rank thoughts, hers, hers; revenges, hers;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Ambitions, covetings, changes of prides, disdain,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Nice longings, slanders, mutability,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span><br /></span>
+<span class="i0">All faults that may be named, nay that hell knows,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Why, hers, in part or all; but rather, all;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">For even to vice<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">They are not constant, but are changing still<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">One vice of a minute old for one<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Not half so old as that. I'll write against them,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Detest them, curse them.&mdash;Yet 'tis greater skill<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In a true hate, to pray they have their will:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The very devils cannot plague them better."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>"Enthralled, a story of international life setting
+forth the curious circumstances concerning
+Lord Cloden and Oswald Quain":<a name="FNanchor_23_23" id="FNanchor_23_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a> a mad <i>opus</i>
+this, an insane phantasmagoria of crime, avarice,
+and murder. For the second time in this author's
+novels incest plays a r&ocirc;le. This time it is real.
+Quain is indeed the half-brother of the lady who
+desires to marry him. He is as vile and virulent
+a villain as any who stalks through the pages of
+Ann Ker, Eliza Bromley, or Mrs. Radcliffe. A
+Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde motive is sounded. An
+ugly man comes back from London a handsome
+fellow after visits to a certain doctor who rearranges
+the lines of his face. The transformation
+is effected every day now (some of our
+prominent actresses are said to have benefited by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span>
+this operation), but in 1894 the mechanism of
+the trick must have been appallingly creaky.
+This story, indeed, borders on the burlesque and
+has almost as much claim to the title as "The
+Green Carnation." Was the author laughing at
+the Eighteen Nineties? The period is subtly
+evoked in one detail, constantly reiterated in Saltus's
+early books: ladies and gentlemen when they
+leave a room "push aside the portieres." Sometimes
+the "rings jingle." He has in most instances
+mercifully spared us further descriptions
+of the interiors of New York houses at this
+epoch.... At a dinner party one of the guests
+refers to Howells as the "foremost novelist who is
+never read." The book is dedicated to "Cherubina,
+<i>dulcissime rerum</i>." Saltus returned to the
+central theme of "Enthralled" in a story called
+"The Impostor," printed in "Ainslee's" for May,
+1917.</p>
+
+<p>"When Dreams Come True"<a name="FNanchor_24_24" id="FNanchor_24_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a> again brings us
+in touch with Tancred Ennever, the stupid hero
+of "The Transient Guest." In the meantime he
+has become an almost intolerable prig. It is
+probable that Saltus meant more by this fable
+than he has let appear. The roar of the waves
+on the coast of Lesbos is distinctly audible for a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span>
+time and the d&eacute;no&ucirc;ment seems to belong to quite
+another story.... Ennever has turned author.
+We are informed that he has completed studies on
+Huysmans and Leconte de Lisle; he is also engaged
+on a "Historia Amoris." There is an interesting
+passage relating to the names of great
+writers. Alphabet Jones assures us that they are
+always "in two syllables with the accent on the
+first. Oyez: Homer, Sappho, Horace, Dante,
+Petrarch, Ronsard, Shakespeare, Hugo, Swinburne
+... Balzac, Flaubert, Huysmans, Michelet,
+Renan." The reader is permitted to
+add ... "Saltus"!</p>
+
+<p>"Purple and Fine Women"<a name="FNanchor_25_25" id="FNanchor_25_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a> is a misnamed
+book. It should be called "Philosophic Fables."
+The first two stories are French in form. Paul
+Bourget himself is the hero of one of them! In
+"The Princess of the Sun" we are offered a new
+and fantastic version of the Coppelia story.
+"The Dear Departed" finds Saltus in a murderous
+amorous mood again. In "The Princess
+of the Golden Isles" a new poison is introduced,
+muscarine. Alchemy furnishes the theme for one
+tale; the protagonist seeks an alcahest, a human
+victim for his crucible. We are left in doubt as
+to whether he chooses his wife, who wears a diamond<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span>
+set in one of her teeth, or a gorilla. There
+are dramas of dual personality and of death.
+Metaphysics and spiritualism rise dimly out of the
+charm of this book. There is a duchess who mews
+like a cat and somewhere we are assured that
+<i>Perche non posso odiarte</i> from <i>La Sonnnambula</i> is
+the most beautiful aria in the Italian repertory.
+Here is a true and soul-revealing epigram:
+"The best way to master a subject of which you
+are ignorant is to write it up." Certainly not
+Saltus at his best, this <i>opus</i>, but far from his
+worst.</p>
+
+<p>"The Perfume of Eros"<a name="FNanchor_26_26" id="FNanchor_26_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a> is frenzied fiction
+again; amnesia, drunkenness, white slavery, sex,
+are its mingled themes. There is a pretty picture,
+recognizable in any smart community, of a witty
+woman of fashion, and a full-length portrait of a
+bounder. "The Yellow Fay," Saltus's <i>clich&eacute;</i> for
+the Demon Rum, was the original title of this
+"Fifth Avenue Incident." Romance and Realism
+consort lovingly together in its pages. There is
+an unforgetable passage descriptive of a young
+man ridding himself of his mistress. He interrupts
+his flow of explanation to hand her a card
+case, which she promptly throws out of the window.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"'That is an agreeable way of getting rid of
+twelve thousand dollars,' he remarked.</p>
+
+<p>"Yet, however lightly he affected to speak, the
+action annoyed him. Like all men of large means
+he was close. It seemed to him beastly to lose
+such a sum. He got up, went to the window and
+looked down. He could not see the case and he
+much wanted to go and look for it. But that for
+the moment Marie prevented."</p>
+
+<p>"The Pomps of Satan"<a name="FNanchor_27_27" id="FNanchor_27_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a> is replete with grace
+and graciousness, and full of charm, a quality more
+valuable to its possessor than juvenility, our author
+tells us in a chapter concerning the lost elixir
+of youth. Neither form nor matter assume ponderous
+shape in this volume, which in the quality
+of its contents reminds one faintly of Franz Blei's
+lady's breviary, "The Powder Puff," but Saltus's
+book is the more ingratiating of the two. Satan's
+pomps are varied; the author exposes his whims,
+his ideas, images the past, forecasts the future, deplores
+the present. There is a chapter on cooking
+and we learn that Saltus does not care for
+food prepared in the German style ... nor yet
+in the American. He forbids us champagne:
+"Champagne is not a wine. It is a beverage,
+lighter indeed than brandy and soda, but, like<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span>
+cologne, fit only for demi-reps." But he seems
+untrue to himself in an essay condemning the use
+of perfumes. His own books are heavily scented.
+With the rare prescience and clairvoyance of an
+artist he includes the German Kaiser in a chapter
+on hyenas (in 1906!); therein stalk the blood-stained
+shadows of Caligula, Caracalla, Atilla,
+Tamerlane, Cesare Borgia, Philip II, and Ivan
+the Terrible. The paragraph is worth quoting:
+"Power consists in having a million bayonets behind
+you. Its diffusion is not general. But there
+are people who possess it. For one, the German
+Kaiser. Not long since somebody or other diagnosed
+in him the habitual criminal. We doubt
+that he is that. But we suspect that, were it not
+for the press, he would show more of primitive man
+than he has thus far thought judicious." Has
+Mme. de Th&egrave;bes done better? Saltus also foresaw
+Gertrude Stein. Peering into the future he
+wrote: "When that day comes the models of literary
+excellence will not be the long and windy
+sentences of accredited bores, but ample brevities,
+such as the 'N' on Napoleon's tomb, in which, in
+less than a syllable, an epoch, and the glory of it,
+is resumed." Saltus forsakes his previous choice
+from Bellini and installs <i>Tu che a Dio</i> as his favourite
+Italian opera air. Here is another flash<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span>
+of self-revealment: "Byzance is rumoured to
+have been the sewer of every sin, yet such was its
+beauty that it is the canker of our heart we could
+not have lived there." Always this turning to the
+far past, this delving in rosetta stones and palimpsests,
+this preoccupation with the sights and sins
+of the ancient gods and kings. A chapter on
+poisons, another on Gille de Retz, which probably
+owes something to "La Bas," betray this preference.
+He playfully suggests that the Academy of
+Arts and Letters be filled up with young nobodies:
+"They have, indeed, done nothing yet. But
+therein is their charm. An academy composed of
+young people who have done nothing yet would be
+more alluring than one made up of fossils who are
+unable to do anything more." Herein are contained
+enough aphorisms and epigrams to make
+up a new book of Solomonic wisdom. Hardly as
+evenly inspired as "Imperial Purple," "The
+Pomps of Satan" is more dashing and more
+varied. It is also more tired.</p>
+
+<p>"Vanity Square"<a name="FNanchor_28_28" id="FNanchor_28_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a> in Stella Sixmuth boasts
+such a "vampire" as even Theda Bara is seldom
+called upon to portray. Not until the final chapters
+of this mystery story do we discover that
+this lady has been poisoning a rich man's wife,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span>
+with an eye on the rich man's heart and hand.
+Oraere is this slow and subtle poison which leaves
+no subsequent trace. She is thwarted but in a
+subsequent attempt she is successful. Robert
+Hichens has used this theme in "Bella Donna."
+There is a suicide by pistol. An exciting story
+but little else, this book contains fewer references
+to the gods and the c&aelig;sars than is usual with
+Saltus. To compensate there are long discussions
+about phobias, dual personalities (a girl with six
+is described) and theories about future existence.
+Vanity Square, we are told, is bounded by Central
+Park, Madison Avenue, Seventy-second Street and
+the Plaza.</p>
+
+<p>It will be remembered that Tancred Ennever
+was at work on "Historia Amoris"<a name="FNanchor_29_29" id="FNanchor_29_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> in 1895,
+which would seem to indicate that Saltus had begun
+to collect material for it himself at that time.
+The title is a literal description of the contents of
+the book: it is a history of love. Such a work
+might have been made purely anecdotal or scientific,
+but Saltus's purpose has been at once more
+serious and more graceful, to show how the love
+currents flowed through the centuries, to show what
+effect period life had on love and what effect love
+had on period life. Beginning with Babylon and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span>
+passing on through the "Song of Songs" we meet
+Helen of Troy, Scheherazade (though but briefly),
+Sappho (to whom an entire chapter is devoted),
+Cleopatra (whom Heine called "<i>cette reine entretenue</i>"),
+Mary Magdalen, H&eacute;lo&iuml;se.... The
+Courts of Love are described and deductions are
+drawn as to the effect of the Renaissance on the
+Gay Science. "Historia Amoris" is concluded by
+a Schopenhauerian essay on "The Law of Attraction."
+Cicisbeism is not treated in extenso, as it
+should be, and I also missed the fragrant name
+of Sophie Arnould. Readers of "Love and Lore,"
+"The Pomps of Satan," "Imperial Purple," and
+"The Lords of the Ghostland" will find much of
+their material adjusted to the purposes of this
+History of Love, which, nevertheless, no one interested
+in Saltus can afford to miss.</p>
+
+<p>In "The Lords of the Ghostland, a history of
+the ideal,"<a name="FNanchor_30_30" id="FNanchor_30_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a> Saltus returns to the theme of "The
+Anatomy of Negation." The newer work is both
+more cynical and more charming. It is, of course,
+a history and a comparison of religions. With
+Reinach Saltus believes that Christianity owes
+much to its ancestors. Brahma, Ormuzd, Amon-R&acirc;,
+Bel-Marduk, Jehovah, Zeus, Jupiter, and
+many lesser deities parade before us in defile.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span>
+Prejudice, intolerance, tolerance even are lacking
+from this book, as they were from "Imperial
+Purple." "The Lords of the Ghostland" is
+neither reverent nor irreverent, it is unreverent.
+Mr. Saltus finds joy in writing about the gods, the
+joy of a poet, and if his chiefest pleasure is to
+extol the gods of Greece that is only what might
+be expected of this truly pagan spirit. Students
+of comparative theology can learn much from
+these pages, but they will learn it unwittingly, for
+the poet supersedes the teacher. Saltus is never
+professorial. The scientific spirit is never to the
+fore; no marshalling of dull facts for their own
+sakes. Nevertheless I suspect that the book contains
+more absorbing information than any similar
+volume on the subject. With a fascinating and
+guileful style this divine devil of an author leads us
+on to the spot where he can point out to us that
+the only original feature of Christianity is the
+crucifixion, and even that is foreshadowed in
+Hindoo legend, in which Krishna dies, nailed by
+arrows to a tree. This book should be required
+reading for the first class in isogogies.</p>
+
+<p>Most of the scenes of "Daughters of the
+Rich"<a name="FNanchor_31_31" id="FNanchor_31_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a> are laid in Paris. The plot hinges on mistaken
+identity and the whole is a very ingenious<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span>
+detective story. The book begins rather than
+ends with a murder, but that is because the tale
+is told backward. Through lies, deceit, and
+treachery the woman in the case, one Sallie Malakoff,
+betrays the hero into marriage with her.
+When he discovers her perfidy he cheerfully cuts
+her throat from ear to ear and goes to join the
+lady from whom he has been estranged. She receives
+him with open arms and suggests wedding
+bells. No woman, she asserts, could resist a man
+who has killed another woman for her sake. This
+is decidedly a Roman point of view! Some of the
+action takes place in a house on the Avenue Malakoff,
+which must have been near the <i>h&ocirc;tel</i> of the
+Princesse de Sagan and the apartment occupied
+by Miss Mary Garden.... A fat manufacturer's
+wife confronts the proposal of a mercenary duke
+with an epic rejoinder: "Pay a man a million
+dollars to sleep with my daughter! Never!"...
+Again Saltus demonstrates how completely he is
+master of the story-telling gift, how surely he possesses
+the power to compel breathless attention.</p>
+
+<p>"The Monster"<a name="FNanchor_32_32" id="FNanchor_32_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a> is fiction, incredible, insane
+fiction. The monster is incest, in this instance
+<i>inceste manqu&eacute;</i> because it doesn't come off. On
+the eve of a runaway marriage Leilah Ogsten is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span>
+informed by her father that her intended husband
+is her own brother (he inculpates her mother in the
+scandal). Leilah disappears and to put barriers
+between her and the man she loves becomes the
+bride of another. Verplank pursues. There are
+two fabulous duels and a scene in which our hero
+is mangled by dogs. The stage (for we are always
+in some extravagant theatre) is frequently set in
+Paris and the familiar scenes of the capital are in
+turn exposed to our view. It is all mad, full of
+purple patches and crimson splotches and yet, once
+opened, it is impossible to lay the book down
+until it is completed. From this novel Mr. Saltus
+fashioned his only play, <i>The Gates of Life</i>, which
+he sent to Charles Frohman and which Mr. Frohman
+returned. The piece has neither been produced
+nor published.</p>
+
+<p>Last year (1917) the Brothers of the Book in
+Chicago published privately an extremely limited
+edition (474 copies) of a book by Edgar Saltus
+entitled, "Oscar Wilde: An Idler's Impression,"
+which contains only twenty-six pages, but those
+twenty-six pages are very beautiful. They evoke
+a spirit from the dead. Indeed, I doubt if even
+Saltus has done better than his description of a
+strange occurrence in a Regent Street Restaurant
+on a certain night when he was supping with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span>
+Wilde and Wilde was reading <i>Salome</i> to him:
+"apropos of nothing, or rather with what to me at
+the time was curious irrelevance, Oscar, while tossing
+off glass after glass of liquor, spoke of Ph&eacute;m&eacute;,
+a goddess rare even in mythology, who after appearing
+twice in Homer, flashed through a verse of
+Hesiod and vanished behind a page of Herodotus.
+In telling of her, suddenly his eyes lifted, his
+mouth contracted, a spasm of pain&mdash;or was it
+dread?&mdash;had gripped him. A moment only.
+His face relaxed. It had gone.</p>
+
+<p>"I have since wondered, could he have evoked
+the goddess then? For Ph&eacute;m&eacute; typified what modern
+occultism terms the impact&mdash;the premonition
+that surges and warns. It was Wilde's fate to die
+three times&mdash;to die in the dock, to die in prison,
+to die all along the boulevards of Paris. Often
+since I have wondered could the goddess have been
+lifting, however slightly, some fringe of the crimson
+curtain, behind which, in all its horror, his
+destiny crouched. If so, he braved it.</p>
+
+<p>"I had looked away. I looked again. Before
+me was a fat pauper, florid and over-dressed, who,
+in the voice of an immortal, was reading the fantasies
+of the damned. In his hand was a manuscript,
+and we were supping on <i>Salome</i>."</p>
+
+<p>Edgar Saltus began with Balzac in 1884 and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span>
+he has reached Oscar Wilde in 1917. His other
+literary essays, on Gautier and M&eacute;rim&eacute;e in "Tales
+Before Supper," on Barbey d'Aurevilly in "The
+Story Without a Name," and on Victor Hugo in
+"The Forum" (June, 1912,) all display the finest
+qualities of his genius. Pervaded with his rare
+charm they are clairvoyant and illuminating, more
+than that arresting. They should be brought together
+in one volume, especially as they are at
+present absolutely inaccessible, terrifyingly so,
+every one of them. And if they are to be thus
+collected may we not hope for one or two new essays
+with, say, for subjects, Flaubert and Huysmans?</p>
+
+<p>It is, you may perceive, as an essayist, a historian,
+an amateur philosopher that Saltus excels,
+but his fiction should not be underrated on
+that account. His novels indeed are half essays,
+just as his essays are half novels. Even the worst
+of them contains charming pages, delightful and
+unexpected interruptions. His series of fables
+suggests a vast <i>Com&eacute;die Inhumaine</i> but this statement
+must not be regarded as dispraise: it is
+merely description. You will find something of
+the same quality in the work of Edgar Allan Poe,
+but Saltus has more grace and charm than Poe,
+if less intensity. After one dip into realism<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span>
+("Mr. Incoul's Misadventure") Saltus became an
+incorrigible romantic. All his characters are the
+inventions of an errant fancy; scarcely one of
+them suggests a human being, but they are none
+the less creations of art. This, perhaps, was a
+daring procedure in an era devoted to the exploitation
+in fiction of the facts of hearth and home....
+After all, however, his way may be the better
+way. Personally I may say that my passion for
+realism is on the wane.</p>
+
+<p>In these strange tales we pass through the
+familiar haunts of metropolitan life, but the creatures
+are amazingly unfamiliar. They have horns
+and hoofs, halos and wings, or fins and tails. An
+esoteric band of fabulous monsters these: harpies
+and vampires take tea at Sherry's; succubi and
+incubbi are observed buying opal rings at Tiffany's;
+fairies, angels, dwarfs, and elves, bearing
+branches of asphodel, trip lightly down Waverly
+Place; peris, amshaspahands, &aelig;sir, izeds, and goblins
+sleep at the Brevoort; seraphim and cherubim
+decorate drawing rooms on Irving Place; griffons,
+chimeras, and sphynxes take courses in philosophy
+at Harvard; willis and sylphs sing airs
+from <i>Lucia di Lammermoor</i> and <i>Le Nozze di
+Figaro</i>; naiads and mermaids embark on the
+Cunard Line; centaurs and amazons drive in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span>
+Florentine Cascine; kobolds, gnomes, and trolls
+stab, shoot, and poison one another; and a satyr
+meets the martichoras in Gramercy Park. No
+such pictures of monstrous, diverting, sensuous
+existence can be found elsewhere save in the paintings
+of Arnold B&ouml;cklin, Franz von Stuck, and
+above all those of Gustave Moreau. If he had
+done nothing else Edgar Saltus should be famous
+for having given New York a mythology of its
+own!</p>
+
+<p><span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>January 12, 1918.</i></span></p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="The_New_Art" id="The_New_Art"></a>The New Art of the Singer</h3>
+
+
+<div class="blockquot">
+<p class="center"><i>"It's the law of life that nothing new can come into the world without pain."</i></p>
+<p class="author">Karen Borneman.</p></div>
+
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="The_New_Art_of_the_Singer" id="The_New_Art_of_the_Singer"></a>The New Art of the Singer</h2>
+
+
+<p>The art of vocalization is retarding the
+progress of the modern music drama.
+That is the simple fact although, doubtless,
+you are as accustomed as I am to hearing it expressed
+<i>&agrave; rebours</i>. How many times have we read
+that the art of singing is in its decadence, that
+soon there would not be one artist left fitted to
+deliver vocal music in public. The Earl of Mount
+Edgcumbe wrote something of the sort in 1825
+for he found the great Catalani but a sorry travesty
+of his early favourites, Pacchierotti and
+Banti. I protest against this misconception.
+Any one who asserts that there are laws which
+govern singing, physical, scientific laws, must pay
+court to other ears than mine. I have heard this
+same man for twenty years shouting in the market
+place that a piece without action was not a play
+(usually the drama he referred to had more real
+action than that which decorates the progress of
+<i>Nellie, the Beautiful Cloak Model</i>), that a composition
+without melody (meaning something by
+Richard Wagner, Robert Franz, or even Edvard
+Grieg) was not music, that verse without rhyme
+was not poetry. This same type of brilliant mind
+will go on to aver (forgetting the Scot) that men<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span>
+who wear skirts are not men, (forgetting the Spaniards)
+that women who smoke cigars are not
+women, and to settle numberless other matters in
+so silly a manner that a ten year old, half-witted
+school boy, after three minutes light thinking,
+could be depended upon to do better.</p>
+
+<p>The rules for the art of singing, laid down in
+the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries, have
+become obsolete. How could it be otherwise?
+They were contrived to fit a certain style of composition.
+We have but the briefest knowledge, indeed,
+of how people sang before 1700, although
+records exist praising the performances of Archilei
+and others. If a different standard for the criticism
+of vocalization existed before 1600 there is
+no reason why there should not after 1917. As
+a matter of fact, maugre much authoritative opinion
+to the contrary, a different standard does exist.
+In certain respects the new standard is taken
+for granted. We do not, for example, expect to
+hear male sopranos at the opera. The Earl of
+Mount Edgcumbe admired this artificial form of
+voice almost to the exclusion of all others. His
+favourite singer, indeed, Pacchierotti, was a male
+soprano. But other breaks have been made with
+tradition, breaks which are not yet taken for
+granted. When you find that all but one or two<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span>
+of the singers in every opera house in the world
+are ignoring the rules in some respect or other you
+may be certain, in spite of the protests of the
+professors, that the rules are dead. Their excuse
+has disappeared and they remain only as silly
+commandments made to fit an old religion. A
+singer in Handel's day was accustomed to stand
+in one spot on the stage and sing; nothing else
+was required of him. He was not asked to walk
+about or to act; even expression in his singing
+was limited to pathos. The singers of this period,
+Nicolini, Senesino, Cuzzoni, Faustina, Caffarelli,
+Farinelli, Carestini, Gizziello, and Pacchierotti,
+devoted their study years to preparing their voices
+for the display of a certain definite kind of florid
+music. They had nothing else to learn. As a
+consequence they were expected to be particularly
+efficient. Porpora, Caffarelli's teacher, is said to
+have spent six years on his pupil before he sent
+him forth to be "the greatest singer in the world."
+Contemporary critics appear to have been highly
+pleased with the result but there is some excuse
+for H. T. Finck's impatience, expressed in "Songs
+and Song Writers": "The favourites of the
+eighteenth-century Italian audiences were artificial
+male sopranos, like Farinelli, who was frantically
+applauded for such circus tricks as beating<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span>
+a trumpeter in holding on to a note, or racing
+with an orchestra and getting ahead of it; or
+Caffarelli, who entertained his audiences by singing,
+<i>in one breath</i>, a chromatic chain of trills up
+and down two octaves. Caffarelli was a pupil of
+the famous vocal teacher Porpora, who wrote
+operas consisting chiefly of monotonous successions
+of florid arias resembling the music that is
+now written for flutes and violins." All very well
+for the day, no doubt, but could Cuzzoni sing
+Isolde? Could Faustina sing M&eacute;lisande? And
+what modern parts would be allotted to the Julian
+Eltinges of the Eighteenth Century?</p>
+
+<p>When composers began to set dramatic texts
+to music trouble immediately appeared at the door.
+For example, the contemporaries of Sophie
+Arnould, the "creator" of <i>Iphig&eacute;nie en Aulide</i>,
+are agreed that she was greater as an actress than
+she was as a singer. David Garrick, indeed, pronounced
+her a finer actress than Clairon. From
+that day to this there has been a continual triangular
+conflict between critic, composer, and
+singer, which up to date, it must be admitted, has
+been won by the academic pundits, for, although
+the singer has struggled, she has generally bent
+under the blows of the critical knout, thereby
+holding the lyric drama more or less in the state<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span>
+it was in a hundred years ago (every critic and
+almost every composer will tell you that any modern
+opera can be sung according to the laws of
+<i>bel canto</i> and enough singers exist, unfortunately,
+to justify this assertion) save that the music is
+not so well sung, according to the old standards,
+as it was then. No singer has had quite the courage
+to entirely defy tradition, to refuse to study
+with a teacher, to embody her own natural ideas
+in the performance of music, to found a new school
+... but there have been many rebells.</p>
+
+<p>The operas of Mozart, Bellini, Donizetti, and
+Rossini, as a whole, do not demand great histrionic
+exertion from their interpreters and for a time
+singers trained in the old Handelian tradition met
+every requirement of these composers and their
+audiences. If more action was demanded than
+in Handel's day the newer music, in compensation,
+was easier to sing. But even early in the Nineteenth
+Century we observe that those artists who
+strove to be actors as well as singers lost something
+in vocal facility (really they were pushing
+on to the new technique). I need only speak of
+Ronconi and Mme. Pasta. The lady was admittedly
+the greatest lyric artist of her day although
+it is recorded that her slips from true intonation
+were frequent. When she could no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span>
+longer command a steady tone the <i>beaux restes</i>
+of her art and her authoritative style caused
+Pauline Viardot, who was hearing her then for
+the first time, to burst into tears. Ronconi's
+voice, according to Chorley, barely exceeded an
+octave; it was weak and habitually out of tune.
+This baritone was not gifted with vocal agility
+and he was monotonous in his use of ornament.
+Nevertheless this same Chorley admits that Ronconi
+afforded him more pleasure in the theatre
+than almost any other singer he ever heard! If
+this critic did not rise to the occasion here and
+point the way to the future in another place he
+had a faint glimmering of the coming revolution:
+"There might, there <i>should</i> be yet, a new <i>Medea</i>
+as an opera. Nothing can be grander, more antique,
+more Greek, than Cherubini's setting of the
+'grand fiendish part' (to quote the words of
+Mrs. Siddons on Lady Macbeth). But, as music,
+it becomes simply impossible to be executed, so
+frightful is the strain on the energies of her who
+is to present the heroine. Compared with this
+character, Beethoven's Leonora, Weber's Euryanthe,
+are only so much child's play." This is
+topsy-turvy reasoning, of course, but at the same
+time it is suggestive.</p>
+
+<p>The modern orchestra dug a deeper breach<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span>
+between the two schools. Wagner called upon
+the singer to express powerful emotion, passionate
+feeling, over a great body of sound, nay, in many
+instances, <i>against</i> a great body of sound. (It is
+significant that Wagner himself admitted that it
+was a singer [Madame Schroeder-Devrient] who
+revealed to him the possibilities of dramatic singing.
+He boasted that he was the only one to
+learn the lesson. "She was the first artist,"
+writes H. T. Finck, "who fully revealed the fact
+that in a dramatic opera there may be situations
+where <i>characteristic</i> singing is of more importance
+than <i>beautiful</i> singing.") It is small occasion
+for wonder that singers began to bark. Indeed
+they nearly expired under the strain of trying
+successfully to mingle Porpora and passion. According
+to W. F. Apthorp, Max Alvary once said
+that, considering the emotional intensity of music
+and situations, the constant co-operation of the
+surging orchestra, and, most of all, the unconquerable
+feeling of the reality of it all, it was a
+wonder that singing actors did not go stark mad,
+before the very faces of the audience, in parts like
+Tristan or Siegfried.... The critics, however,
+were inexorable; they stood by their guns. There
+was but one way to sing the new music and that
+was the way of Bernacchi and Pistocchi. In<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span>
+time, by dint of persevering, talking night and
+day, writing day and night, they convinced the
+singer. The music drama developed but the singer
+was held in his place. Some artists, great geniuses,
+of course, made the compromise successfully....
+Jean de Reszke, for example, and Lilli Lehmann,
+who said to H. E. Krehbiel ("Chapters of
+Opera"): "It is easier to sing all three Br&uuml;nnhildes
+than one Norma. You are so carried away
+by the dramatic emotion, the action, and the scene,
+that you do not have to think how to sing the
+words. That comes of itself" ... but they
+made the further progress of the composer more
+difficult thereby; music remained merely pretty.
+The successors of these supple singers even learned
+to sing Richard Strauss with broad cantilena effects.
+As for Puccini! At a performance of
+<i>Madama Butterfly</i> a Japanese once asked why
+the singers were producing those nice round tones
+in moments of passion; why not ugly sounds?</p>
+
+<p>Will any composer arise with the courage to
+write an opera which <i>cannot</i> be sung? Stravinsky
+almost did this in <i>The Nightingale</i> but the break
+must be more complete. Think of the range of
+sounds made by the Japanese, the gipsy, the Chinese,
+the Spanish folk-singers. The newest composer
+may ask for shrieks, squeaks, groans,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span>
+screams, a thousand delicate shades of guttural
+and falsetto vocal tones from his interpreters.
+Why should the gamut of expression on our opera
+stage be so much more limited than it is in our
+music halls? Why should the Hottentots be able
+to make so many delightful noises that we are incapable
+of producing? Composers up to date
+have taken into account a singer's apparent inability
+to bridge difficult intervals. It is only by
+ignoring all such limitations that the new music
+will definitely emerge, the new art of the singer
+be born. What marvellous effects might be
+achieved by skipping from octave to octave in
+the human voice! When will the obfusc pundits
+stop shouting for what Avery Hopwood calls
+"ascending and descending tetrarchs!"</p>
+
+<p>But, some one will argue, with the passing of
+<i>bel canto</i> what will become of the operas of Mozart,
+Bellini, Rossini, and Donizetti? Who will sing
+them? Fear not, lover of the golden age of song,
+<i>bel canto</i> is not passing as swiftly as that. Singers
+will continue to be born into this world who
+are able to cope with the floridity of this music, for
+they are born, not made. Amelita Galli-Curci
+will have her successors, just as Adelina Patti
+had hers. Singers of this kind begin to sing
+naturally in their infancy and they continue to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span>
+sing, just sing.... One touch of drama or emotion
+and their voices disappear. Remember Nellie
+Melba's sad experience with <i>Siegfried</i>. The
+great Mario had scarcely studied singing (one
+authority says that he had taken a few lessons
+of Meyerbeer!) when he made his d&eacute;but in <i>Robert,
+le Diable</i> and there is no evidence that he studied
+very much afterwards. Melba, herself, spent less
+than a year with Mme. Marchesi in preparation
+for her opera career. Mme. Galli-Curci asserts
+that she has had very little to do with professors
+and I do not think Mme. Tetrazzini passed her
+youth in mastering <i>vocalizzi</i>. As a matter of fact
+she studied singing only six months. Adelina
+Patti told Dr. Hanslick that she had sung <i>Una
+voce poco f&agrave;</i> at the age of seven with the same
+embellishments which she used later when she appeared
+in the opera in which the air occurs. No,
+these singers are freaks of nature like tortoise-shell
+cats and like those rare felines they are
+usually females of late, although such singers as
+Battistini and Bonci remind us that men once sang
+with as much agility as women. But when this
+type of singer finally becomes extinct naturally
+the operas which depend on it will disappear too
+for the same reason that the works of Monteverde
+and Handel have dropped out of the repertory,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span>
+that the Greek tragedies and the Elizabethan interludes
+are no longer current on our stage.
+None of our actors understands the style of Chinese
+plays; consequently it would be impossible to
+present one of them in our theatre. As Deirdre
+says in Synge's great play, "It's a heartbreak
+to the wise that it's for a short space we have
+the same things only." We cannot, indeed, have
+everything. No one doubts that the plays of
+&AElig;schylus, Euripides, and Sophocles are great
+dramas; the operas I have just referred to can
+also be admired in the closet and probably they
+will be. Even today no more than two works of
+Rossini, the most popular composer of the early
+Nineteenth Century, are to be heard. What has
+become of <i>Semiramide</i>, <i>La Cenerentola</i>, and the
+others? There are no singers to sing them and
+so they have been dropped from the repertory
+without being missed. Can any of our young
+misses hum <i>Di Tanti Palpiti</i>? You know they
+cannot. I doubt if you can find two girls in New
+York (and I mean girls with a musical education)
+who can tell you in what opera the air belongs
+and yet in the early Twenties this tune was as
+popular as <i>Un Bel Di</i> is today.</p>
+
+<p>Coloratura singing has been called heartless, not
+altogether without reason. At one time its <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span>exemplars
+fired composers to their best efforts.
+That day has passed. That day passed seventy
+years ago. It may occur to you that there is
+something wrong when singers of a certain type
+can only find the proper means to exploit their
+voices in works of the past, operas which are dead.
+It is to be noted that Nellie Melba and Amelita
+Galli-Curci are absolutely unfitted to sing in music
+dramas even so early as those of Richard Wagner;
+Dukas, Strauss, and Stravinsky are utterly beyond
+them. Even Adelina Patti and Marcella
+Sembrich appeared in few, if any, new works of
+importance. They had no bearing on the march
+of musical history. Here is an entirely paradoxical
+situation; a set of interpreters who exist,
+it would seem, only for the purpose of delivering
+to us the art of the past. What would we think
+of an actor who could make no effect save in the
+tragedies of Corneille? It is such as these who
+have kept Leo Ornstein from writing an opera.
+Berlioz forewarned us in his "Memoirs." He was
+one of the first to foresee the coming day: "We
+shall always find a fair number of female singers,
+popular from their brilliant singing of brilliant
+trifles, and odious to the great masters because
+utterly incapable of properly interpreting
+them. They have voices, a certain knowledge of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span>
+music, and flexible throats: they are lacking in
+soul, brain, and heart. Such women are regular
+monsters and all the more formidable to composers
+because they are often charming monsters. This
+explains the weakness of certain masters in writing
+falsely sentimental parts, which attract the
+public by their brilliancy. It also explains the
+number of degenerate works, the gradual degradation
+of style, the destruction of all sense of expression,
+the neglect of dramatic properties, the
+contempt for the true, the grand, and the beautiful,
+and the cynicism and decrepitude of art in
+certain countries."</p>
+
+<p>So, even if, as the ponderous criticasters are
+continually pointing out, the age of <i>bel canto</i> is
+really passing there is no actual occasion for grief.
+All fashions in art pass and what is known as <i>bel
+canto</i> is just as much a fashion as the bombastic
+style of acting that prevailed in Victor Hugo's
+day or the "realistic" style of acting we prefer
+today. All interpretative art is based primarily
+on the material with which it deals and with contemporary
+public taste. This kind of singing is
+a direct derivative of a certain school of opera
+and as that school of opera is fading more expressive
+methods of singing are coming to the
+fore. The very first principle of <i>bel canto</i>, an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span>
+equalized scale, is a false one. With an equalized
+scale a singer can produce a perfectly ordered
+series of notes, a charming string of matched
+pearls, but nothing else. It is worthy of note
+that it is impossible to sing Spanish or negro
+folk-songs with an equalized scale. Almost all
+folk-music, indeed, exacts a vocal method of its
+interpreter quite distinct from that of the art
+song.</p>
+
+<p>We know now that true beauty lies deeper than
+in the emission of "perfect tone." Beauty is
+truth and expressiveness. The new art of the
+singer should develop to the highest degree the
+significance of the text. Calv&eacute; once said that she
+did not become a real artist until she forgot that
+she had a beautiful voice and thought only of the
+proper expression the music demanded.</p>
+
+<p>Of the old method of singing only one quality
+will persist in the late Twentieth Century (mind
+you, this is deliberate prophecy but it is about as
+safe as it would be to predict that Sarah Bernhardt
+will live to give several hundred more performances
+of <i>La Dame aux Cam&eacute;lias</i>) and that is
+style. The performance of any work demands a
+knowledge of and a feeling for its style but style
+is about the last thing a singer ever studies.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span>
+When, however, you find a singer who understands
+style, there you have an artist!</p>
+
+<p>Style is the quality which endures long after
+the singer has lost the power to produce a pure
+tone or to contrive accurate phrasing and so
+makes it possible for artists to hold their places
+on the stage long after their voices have become
+partially defective or, indeed, have actually departed.
+It is knowledge of style that accounts
+for the long careers of Marcella Sembrich and
+Lilli Lehmann or of Yvette Guilbert and Maggie
+Cline for that matter. It is knowledge of style
+that makes De Wolf Hopper a great artist in his
+interpretation of the music of Sullivan and the
+words of Gilbert. Some artists, indeed, with
+barely a shred of voice, have managed to maintain
+their positions on the stage for many years
+through a knowledge of style. I might mention
+Victor Maurel, Max Heinrich (not on the opera
+stage, of course), Antonio Scotti, and Maurice
+Renaud.</p>
+
+<p>A singer may be born with the ability to produce
+pure tones (I doubt if Mme. Melba learned
+much about tone production from her teachers),
+she may even phrase naturally, although this is
+more doubtful, but the acquirement of style is a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span>
+long and tedious process and one which generally
+requires specialization. For style is elusive. An
+auditor, a critic, will recognize it at once but
+very few can tell of what it consists. Nevertheless
+it is fairly obvious to the casual listener that
+Olive Fremstad is more at home in the music
+dramas of Gluck and Wagner than she is in <i>Carmen</i>
+and <i>Tosca</i>, and that Marcella Sembrich is
+happier when she is singing Zerlina (as a Mozart
+singer she has had no equal in the past three
+decades) than when she is singing <i>Lakm&eacute;</i>. Mme.
+Melba sings <i>Lucia</i> in excellent style but she probably
+could not convince us that she knows how to
+sing a Brahms song. So far as I know she has
+never tried to do so. A recent example comes
+to mind in Maria Marco, the Spanish soprano, who
+sings music of her own country in her own language
+with absolutely irresistible effect, but on
+one occasion when she attempted <i>Vissi d'Arte</i> she
+was transformed immediately into a second-rate
+Italian singer. Even her gestures, ordinarily
+fully of grace and meaning, had become conventionalized.</p>
+
+<p>If this quality of style (which after all means an
+understanding of both the surface manner and
+underlying purpose of a composition and an ability
+to transmit this understanding across the footlights)<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span>
+is of such manifest importance in the
+field of art music it is doubly so in the field of
+popular or folk-music. A foreigner had best
+think twice before attempting to sing a Swedish
+song, a Hungarian song, or a Polish song, popular
+or folk. (According to no less an authority
+than Cecil J. Sharp, the peasants themselves differentiate
+between the two and devote to each a
+<i>special vocal method</i>. Here are his words ["English
+Folk-Song"]: "But, it must be remembered
+that the vocal method of the folk-singer is inseparable
+from the folk-song. It is a cult which
+has grown up side by side with the folk-song, and
+is, no doubt, part and parcel of the same tradition.
+When, for instance, an old singing man sings a
+modern popular song, he will sing it in quite another
+way. The tone of his voice will change and
+he will slur his intervals, after the approved manner
+of the street-singer. Indeed, it is usually
+quite possible to detect a genuine folk-song simply
+by paying attention to the way in which it is
+sung.") Strangers as a rule do not attempt such
+matters although we have before us at the present
+time the very interesting case of Ratan Devi.
+It is a question, however, if Ratan Devi would be
+so much admired if her songs or their traditional
+manner of performance were more familiar to us.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>On our music hall stage there are not more than
+ten singers who understand how to sing American
+popular songs (and these, as I have said elsewhere
+at some length,<a name="FNanchor_33_33" id="FNanchor_33_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a> constitute America's best claim
+in the art of music). It is very difficult to sing
+them well. Tone and phrasing have nothing to
+do with the matter; it is all a question of style
+(leaving aside for the moment the important matter
+of personality which enters into an accounting
+for any artist's popularity or standing).
+Elsie Janis, a very clever mimic, a delightful
+dancer, and perhaps the most deservedly popular
+artist on our music hall stage, is not a good interpreter
+of popular songs. She cannot be compared
+in this respect with Bert Williams, Blanche
+Ring, Stella Mayhew, Al Jolson, May Irwin, Ethel
+Levey, Nora Bayes, Fannie Brice, or Marie Cahill.
+I have named nearly all the good ones. The
+spirit, the very conscious liberties taken with the
+text (the vaudeville singer must elaborate his own
+syncopations as the singer of early opera embroidered
+on the score of the composer) are not
+matters that just happen. They require any
+amount of work and experience with audiences.
+None of the singers I have named is a novice.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span>
+Nor will you find novices who are able to sing
+Schumann and Franz <i>lieder</i>, although they may
+be blessed with well-nigh perfect vocal organs.</p>
+
+<p>Still the music critics with strange persistence
+continue to adjudge a singer by the old formul&aelig;
+and standards: has she an equalized scale? Has
+she taste in ornament? Does she overdo the use
+of <i>portamento</i>, <i>messa di voce</i>, and such devices?
+How is her shake? etc., etc. But how false, how
+ridiculous, this is! Fancy the result if new writers
+and composers were criticized by the old laws
+(so they are, my son, but not for long)! Creative
+artists always smash the old tablets of commandments
+and it does not seem to me that interpretative
+artists need be more unprogressive.
+Acting changes. Judged by the standards by
+which Edwin Booth was assessed John Drew is
+not an actor. But we know now that it is a different
+kind of acting. Acting has been flamboyant,
+extravagant, and intensely emotional,
+something quite different from real life. The
+present craze for counterfeiting the semblance of
+ordinary existence on the stage will also die out
+for the stage is not life and representing life on
+the stage (except in a conventionalized or decorative
+form) is not art. Our new actors (with our
+new playwrights) will develop a new and fantastic<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span>
+mode of expression which will supersede the
+present fashion.... Rubinstein certainly did
+not play the piano like Chopin. Presently a
+<i>virtuoso</i> will appear who will refuse to play the
+piano at all and a new instrument without a tempered
+scale will be invented so that he may indulge
+in all the subtleties between half-tones which are
+denied to the pianist.</p>
+
+<p>It's all very well to cry, "Halt!" and "Who
+goes there?" but you can't stop progress any
+more than you can stop the passing of time.
+The old technique of the singer breaks down before
+the new technique of the composer and the
+musician with daring will go still further if the
+singer will but follow. Would that some singer
+would have the complete courage to lead! But
+do not misunderstand me. The road to Parnassus
+is no shorter because it has been newly
+paved. Indeed I think it is longer. Caffarelli
+studied six years before he made his d&eacute;but as "the
+greatest singer in the world" but I imagine that
+Waslav Nijinsky studied ten before he set foot
+on the stage. The new music drama, combining
+as it does principles from all the arts is all-demanding
+of its interpreters. The new singer
+must learn how to move gracefully and awkwardly,
+how to make both fantastic and realistic gestures,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span>
+always unconventional gestures, because conventions
+stamp the imitator. She must peer into
+every period, glance at every nation. Every
+nerve centre must be prepared to express any
+adumbration of plasticity. Many of the new
+operas, <i>Carmen</i>, <i>La Dolores</i>, <i>Salome</i>, <i>Elektra</i>, to
+name a few, call for interpretative dancing of the
+first order. <i>Madama Butterfly</i> and <i>Lakm&eacute;</i> demand
+a knowledge of national characteristics.
+<i>Pell&eacute;as et M&eacute;lisande</i> and <i>Ariane et Barbe-Bleue</i> require
+of the interpreter absolutely distinct enunciation.
+In Handel's operas the phrases were repeated
+so many times that the singer was excused
+if he proclaimed the meaning of the line once.
+After that he could alter the vowels and consonants
+to suit his vocal convenience. <i>Monna
+Vanna</i> and <i>Tristan und Isolde</i> exact of their interpreters
+acting of the highest poetic and imaginative
+scope....</p>
+
+<p>It is a question whether certain singers of our
+day have not solved these problems with greater
+success than that for which they are given
+credit.... Yvette Guilbert has announced publicly
+that she never had a teacher, that she would
+not trust her voice to a teacher. The enchanting
+Yvette practises a sound by herself until she is
+able to make it; she repeats a phrase until she can<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span>
+deliver it without an interrupting breath, and is
+there a singer on the stage more expressive than
+Yvette Guilbert? She sings a little tenor, a little
+baritone, and a little bass. She can succeed almost
+invariably in making the effect she sets out
+to make. And Yvette Guilbert is the answer to
+the statement often made that unorthodox methods
+of singing ruin the voice. Ruin it for performances
+of <i>Linda di Chaminoux</i> and <i>La Sonnambula</i>
+very possibly, but if young singers sit about saving
+their voices for performances of these operas they
+are more than likely to die unheard. It is a fact
+that good singing in the old-fashioned sense will
+help nobody out in <i>Elektra</i>, <i>Ariane et Barbe-Bleue</i>,
+<i>Pell&eacute;as et M&eacute;lisande</i>, or <i>The Nightingale</i>.
+These works are written in new styles and they
+demand a new technique. Put Mme. Melba, Mme.
+Destinn, Mme. Sembrich, or Mme. Galli-Curci to
+work on these scores and you will simply have a
+sad mess.</p>
+
+<p>We have, I think, but a faint glimmering of
+what vocal expressiveness may become. Such
+torch-bearers as Mariette Mazarin and Feodor
+Chaliapine have been procaciously excoriated by
+the critics. Until recently Mary Garden, who of
+all artists on the lyric stage, is the most nearly in
+touch with the singing of the future, has been<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span>
+treated as a charlatan and a fraud. W. J. Henderson
+once called her the "Queen of Unsong."
+Well, perhaps she is, but she is certainly better
+able to cope artistically with the problems of the
+modern music drama than such Queens of Song as
+Marcella Sembrich and Adelina Patti would be.
+Perhaps Unsong is the name of the new art.</p>
+
+<p>I do not think I have ever been backward in expressing
+my appreciation of this artist. My essay
+devoted to her in "Interpreters and Interpretations"
+will certainly testify eloquently as to my
+previous attitude in regard to her. But it has
+not always been so with some of my colleagues.
+Since she has been away from us they have learned
+something; they have watched and listened to
+others and so when Mary Garden came back to
+New York in <i>Monna Vanna</i> in January, 1918, they
+were ready to sing choruses of praise in her honour.
+They have been encomiastic even in regard to her
+voice and her manner of singing.</p>
+
+<p>Even my own opinion of this artist's work has
+undergone a change. I have always regarded her
+as one of the few great interpreters, but in the
+light of recent experience I now feel assured that
+she is the greatest artist on the contemporary lyric
+stage. It is not, I would insist, Mary Garden that
+has changed so much as we ourselves. She has, it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span>
+is true, polished her interpretations until they
+seem incredibly perfect, but has there ever been a
+time when she gave anything but perfect impersonations
+of M&eacute;lisande or Thais? Has she ever
+been careless before the public? I doubt it.</p>
+
+<p>The fact of the matter is that when Mary Garden
+first came to New York only a few of us were
+ready to receive her at anywhere near her true
+worth. In a field where mediocrity and brainlessness,
+lack of theatrical instinct and vocal insipidity
+are fairly the rule her dominant personality,
+her unerring search for novelty of expression,
+the very completeness of her dramatic and
+vocal pictures, annoyed the philistines, the professors,
+and the academicians. They had been accustomed
+to taking their opera quietly with their after-dinner
+coffee and, on the whole, they preferred it
+that way.</p>
+
+<p>But the main obstacle in the way of her complete
+success lay in the matter of her voice, of her singing.
+Of the quality of any voice there can always
+exist a thousand different opinions. To me the
+great beauty of the middle register of Mary Garden's
+voice has always been apparent. But what
+was not so evident at first was the absolute fitness
+of this voice and her method of using it for the
+dramatic style of the artist and for the artistic<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span>
+demands of the works in which she appeared.
+Thoroughly musical, Miss Garden has often puzzled
+her critical hearers by singing <i>Faust</i> in one
+vocal style and <i>Thais</i> in another. But she was
+right and they were wrong. She might, indeed,
+have experimented still further with a new vocal
+technique if she had been given any encouragement
+but encouragement is seldom offered to any innovator.
+As Edgar Saltus puts it, "The number
+of people who regard a new idea or a fresh theory
+as a personal insult is curiously large; indeed they
+are more frequent today than when Socrates
+quaffed the hemlock." It must, therefore, be a
+source of ironic amusement to her to find herself
+now appreciated not alone by her public, which
+has always been loyal and adoring, but also by
+the professors themselves.</p>
+
+<p>It would do no harm to any singer to study the
+multitude of vocal effects this artist achieves. I
+can think of nobody who could not learn something
+from her. How, for example, she gives her voice
+the hue and colour of a <i>jeune fille</i> in <i>Pell&eacute;as et
+M&eacute;lisande</i>, for although M&eacute;lisande had been the
+bride of Barbe-Bleue before Golaud discovered her
+in the forest she had never learned to be anything
+else than innocent and distraught, unhappy and
+mysterious. Her treatment of certain important<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span>
+phrases in this work is so electrifying in its effect
+that the heart of every auditor is pierced. Remember,
+for example, her question to Pell&eacute;as at
+the end of the first act, "<i>Pourquoi partez-vous?</i>"
+to which she imparts a kind of dreamy intuitive
+longing; recall the amazement shining through her
+grief at Golaud's command that she ask Pell&eacute;as to
+accompany her on her search for the lost ring:
+"<i>Pell&eacute;as!&mdash;Avec Pell&eacute;as!&mdash;Mais Pell&eacute;as ne
+voudra pas</i>...."; and do not forget the terrified
+cry which signals the discovery of the hidden
+Golaud in the park, "<i>Il y a quelqu'un derri&egrave;re
+nous!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>In <i>Monna Vanna</i> her most magnificent vocal gesture
+rested on the single word <i>Si</i> in reply to
+Guido's "<i>Tu ne reviendras pas?</i>" Her performance
+of this work, however, offers many examples
+of just such instinctive intonations. One
+more, I must mention, her answer to Guido's insistent,
+"<i>Cet homme t'a-t-il prise?</i>" ... "<i>J'ai
+dit la v&eacute;rit&eacute;.... Il ne m'a pas touch&eacute;e</i>," sung
+with dignity, with force, with womanliness, and yet
+with growing impatience and a touch of sadness.</p>
+
+<p>Let me quote Pitts Sanborn: "It is easy to
+be flippant about Miss Garden's singing. Her
+faults of voice and technique are patent to a child,
+though he might not name them. One who has<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span>
+become a man can ponder the greatness of her
+singing. I do not mean exclusively in Debussy,
+though we all know that as a singer of Debussy
+... she has scarce a rival. Take her <i>mezza
+voce</i> and her phrasing in the second act of
+<i>Monna Vanna</i>, take them and bow down before
+them. Ponder a moment her singing in <i>Thais</i>.
+The converted Thais, about to betake herself
+desertward with the insistent monk, has a solo to
+sing. The solo is Massenet, simon-pure Massenet,
+the idol of the Paris <i>midinette</i>. Miss Garden, with
+a defective voice, a defective technique, exalts and
+magnifies that passage till it might be the noblest
+air of Handel or of Mozart. By a sheer and unashamed
+reliance on her command of style, Miss
+Garden works that miracle, transfigures Massenet
+into something superearthly, overpowering.
+Will you rise up to deny that is singing?"</p>
+
+<p>As for her acting, there can scarcely be two
+opinions about that! She is one of the few possessors
+of that rare gift of imparting atmosphere
+and mood to a characterization. Some
+exceptional actors and singers accomplish this feat
+occasionally. Mary Garden has scarcely ever
+failed to do so. The moment M&eacute;lisande is disclosed
+to our view, for example, she seems to be
+surrounded by an aura entirely distinct from the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span>
+aura which surrounds Monna Vanna, Jean, Thais,
+Salome, or Sapho. She becomes, indeed, so much
+a part of the character she assumes that the
+spectator finds great difficulty in dissociating her
+from that character, and I have found those who,
+having seen Mary Garden in only one part, were
+quite ready to generalize about her own personality
+from the impression they had received.</p>
+
+<p>One of the tests of great acting is whether or
+not an artist remains in the picture when she is
+not singing or speaking. Mary Garden knows how
+to listen on the stage. She does not need to move
+or speak to make herself a part of the action and
+she is never guilty of such an offence against artistry
+as that committed by Tamagno, who, according
+to Victor Maurel, allowed a scene in <i>Otello</i>
+to drop to nothing while he prepared himself to
+emit a high B.</p>
+
+<p>Watching her magnificent performance of
+Monna Vanna it struck me that she would make an
+incomparable Isolde. At the present moment I
+cannot imagine Mary Garden learning Boche or
+singing in it even if she knew it, but if some one
+will present us Wagner's (who hated the Germans
+as much as Theodore Roosevelt does) music drama
+in French or English with Mary Garden as Isolde,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span>
+I think the public will thank me for having suggested
+it.</p>
+
+<p>Or it would be even better if Schoenberg, or
+Stravinsky, or Leo Ornstein, inspired by the new
+light the example of such a singer has cast over
+our lyric stage, would write a music drama, ignoring
+the technique and the conventions of the past,
+as Debussy did when he wrote <i>Pell&eacute;as et M&eacute;lisande</i>
+(creating opportunities which any opera-goer
+of the last decade knows how gloriously Miss
+Garden realized). It is thus that the new order
+will gradually become established. And then the
+new art ... the new art of the singer....</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>April 18, 1918.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="Au_Bal" id="Au_Bal"></a>Au Bal Musette</h3>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i4"><i>"Aupr&egrave;s de ma blonde</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i4"><i>Qu'il fait bon, fait bon, bon, bon...."</i><br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i10">Old French Song.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="Au_Bal_Musette" id="Au_Bal_Musette"></a>Au Bal Musette</h2>
+
+
+<p>It has often been remarked by philosophers
+and philistines alike that the commonest facts
+of existence escape our attention until they
+are impressed upon it in some unusual way. For
+example I knew nothing of the sovereign powers
+of citronella as a mosquito dispatcher until a
+plague of the insects drove me to make enquiries of
+a chemist. For years I believed that knocking the
+necks off bottles, lacking an opener, was the only
+alternative. A friend who caught me in this predicament
+showed me the other use to which the
+handles of high-boy drawers could be put. It was
+long my habit to quickly dispose of trousers which
+had been disfigured by cigarette burns, but that
+was before I had heard of <i>stoppage</i>, a process by
+which the original weave is cleverly counterfeited.
+And, wishing to dance, in Paris, I have been guilty
+of visits to the great dance halls and to the small
+smart places where champagne is oppressively the
+only listed beverage. But that was before I discovered
+the <i>bal musette</i>.</p>
+
+<p>One July night in Paris I had dinner with a certain
+lady at the Cou-Cou, followed by cognac at
+the Savoyarde. I find nothing strange in this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span>
+program; it seems to me that I must have dined
+at the Cou-Cou with every one I have known in
+Paris from time to time, a range of acquaintanceship
+including Fernand, the <i>apache</i>, and the
+Comtesse de J&mdash;&mdash;, and cognac at the Savoyarde
+usually followed the dinner. This evening at the
+Cou-Cou then resembled any other evening. Do
+you know how to go there? You must take a taxi-cab
+to the foot of the hill of Montmartre and then
+be drawn up in the <i>finiculaire</i> to the top where
+the church of Sacr&eacute;-Coeur squats proudly, for all
+the world like a mammoth Buddha (of course
+you may ride all the way up the mountain in your
+taxi if you like). From Sacr&eacute;-Coeur one turns to
+the left around the board fence which, it would
+seem, will always hedge in this unfinished monument
+of pious Catholics; still turning to the left,
+through the Place du Tertre, in which one must
+not be stayed by the pleasant sight of the <i>Montmartroises
+bourgeoises</i> eating <i>petite marmite</i> in
+the open air, one arrives at the Place du Calvaire.
+The tables of the Restaurant Cou-Cou occupy
+nearly the whole of this tiny square, to which there
+are only two means of approach, one up the stairs
+from the city below, and the other from the Place
+du Tertre. An artist's house disturbs the view on
+the side towards Paris; opposite is the restaurant,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span>
+flanked on the right by a row of modest apartment
+houses, to which one gains entrance through a
+high wall by means of a small gate. Sundry visitors
+to these houses, some on bicycles, make occasional
+interruptions in the dinner.... From over
+this wall, too, comes the huge Cheshire cat (much
+bigger than Alice's, a beautiful animal), which
+lounges about in the hope, frequently realized, that
+some one will give him a chicken bone.... Conterminous
+to the restaurant, on the right, is a tiny
+cottage, fronted by a still tinier garden, fenced in
+and gated. Many of the visitors to the Cou-Cou
+hang their hats and sticks on this fence and its
+gate. I have never seen the occupants of the
+cottage in any of my numerous visits to this open
+air restaurant, but once, towards eleven o'clock
+the crowd in the square becoming too noisy, the
+upper windows were suddenly thrown up and a
+pailful of water descended.... "<i>Per Baccho!</i>"
+quoth the inn-keeper for, it must be known, the
+Restaurant Cou-Cou is Italian by nature of its
+<i>patron</i> and its cooking.</p>
+
+<p>This night, I say, had been as the others. The
+Cou-Cou is (and in this respect it is not exceptional
+in Paris) safe to return to if you have found it to
+your liking in years gone by. Perhaps some day
+the small boy of the place will be grown up. He<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span>
+is a real <i>enfant terrible</i>. It is his pleasure to
+<i>tutoyer</i> the guests, to amuse himself by pretending
+to serve them, only to bring the wrong dishes, or
+none at all. If you call to him he is deaf. Any
+hope of <i>revanche</i> is abandoned in the reflection of
+the super-retaliations he himself conceives. One
+young man who expresses himself freely on the subject
+of Pietro receives a plate of hot soup down
+the back of his neck, followed immediately by a
+"<i>Pardon, Monsieur</i>," said not without respect.
+But where might Pietro's father be? He is in the
+kitchen cooking and if you find your dinner coming
+too slowly at the hands of the distracted maid
+servants, who also have to put up with Pietro, go
+into the kitchen, passing under the little vine-clad
+porch wherein you may discover a pair of lovers,
+and help yourself. And if you find some one else's
+dinner more to your liking than your own take that
+off the stove instead. At the Cou-Cou you pay
+for what you eat, not for what you order. And
+the Signora, Pietro's mother? That unhappy
+woman usually stands in front of the door, where
+she interferes with the passage of the girls going
+for food. She wrings her hands and moans,
+"<i>Mon Dieu, quel monde!</i>" with the idea that she
+is helping vastly in the manipulation of the
+machinery of the place.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>And the <i>monde</i>; who goes there? It is not too
+<i>chic</i>, this <i>monde</i>, and yet it is surely not <i>bourgeois</i>;
+if one does not recognize M. Rodin or M.
+Georges Feydeau, yet there are compensations....
+The girls who come attended by bearded companions,
+are unusually pretty; one sees them afterwards
+at the bars and <i>bals</i> if one does not go to
+the Abbaye or Pag&eacute;s.... It makes a very pleasant
+picture, the Place du Calvaire towards nine
+o'clock on a summer night when tiny lights with
+pink globes are placed on the tables. The little
+square twinkles with them and the couples at the
+tables become very gay, and sometimes sentimental.
+And when the pink lights appear a small
+boy in blue trousers comes along to light the street
+lamp. Then the urchins gather on the wall which
+hedges in the garden on the fourth side of the
+square and chatter, chatter, chatter, about all
+the things that French boys chatter about.
+Naturally they have a good deal to say about the
+people who are eating.</p>
+
+<p>I have described the Cou-Cou as it was this
+night and as it has been all the nights during the
+past eight summers that I have been there.
+The dinner too is always the same. It is served <i>&agrave;
+la carte</i>, but one is not given much choice. There
+is always a <i>potage</i>, always <i>spaghetti</i>, always<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span>
+chicken and a salad, always a lobster, and <i>zabaglione</i>
+if one wants it. The wine&mdash;it is called
+<i>chianti</i>&mdash;is tolerable. And the <i>addition</i> is made
+upon a slate with a piece of white chalk. "<i>Qu'est-ce
+que monsieur a mang&eacute;?</i>" Sometimes it is very
+difficult to remember, but it is necessary. Such
+honesty compels an exertion. It is all added up
+and for the two of us on this evening, or any other
+evening, it may come to nine <i>francs</i>, which is not
+much to pay for a good dinner.</p>
+
+<p>Then, on this evening, and every other evening,
+we went on, back as we had come, round past the
+other side of Sacr&eacute;-Coeur, past the statue of the
+Chevalier who was martyred for refusing to salute
+a procession (why he refused I have never found
+out, although I have asked everybody who has ever
+dined with me at the Cou-Cou) to the Caf&eacute; Savoyarde,
+the broad windows of which look out over
+pretty much all the Northeast of Paris, over a
+glittering labyrinth of lights set in an obscure
+sea of darkness. It was not far from here that
+Louise and Julien kept house when they were interrupted
+by Louise's mother, and it was looking
+down over these lights that they swore those eternal
+vows, ending with Louise's "<i>C'est une F&eacute;erie!</i>"
+and Julien's "<i>Non, c'est la vie!</i>" One always
+remembers these things and feels them at the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span>
+Savoyarde as keenly as one did sometime in the
+remote past watching Mary Garden and L&eacute;on
+Beyle from the topmost gallery of the Op&eacute;ra-Comique
+after an hour and a half wait in the
+<i>queue</i> for one <i>franc</i> tickets (there were always
+people turned away from performances of <i>Louise</i>
+and so it was necessary to be there early; some
+other operas did not demand such punctuality).
+There is a terrace outside the Savoyarde, a tiny
+terrace, with just room for one man, who griddles
+<i>gaufrettes</i>, and three or four tiny tables with
+chairs. At one of these we sat that night (just
+as I had sat so many times before) and sipped our
+cognac.</p>
+
+<p>It is difficult in an adventure to remember just
+when the departure comes, when one leaves the
+past and strides into the future, but I think that
+moment befell me in this caf&eacute; ... for it was the
+first time I had ever seen a cat there. He was a
+lazy, splendid animal. In New York he would have
+been an oddity, but in Paris there are many such
+beasts. Tawny he was and soft to the touch and
+of a hugeness. He was lying on the bar and as I
+stroked his coat he purred melifluously.... I
+stroked his warm fur and thought how I belonged
+to the mystic band (Gautier, Baudelaire, M&eacute;rim&eacute;e,
+all knew the secrets) of those who are <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span>acquainted
+with cats; it is a feeling of pride we have
+that differentiates us from the dog lovers, the
+pride of the appreciation of indifference or of
+conscious preference. And it was, I think, as I
+was stroking the cat that my past was smote
+away from me and I was projected into the adventure
+for, as I lifted the animal into my arms,
+the better to feel its warmth and softness, it
+sprang with strength and unsheathed claws out
+of my embrace, and soon was back on the bar
+again, "just as if nothing had happened." There
+was blood on my face. Madame, behind the bar,
+was apologetic but not chastening. "<i>Il avait
+peur</i>," she said. "<i>Il n'est pas m&eacute;chant.</i>" The
+wound was not deep, and as I bent to pet the cat
+again he again purred. I had interfered with his
+habits and, as I discovered later, he had interfered
+with mine.</p>
+
+<p>We decided to walk down the hill instead of
+riding down in the <i>finiculaire</i>, down the stairs
+which form another of the pictures in <i>Louise</i>, with
+the abutting houses, into the rooms of which one
+looks, conscious of prying. And you see the old
+in these interiors, making shoes, or preparing dinner,
+or the middle-aged going to bed, but the young
+one never sees in the houses in the summer....
+It was early and we decided to dance; I thought of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span>
+the Moulin de la Galette, which I had visited twice
+before. The Moulin de la Galette waves its gaunt
+arms in the air half way up the <i>butte</i> of Montmartre;
+it serves its purpose as a dance hall of the
+quarter. One meets the pretty little <i>Montmartroises</i>
+there and the young artists; the entrance
+fee is not exorbitant and one may drink a bock.
+And when I have been there, sitting at a small
+table facing the somewhat vivid mural decoration
+which runs the length of one wall, drinking my
+brown <i>bock</i>, I have remembered the story which
+Mary Garden once told me, how Albert Carr&eacute; to
+celebrate the hundredth&mdash;or was it the twenty-fifth?&mdash;performance
+of <i>Louise</i>, gave a dinner
+there&mdash;so near to the scenes he had conceived&mdash;to
+Charpentier and how, surrounded by some of
+the most notable musicians and poets of France,
+the composer had suddenly fallen from the table,
+face downwards; he had starved himself so long to
+complete his masterpiece that food did not seem
+to nourish him. It was the end of a brilliant dinner.
+He was carried away ... to the Riviera;
+some said that he had lost his mind; some said
+that he was dying. Mary Garden herself did not
+know, at the time she first sang <i>Louise</i> in America,
+what had happened to him. But a little later the
+rumour that he was writing a trilogy was spread<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span>
+about and soon it was a known fact that at least
+one other part of the trilogy had been written,
+<i>Julien</i>; that lyric drama was produced and everybody
+knows the story of its failure. Charpentier,
+the natural philosopher and the poet of Montmartre,
+had said everything he had to say in
+<i>Louise</i>. As for the third play, one has heard
+nothing about that yet.</p>
+
+<p>But on this evening the Moulin de la Galette was
+closed and then I remembered that it was open on
+Thursday and this was Wednesday. Is it
+Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday that the Moulin
+de la Galette is open? I think so. By this time
+we were determined to dance; but where? We had
+no desire to go to some stupid place, common to
+tourists, no such place as the Bal Tabarin lured
+us; nor did the Grelot in the Place Blanche, for
+we had been there a night or two before. The
+Elys&eacute;e Montmartre (celebrated by George Moore)
+would be closed. Its <i>patron</i> followed the schedule
+of days adopted for the Galette.... To chance
+I turn in such dilemmas.... I consulted a small
+boy, who, with his companion, had been good
+enough to guide us through many winding streets
+to the Moulin. Certainly he knew of a <i>bal</i>.
+Would <i>monsieur</i> care to visit a <i>bal musette</i>? His
+companion was horrified. I caught the phrase<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span>
+"<i>mal frequent&eacute;</i>." Our curiosity was aroused and
+we gave the signal to advance.</p>
+
+<p>There were two grounds for my personal curiosity
+beyond the more obvious ones. I seemed
+to remember to have read somewhere that the
+ladies of the court of Louis XIV played the
+<i>musette</i>, which is French for bag-pipe. It was the
+fashionable instrument of an epoch and the <i>musettes</i>
+played by the <i>grandes dames</i> were elaborately
+decorated. The word in time slunk into
+the dictionaries of musical terms as descriptive of
+a drone bass. Many of Gluck's ballet airs bear
+the title, <i>Musette</i>. Perhaps the bass was even performed
+on a bag-pipe.... "<i>Mal frequent&eacute;</i>" in
+Parisian <i>argot</i> has a variety of significations; in
+this particular instance it suggested <i>apaches</i> to
+me. A <i>bal</i>, for instance, attended by <i>cocottes</i>,
+<i>mannequins</i>, or <i>mod&egrave;les</i>, could not be described as
+<i>mal frequent&eacute;</i> unless one were speaking to a boarding
+school miss, for all the public <i>bals</i> in Paris are
+so attended. No, the words spoken to me, in this
+connection, could only mean <i>apaches</i>. The confusion
+of epochs began to invite my interest and I
+wondered, in my mind's eye, how a Louis XIV
+<i>apache</i> would dress, how he would be represented
+at a costume ball, and a picture of a ragged silk-betrousered
+person, flaunting a plaid-bellied <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span>instrument
+came to mind. An imagination often
+leads one violently astray.</p>
+
+<p>The two urchins were marching us through
+street after street, one of them whistling that
+pleasing tune, <i>Le lendemain elle &eacute;tait souriante</i>.
+Dark passage ways intervened between us and our
+destination: we threaded them. The cobble stones
+of the underfoot were not easy to walk on for my
+companion, shod in high-heels from the Place
+Vend&ocirc;me.... The urchins amused each other
+and us by capers on the way. They could have
+made our speed walking on their hands, and they
+accomplished at least a third of the journey this
+way. Of course, I deluged them with large round
+five and ten <i>centimes</i> pieces.</p>
+
+<p>We arrived at last before a door in a short
+street near the Gare du Nord. Was it the Rue
+Jessaint? I do not know, for when, a year later,
+I attempted to re-find this <i>bal</i> it had disappeared....
+We could hear the hum of the pipes for some
+paces before we turned the corner into the street,
+and never have pipes sounded in my ears with
+such a shrill significance of being somewhere they
+ought not to be, never but once, and that was
+when I had heard the piper who accompanies the
+dinner of the Governor of the Bahamas in Nassau.
+Marching round the porch of the Governor's Villa<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span>
+he played <i>The Blue Bells of Scotland</i> and <i>God
+Save the King</i>, but, hearing the sound from a distance
+through the interstices of the cocoa-palm
+fronds in the hot tropical night, I could only think
+of a Hindoo blowing the pipes in India, the charming
+of snakes.... So, as we turned the corner
+into the Rue Jessaint, I seemed to catch a faint
+glimpse of a scene on the lawn at Versailles....
+Louis XIV&mdash;it was the epoch of Cinderella!</p>
+
+<p>But it wasn't a bag-pipe at all. That we discovered
+when we entered the room, after passing
+through the bar in the front. The <i>bal</i> was conducted
+in a large hall at the back of the <i>maison</i>.
+In the doorway lounged an <i>agent de service</i>, always
+a guest at one of these functions, I found out
+later. There were rows of tables, long tables, with
+long wooden benches placed between them. One
+corner of the floor was cleared&mdash;not so large a
+corner either&mdash;for dancing, and on a small platform
+sat the strangest looking youth, like Peter
+Pan never to grow old, like the <i>Monna Lisa</i> a boy
+of a thousand years, without emotion or expression
+of any sort. He was playing an accordion;
+the bag-pipe, symbol of the <i>bal</i>, hung disused on
+the wall over his head. His accordion, manipulated
+with great skill, was augmented by sleigh-bells
+attached to his ankles in such a manner that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span>
+a minimum of movement produced a maximum of
+effect; he further added to the complexity of sound
+and rhythm by striking a cymbal occasionally
+with one of his feet. The music was both rhythmic
+and ordered, now a waltz, now a tune in two-four
+time, but never faster or slower, and never
+ending ... except in the middle of each dance,
+for a brief few seconds, while the <i>patronne</i> collected
+a <i>sou</i> from each dancer, after which the
+dance proceeded. All the time we remained never
+did the musician smile, except twice, once briefly
+when I sent word to him by the waiter to order a
+<i>consommation</i> and once, at some length, when we
+departed. On these occasions the effect was almost
+emotionally illuminating, so inexpressive was
+the ordinary cast of his features. A strange lad;
+I like to think of him always sitting there, passively,
+playing the accordion and shaking his
+sleigh-bells. He suggested a static picture, a
+thing of always, but I know it is not so, for even
+the next summer he had disappeared along with
+the <i>bal</i> and now he may have been shot in the
+Battle of the Marne or he may have murdered his
+<i>gigolette</i> and been transported to one of the
+French penal colonies.... An <i>apache, en musicien!</i> ...
+black cloth around his throat, hair
+parted in the middle, <i>velours</i> trousers; a <i>vrai<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span>
+apache</i> I tell you, a cool, cunning creature,
+shredded with cocaine and absinthe, monotonous in
+his virtuosity, playing the accordion. He had
+begun before we arrived and he continued after we
+left. I like to think of him as always playing,
+but it is not so....</p>
+
+<p>As for the dancers, they were of various kinds
+and sorts. The women had that air which gave
+them the stamp of a quarter; they wore loose
+<i>blouses</i>, tucked in plaid skirts, or dark blue skirts,
+or multi-coloured calico skirts (if you have seen
+the lithographs of Steinlen you may reconstruct
+the picture with no difficulty) and they danced in
+that peculiar fashion so much in vogue in the
+Northern outskirts of Paris. The men seized
+them tightly and they whirled to the inexorable
+music when it was a waltz, whirled and whirled,
+until one thought of the Viennese and how they
+become as dervishes and Japanese mice when one
+plays Johann Strauss. But in the dances in two-four
+time their way was more our way, something
+between a one-step, a mattchiche, and a tango,
+with strange fascinating steps of their own devising,
+a folk-dance manner.... Yes, under their
+feet, the dance became a real dance of the people
+and, when we entered into it, our feet seemed heavy
+and our steps conventional, although we tried to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span>
+do what they did. (How they did laugh at us!)
+And the strange youth emphasized the effect of
+folk-dancing by playing old <i>chansons de France</i>
+which he mingled with his repertory of <i>caf&eacute;-concert</i>
+airs. And there was achieved that wonderful
+thing (to an artist) a mixture of <i>genres</i>&mdash;intriguing
+one's curiosity, awakening the most dormant
+interest, and inspiring the dullest imagination.</p>
+
+<p>This was my first night at a <i>bal musette</i> and
+my last in that year, for shortly afterwards I left
+for Italy and in Italy one does not dance. But
+the next season found me anxious to renew the adventure,
+to again enjoy the pleasures of the <i>bal
+musette</i>. I have said I was perhaps wrong in recalling
+the street as the Rue Jessaint, or perhaps
+the old <i>maison</i> had disappeared. At any rate,
+when I searched I could not find the <i>bal</i>, not even
+the bar. So again I appealed for help, this time
+to a chauffeur, who drove me to the opposite side
+of the city, to the <i>quartier</i> of the <i>Halles</i>....
+And I was beginning to think that the man had misunderstood
+me, or was stupid. "He will take me
+to a cabaret, l'Ange Gabriel or"&mdash;and I rapidly
+revolved in my mind the possibilities of this quarter
+where the <i>apaches</i> come to the surface to feel
+the purse of the tourist, who buys drinks as he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span>
+listens to stories of murders, some of which have
+been committed, for it is true that some of the
+real <i>apaches</i> go there (I know because my friend
+Fernand did and it was in l'Ange Gabriel that he
+knocked all the teeth down the throat of Ang&eacute;lique,
+<i>sa gigolette</i>. You may find the life of these
+creatures vividly and amusingly described in that
+amazing book of Charles-Henry Hirsch, "Le Tigre
+et Coquelicot" It is the only book I have read
+about the <i>apaches</i> of modern Paris that is worth
+its pages). But the idea of l'Ange Gabriel was
+not amusing to me this evening and I leaned forward
+to ask my chauffeur if he had it in mind to
+substitute another attraction for my desired <i>bal
+musette</i>. His reply was reassuring; it took the
+form of a gesture, the waving of a hand towards a
+small lighted globe depending over the door of a
+little <i>marchand de vin</i>. On this globe was painted
+in black letters the single word, <i>bal</i>. We were in
+the narrow Rue des Gravilliers&mdash;I was there for
+the first time&mdash;and the <i>bal</i> was the Bal des Gravilliers.</p>
+
+<p>The bar is so small, when one enters, that there
+is no intimation of the really splendid aspect of
+the dancing room. For here there are two rooms
+separated by the dancing floor, two halls filled
+with tables, with long wooden benches between<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span>
+them. Benches also line the walls, which are white
+with a grey-blue frieze; the lighting is brilliant.
+The musicians play in a little balcony, and here
+there are two of them, an accordionist and a
+guitarist. The performer on the accordion is a
+<i>virtuoso</i>; he takes delight in winding florid ornament,
+after the manner of some brilliant singer
+impersonating Rosina in <i>Il Barbiere</i>, around
+the melodies he performs. As in the Rue Jessaint
+a <i>sou</i> is demanded in the middle of each dance.
+But there comparison must cease, for the life here
+is gayer, more of a character. The types are of
+the <i>Halles</i>.... There are strange exits....</p>
+
+<p>A short woman enters; "<i>elle s'avance en se
+balan&ccedil;ant sur ses hanches comme une pouliche du
+haras de Cordoue</i>"; she suggests an operatic Carmen
+in her swagger. She is slender, with short,
+dark hair, cropped <i>&agrave; la</i> Boutet de Monvel, and she
+flourishes a cigarette, the smoke from which
+wreathes upward and obscures&mdash;nay makes more
+subtle&mdash;the strange poignancy of her deep blue
+eyes. Her nose is of a snubness. It is the <i>m&ocirc;me</i>
+Estelle, and as she passes down the narrow aisle,
+between the tables, there is a stir of excitement....
+The men raise their eyes.... Edouard, <i>le
+petit</i>, flicks a <i>louis</i> carelessly between his thumb
+and fore-finger, with the long dirty nails, and then<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span>
+passes it back into his pocket. Do not mistake
+the gesture; it is not made to entice the <i>m&ocirc;me</i>, nor
+is it a sign of affluence; it is Edouard's means of
+demanding another <i>louis</i> before the night is up, if
+it be only a "<i>louis de dix francs</i>." Estelle looks
+at him boldly; there is no fear in her eyes; you can
+see that she would face death with Carmen's calm
+if the Fates cut the thread to that effect....
+The music begins and Estelle dances with Carmella,
+<i>l'Arabe</i>. Edouard glowers and pulls his
+little grey cap down tower.... It is a waltz....
+Suddenly he is on the floor and Estelle is
+pressed close to his body.... Carmella sits
+down. She smiles, and presently she is dancing
+with Jean-Baptiste.... Estelle and Edouard are
+now whirling, whirling, and all the while his dark
+eyes look down piercingly into her blue eyes. The
+music stops. Estelle fumbles in her stocking for
+two <i>sous</i>. Edouard lights a <i>Maryland</i>.</p>
+
+<p>There is a newcomer tonight. (I am talking
+to the <i>agent de service</i>.) She is of a youth and
+she is certainly from Brittany. I see her sitting
+in a corner, waiting for something, trying to know.
+"She will learn," says my friend, "She will learn
+to pay like the others." That is the <i>gros</i> Pierre
+who regards her. He twirls his moustache and
+considers, and in the end he lumbers to her and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span>
+asks her to dance. She is willing to do so, but the
+intensity of Pierre frightens her, frightens and intrigues....
+There is a sign on the wall that one
+must not stamp one's feet, but no other prohibition....
+He twists her finger purposely as they
+whirl ... and whirl. She cowers. <i>Gros</i> Pierre
+is very big and strong. "<i>T'es bath, m&ocirc;me</i>," I
+hear him say, as they pass me by.... The dance
+over, he towers above her for a brief second before
+he swaggers out.... Estelle smiles. Her lips
+move and she speaks quickly to Edouard, <i>le petit</i>....
+He does not listen. Why should he listen to
+his <i>gigolette</i>? She is wasting her time here anyway.
+He becomes impatient.... Carmella
+smiles across the room in a brief second of chance
+and Estelle answers the smile. Carmella holds up
+three fingers (it is now 1.30). Estelle nods her
+head quickly. The musicians are always playing,
+except in the middle of the dance when <i>madame, la
+patronne</i>, gathers in the <i>sous</i>.... Only from
+one she takes nothing.... He is twenty and very
+blonde and he is dancing with <i>Madame</i>.... Between
+dances she pays his <i>consommations</i>....
+Estelle rises slowly and walks out while Carmella,
+<i>l'Arabe</i>, follows her with his eyes. Edouard, <i>le
+petit</i>, lights a <i>Maryland</i> and poises a <i>louis</i> between
+his thumb and fore-finger, the nails of which are<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span>
+long and dirty.... The music is always playing....
+The little girl from Brittany is again alone
+in the corner. There is fear in her face. She is
+beginning to know. She summons her courage and
+walks to the door, on through.... The <i>agent de
+service</i> twirls his moustache and points after her.
+"She soon will know." I follow. She hesitates
+for a second at the street door and then starts
+towards the corner.... She reaches the corner
+and passes around it.... I hear a scream ...
+the sound of running footsteps ... the beat of
+a horse's hoofs ... the rolling of wheels on the
+cobble stones....</p>
+
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>November 11, 1915.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="Cooking" id="Cooking"></a>Music and Cooking</h3>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i4"><i>"Give me some music,&mdash;music, moody food</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i4"><i>Of us that trade in love."</i><br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i10">Shakespeare's <i>Cleopatra</i>.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="Music_and_Cooking" id="Music_and_Cooking"></a>Music and Cooking</h2>
+
+
+<p>It is my firm belief that there is an intimate
+relationship between the stomach and the ear,
+the saucepan and the crotchet, the mysteries
+of Mrs. Rorer and the mysteries of Mme. Marchesi.
+It has even occurred to me that one of the
+reasons our American composers are so barren in
+ideas is because as a race we are not interested in
+cooking and eating. Those countries in which
+music plays the greater part in the national life
+are precisely those which are the most interested in
+the culinary art. The food of Italy, the cooking,
+is celebrated; every peasant in that sunny land
+sings, and the voices of some Italians have reverberated
+around the world. The very melodies of
+Verdi and Rossini are inextricably twined in our
+minds around memories of <i>ravioli</i> and <i>zabaglione</i>.
+<i>Vesti la Giubba</i> is <i>spaghetti</i>. The composers of
+these melodies and their interpreters alike cooked,
+ate, and drank with joy, and so they composed and
+sang with joy too. Men with indigestion may be
+able to write novels, but they cannot compose great
+music.... The Germans spend more time eating
+than the people of any other country (at least they
+did once). It is small occasion for wonder, therefore,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span>
+that they produce so many musicians. They
+are always eating, mammoth plates heaped high
+with Bavarian cabbage, <i>Koenigsberger Klopps</i>,
+<i>Hasenpfeffer</i>, noodles, sauerkraut, <i>Wiener Schnitzel</i> ... drinking
+seidels of beer. They escort
+sausages with them to the opera. All the women
+have their skirts honeycombed with capacious
+pockets, in which they carry substantial lunches to
+eat while Isolde is deceiving King Mark. Why,
+the very principle of German music is based on a
+theory of well-fed auditors. The voluptuous
+scores of Richard Wagner, Richard Strauss, Max
+Schillings and Co. were not written for skinny, ill-nourished
+wights. Even Beethoven demands flesh
+and bone of his hearers. The music of Bach is
+directly aimed against the doctrine of asceticism.
+"The German capacity for feeling emotion in
+music has developed to the same extent as the
+capacity of the German stomach for containing
+food," writes Ernest Newman, "but in neither the
+one case nor the other has there been a corresponding
+development in refinement of perceptions.
+German sentimental music is not quite as gross as
+German food and German feeding, but it comes
+very near to it sometimes.... 'The Germans do
+not taste,' said Montaigne, 'they gulp.' As with
+their food, so with the emotions of their music.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span>
+So long as they get them in sufficient mass, of the
+traditional quality, and with the traditional pungent
+seasoning, they are content to leave piquancy
+and variety of effect to others."... Once in
+Munich in a second storey window of the Bayerischebank
+I saw a small boy, about ten years old,
+sitting outside on the sill, washing the panes of
+glass. Opposite him on the same sill a dachshund
+reposed on her paws, regarding her master affectionately.
+Between the two stood a half-filled
+toby of foaming L&ouml;wenbrau, which, from time to
+time, the lad raised to his lips, quaffing deep
+draughts. And when he set the pot down he whistled
+the first subject of Beethoven's <i>Fifth Symphony</i>.
+On Sunday afternoons, in the gardens
+which invariably surround the Munich breweries,
+the happy mothers, who gather to listen to the
+band play while they drink beer, frequently replenish
+the empty nursing bottles of their offspring at
+the taps from which flows the deep brown beverage....
+The food of the French is highly artificial,
+delicately prepared and served, and flavoured with
+infinite art: <i>vol au vent &agrave; la reine</i> and Massenet,
+<i>petits pois &agrave; l'etuv&eacute;e</i> and Gounod, <i>oeuf Ste. Clotilde</i>
+and C&eacute;sar Franck, all strike the tongue and
+the ear quite pleasantly. Des Esseintes and his
+liqueur symphony were the inventions of a Frenchman....<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span>
+Hungarian goulash and Hungarian
+rhapsodies are certainly designed to be taken in
+conjunction.... Russian music tastes of <i>kascha</i>
+and <i>bortsch</i> and vodka. The happy, hearty eaters
+of Russia, the drunken, sodden drinkers of Russia
+are reflected in the scores of <i>Boris Godunow</i>
+and <i>Petrouchka</i>.... In England we find that the
+great English meat pasties and puddings appeared
+in the same century with the immortal Purcell....
+But in America we import our cooks
+... and our music. As a race we do not like to
+cook. We scarcely like to eat. We certainly do
+not enjoy eating. We will never have a national
+music until we have national dishes and national
+drinks and until we like good food. It is significant
+that our national drinks at present are
+mixed drinks, the ingredients of which are foreign.
+It is doubly significant that that section of the
+country which produces chicken <i>&agrave; la Maryland</i>,
+corn bread, beaten biscuit, mint juleps, and New
+Orleans fizzes has furnished us with the best of
+such music as we can boast. Maine has offered us
+no <i>Suwanee River</i>; we owe no <i>Swing Low, Sweet
+Chariot</i> to Nebraska. The best of our ragtime
+composers are Jews, a race which regards eating
+and cooking of sufficient importance to include<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span>
+rules for the preparation and disposition of food
+in its religious tenets.</p>
+
+<p>Most musicians and those who enjoy listening to
+music, like to eat (this does not mean that people
+who like to eat always desire to listen to music at
+the same time, but nowadays one has little choice
+in the matter); what is more pregnant, most of
+them like to cook. We may include even the music
+critics, one of whom (Henry T. Finck) has written
+a book about such matters. The others eat
+... and expand. James Huneker devotes sixteen
+pages of "The New Cosmopolis" to the "maw of
+the monster." And as H. L. Mencken has pointed
+out, "The Pilsner motive runs through the book
+from cover to cover." Dinners are constantly
+being given for the musicians and critics to meet
+and talk over thirteen courses with wine. You
+may read Mr. Krehbiel's glowing accounts of the
+dinner given to Adelina Patti (a dinner referred
+to in Joseph Hergesheimer's lyric novel, "The
+Three Black Pennys") on the occasion of her
+twenty-fifth anniversary as a singer, of the dinner
+to Marcella Sembrich to mark her retirement
+from the opera stage, and of a dinner to Teresa
+Carre&ntilde;o when she proposed a toast to her three
+husbands.... Go to the opera house and observe<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span>
+the lady singers, with their ample bosoms and
+their broad hips, the men with their expansive
+paunches ... and use your imagination. Why
+is it, when a singer is interviewed for a newspaper,
+that she invariably finds herself tired of
+hotel food and wants an apartment of her own,
+where she can cook to her stomach's content?
+Why are the musical journals and the Sunday
+supplements of the newspapers always publishing
+pictures of contralti with their sleeves rolled back
+to the elbows, their Poiret gowns (cunningly and
+carefully exhibited nevertheless) covered with
+aprons, baking bread, turning omelettes, or preparing
+clam broth Uncle Sam? You, my reader,
+have surely seen these pictures, but it has perhaps
+not occurred to you to conjure up a reason for
+them.</p>
+
+<p>Edgar Saltus says: "A perfect dinner should
+resemble a concert. As the <i>morceaux</i> succeed each
+other, so, too, should the names of the composers."
+Few dinners in New York may be regarded as concerts
+and still fewer restaurants may be looked
+upon as concert halls, except, unfortunately, in
+the literal sense. However, if you can find a restaurant
+where opera singers and conductors eat
+you may be sure it is a good one. Huneker describes
+the old Lienau's, where William Steinway,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span>
+Anton Seidl, Theodore Thomas, Scharwenka,
+Joseffy, Lilli Lehmann, Max Heinrich, and Victor
+Herbert used to gather. Follow Alfred Hertz and
+you will be in excellent company in a double sense.
+Then watch him consume a plateful of Viennese
+pastry. If you have ever seen Emmy Destinn or
+Feodor Chaliapine eat you will feel that justice has
+been done to a meal. I once sat with the Russian
+bass for twelve hours, all of which time he was
+eating or drinking. He began with six plates of
+steaming onion soup (cooked with cheese and
+toast). The old New Year's eve festivities at the
+Gadski-Tauschers' resembled the storied banquets
+of the middle ages.... Boars' heads, meat
+pies, <i>salade mac&eacute;doine</i>, <i>coeur de palmier</i>, <i>hollandaise</i>
+were washed down with magnums and quarts
+of Irroy brut, 1900, Pol Roger, Chambertin,
+graceful Bohemian crystal goblets of Liebfraumilch
+and Johannisberger Schloss-Auslese.
+Mary Garden once sent a jewelled gift to the <i>chef</i>
+at the Ritz-Carlton in return for a superb fish
+sauce which he had contrived for her. H. E.
+Krehbiel says that Brignoli "probably ate as no
+tenor ever ate before or since&mdash;ravenously as a
+Prussian dragoon after a fast." <i>P&ecirc;che Melba</i> has
+become a stable article on many menus in many
+cities in many lands. Agnes G. Murphy, in her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span>
+biography of Mme. Melba, says that one day the
+singer, Joachim, and a party of friends stopped
+at a peasant's cottage near Bergamo, where they
+were regaled with such delicious macaroni that
+Melba persuaded her friends to return another day
+and wait while the peasant taught her the exact
+method of preparing the dish. In at least one
+New York restaurant <i>oeuf Toscanini</i> is to be found
+on the bill. I have heard Olive Fremstad complain
+of the cooking in this hotel in Paris, or that
+hotel in New York, or the other hotel in Munich,
+and when she found herself in an apartment of her
+own she immediately set about to cook a few special
+dishes for herself.</p>
+
+<p>Two musicians I know not only keep restaurants
+in New York, but actually prepare the dinners
+themselves. One of them is at the same time a
+singer in the Metropolitan Opera Company.
+Have you seen Bernard B&eacute;gu&eacute; standing before his
+cook stove preparing food for his patrons? His
+huge form, clad in white, viewed through the
+open doorway connecting the dining room with the
+kitchen, almost conceals the great stove, but occasionally
+you can catch sight of the pots and
+pans, the <i>casseroles</i> of <i>pot-au-feu</i>, the roasting
+chicken, the filets of sole, all the ingredients of a
+dinner, <i>cuisine bourgeoise</i> ... and after dining,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span>
+you can hear B&eacute;gu&eacute; sing the Uncle-priest in
+<i>Madama Butterfly</i> at the Opera House.</p>
+
+<p>Or have you seen Giacomo (and have not
+Meyerbeer and Puccini been bearers of this
+name?) Pogliani turning from the <i>spaghetti</i> theme
+chromatically to that of the <i>risotto</i>, the most succulent
+and appetizing <i>risotto</i> to be tasted this side
+of Bonvecchiati's in Venice ... or the <i>polenta</i>
+with <i>funghi</i>.... But, best of all, the roasts, and
+were it not that the Prince Troubetskoy is a
+vegetarian you would fancy that he came to
+Pogliani's for these viands. And it must not be
+forgotten that this supreme cook is&mdash;or was&mdash;a
+bassoon player of the first rank, that he is a
+graduate of the Milan Conservatory. The bassoon
+is a difficult instrument. It is sometimes
+called the "comedian of the orchestra," but there
+are few who can play it at all, still fewer who can
+play it well. Bassoonists are highly paid and
+they are in demand. Walter Damrosch used to
+say that when he was engaging a bassoon player
+he would ask him to play a passage from the
+bassoon part in <i>Scheherazade</i>. If he could play
+that, he could play anything else written for his
+instrument. Pogliani gave up the bassoon for the
+fork, spoon, and saucepan. Like Prospero he
+buried his magic wand and in Viafora's cartoon<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span>
+the instrument lies idle in the cobwebs.</p>
+
+<p>Charles Santley's "Reminiscences" and "Student
+and Singer" are full of references to food:
+"ox-hearts, stuffed with onions," "a joint of
+meat, well cooked, with a bright brown crust which
+prevented the juices escaping," "a splendid shoulder
+of mutton, a picture to behold, and a <i>peas pudding</i>,"
+and "whaffles" are a few of the dishes referred
+to with enthusiasm. In America a newspaper
+gravely informed its readers that "Santley
+says squash pie is the best thing to sing on he
+knows!" Santley was a true pantophagist, but
+he was worsted in his first encounter with the
+American oyster: "I had often heard of the celebrated
+American oyster, which half a dozen people
+had tried to swallow without success, and was
+anxious to learn if the story were founded on fact.
+Cummings conducted me to a cellar in Broadway,
+where, upon his order, a waiter produced two
+plates, on which were half a dozen objects, about
+the size and shape of the sole of an ordinary lady's
+shoe, on each of which lay what appeared to me
+to be a very bilious tongue, accompanied by
+smaller plates containing shredded white cabbage
+raw. I did not admire the look of the repast, but
+I never discard food on account of looks. I took
+up an oyster and tried to get it into my mouth,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span>
+but it was of no use; I tried to ram it in with the
+butt-end of the fork, but all to no purpose, and I
+had to drop it, and, to the great indignation of the
+waiter, paid and left the oysters for him to dispose
+of as he might like best. I presume those
+oysters are eaten, but I cannot imagine by whom;
+I have rarely seen a mouth capable of the necessary
+expansion. I soon found out that there
+were plenty of delicious oysters in the States
+within the compass of ordinary jaws."</p>
+
+<p>J. H. Mapleson says in his "Memoirs" that at
+the Opera at Lodi, where he made his d&eacute;but as a
+tenor, refreshments of all kinds were served to the
+audience between the acts and every box was furnished
+with a little kitchen for cooking macaroni
+and baking or frying pastry. The wine of the
+country was drunk freely, not out of glasses, but
+"in classical fashion&mdash;from bowls." Mapleson
+also tells us that Del Puente was a "very tolerable
+cook." On one trying occasion he prepared
+macaroni for his impressario. Michael Kelly declares
+that the sight of Signor St. Giorgio entering
+a fruit shop to eat peaches, nectarines, and a pineapple,
+was really what stimulated him to study for
+a career on the stage. "While my mouth watered,
+I asked myself why, if I assiduously studied music,
+I should not be able to earn money enough to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span>
+lounge about in fruit-shops, and eat peaches and
+pineapples as well as Signor St. Giorgio...."</p>
+
+<p>Lillian Russell is a good cook. I can recommend
+her recipe for the preparation of mushrooms:
+"Put a lump of butter in a chafing dish
+(or a saucepan) and a slice of Spanish onion and
+the mushrooms minus the stems; let them simmer
+until they are all deliciously tender and the juice
+has run from them&mdash;about twenty minutes should
+be enough&mdash;then add a cupful of cream and let
+this boil. As a last touch squeeze in the juice of
+a lemon." When Luisa Tetrazzini was going mad
+with a flute in our vicinity she varied the monotony
+of her life by sending pages of her favourite recipes
+to the Sunday yellow press. Unfortunately, I
+neglected to make a collection of this series. A
+passion for cooking caused the death of Naldi, a
+buffo singer of the early Nineteenth Century.
+Michael Kelly tells the story: "His ill stars took
+him to Paris, where, one day, just before dinner,
+at his friend Garcia's house, in the year 1821, he
+was showing the method of cooking by steam, with
+a portable apparatus for that purpose; unfortunately,
+in consequence of some derangement of
+the machinery, an explosion took place, by which
+he was instantaneously killed." Almost everybody
+knows some story or other about a <i>virtuoso</i>,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span>
+trapped into dining and asked to perform after
+dinner by his host. Kelly relates one of the first:
+"Fischer, the great oboe player, whose minuet
+was then all the rage ... being very much
+pressed by a nobleman to sup with him after the
+opera, declined the invitation, saying that he was
+usually much fatigued, and made it a rule never to
+go out after the evening's performance. The
+noble lord would, however, take no denial, and assured
+Fischer that he did not ask him professionally,
+but merely for the gratification of his society
+and conversation. Thus urged and encouraged,
+he went; he had not, however, been many
+minutes in the house of the consistent nobleman,
+before his lordship approached him, and said, 'I
+hope, Mr. Fischer, you have brought your oboe in
+your pocket.'&mdash;'No, my Lord,' said Fischer, 'my
+oboe never sups.' He turned on his heel, and instantly
+left the house, and no persuasion could
+ever induce him to return to it." You perhaps
+have heard rumours that Giuseppe Campanari prefers
+<i>spaghetti</i> to Mozart, especially when he cooks
+it himself. When this baritone was a member of
+the Metropolitan Opera Company his paraphernalia
+for preparing his favourite food went everywhere
+with him on tour. Heinrich Conried (or
+was it Maurice Grau?) once tried to take <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span>advantage
+of this weakness, according to a story
+often related by the late Algernon St. John Brenon.
+Campanari was to appear as Kothner in <i>Die Meistersinger</i>,
+a character with no singing to do after
+the first act, although he appears in the procession
+in the third act. The singer told his impressario
+that he saw no reason why he should remain to the
+end and explained that he would leave his costume
+for a chorus man to don to represent him in the
+final episode. "What would the Master say?"
+demanded Conried, wringing his hands. "Would
+he approve of such a proceeding? No. That
+would not be truth! That would not be art!"
+Campanari was obdurate. The Herr Direktor became
+reflective. He was silent for a moment and
+then he continued: "If you will stay for the last
+act you will find in your room a little supper,
+a bottle of wine, and a box of cigars, which you
+may consume while you are waiting." In sooth
+when Campanari entered his dressing room after
+the first act of Wagner's comic opera he found that
+his director had kept his word.... The baritone
+ate the supper, drank the wine, put the cigars in
+his pocket ... and went home!</p>
+
+<p>If some singers are good cooks it does not follow
+that all good cooks are singers. Benjamin
+Lumley, in his "Reminiscences of the Opera," tells<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span>
+the sad story of the Countess of Cannazaro's cook,
+which should serve as a lesson to housemaids who
+are desirous of becoming moving picture stars.
+"This worthy man, excellent no doubt as a <i>chef</i>,
+took it into his head that he was a vocalist of the
+highest order, and that he only wanted opportunity
+to earn musical distinction. His strange
+fancy came to the knowledge of Rubini, and it was
+arranged that a performance should take place in
+the morning, in which the cook's talent should be
+fairly tested. Certainly every chance was afforded
+him. Not only was he encouraged by
+Rubini and Lablache (whose gravity on the occasion
+was wonderful), but by a few others, Costa
+included, as instrumentalists. The failure was
+miserable, ridiculous, as everybody expected."
+Frederick Crowest describes a certain Count Castel
+de Maria who had a spit that played tunes,
+"and so regulated and indicated the condition of
+whatever was hung upon it to roast. By a singular
+mechanical contrivance this wonderful spit
+would strike up an appropriate tune whenever a
+joint had hung sufficiently long on its particular
+roast. Thus, <i>Oh! the roast beef of Old England</i>,
+when a sirloin had turned and hung its appointed
+time. At another air, a leg of mutton, <i>&agrave; l'Anglaise</i>
+would be found excellent; while some other<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span>
+tune would indicate that a fowl <i>&agrave; la Flamande</i> was
+cooked to a nicety and needed removal from the
+fowl roast."</p>
+
+<p>To Crowest, too, I am indebted for a list of
+beverages and eatables which certain singers held
+in superstitious awe as capable of refreshing their
+voices. Formes swore by a pot of good porter
+and Wachtel is said to have trusted to the yolk of
+an egg beaten up with sugar to make sure of his
+high Cs. The Swedish tenor, Labatt, declared
+that two salted cucumbers gave the voice the true
+metallic ring. Walter drank cold black coffee
+during a performance; Southeim took snuff and
+cold lemonade; Steger, beer; Niemann, champagne,
+slightly warmed, (Huneker once saw Niemann
+drinking cocktails from a beer glass; he
+sang Siegmund at the opera the next night);
+Tichatschek, mulled claret; R&uuml;bgam drank mead;
+Nachbaur ate bonbons; Arabanek believed in Gampoldskirchner
+wine. Mlle. Brann-Brini took beer
+and <i>cafe au lait</i>, but she also firmly believed in
+champagne and would never dare venture the great
+duet in the fourth act of <i>Les Huguenots</i> without a
+bottle of Mo&euml;t Cr&eacute;mant Rose. Giardini being
+asked his opinion of Banti, previous to her arrival
+in England, said: "She is the first singer in Italy
+and drinks a bottle of wine every day." Malibran<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span>
+believed in the efficacy of porter. She made her
+last appearances in opera in Balfe's <i>Maid of Artois</i>
+during the fall of 1836 in London. On the first
+night she was in anything but good physical condition
+and the author of "Musical Recollections
+of the Last Half-Century" tells how she pulled
+herself through: "She remembered that an immense
+trial awaited her in the finale of the third
+act; and finding her strength giving way, she sent
+for Mr. Balfe and Mr. Bunn, and told them that
+unless they did as they were bid, after all the previous
+success, the end might result in failure; but
+she said, 'Manage to let me have a pot of porter
+somehow or other before I have to sing, and I will
+get you an encore which will bring down the house.'
+How to manage this was difficult; for the scene was
+so set that it seemed scarcely possible to hand her
+up 'the pewter' without its being witnessed by the
+audience. After much consultation, Malibran
+having been assured that her wish should be fulfilled,
+it was arranged that the pot of porter
+should be handed up to her through a trap in the
+stage at the moment when Jules had thrown himself
+on her body, supposing that life had fled; and
+Mr. Templeton was drilled into the manner in
+which he should so manage to conceal the necessary
+arrangement, that the audience would never<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span>
+suspect what was going on. At the right moment
+a friendly hand put the foaming pewter through
+the stage, to be swallowed at a draught, and success
+was won!... Malibran, however, had not overestimated
+her own strength. She knew that it
+wanted but this fillip to carry her through. She
+had resolved to have an encore, and she had it, in
+such a fashion as made the roof of 'Old Drury'
+ring as it had never rung before. On the repetition
+of the opera and afterwards, a different arrangement
+of the stage was made, and a property
+calabash containing a pot of porter was used; but
+although the same result was constantly won, Malibran
+always said it was not half so 'nice,' nor did
+her anything like the good it would have done if
+she could only have had it out of the pewter."
+Clara Louise Kellogg in her very lively "Memoirs"
+publishes a similar tale of another singer:
+"It was told of Grisi that when she was growing
+old and severe exertion told on her she always,
+after her fall as Lucrezia Borgia, drank a glass of
+beer sent up to her through the floor, lying with
+her back half turned to the audience." Miss Kellogg
+complains of the breaths of the tenors she
+sang with: "Stigelli usually exhaled an aroma of
+lager beer; while the good Mazzoleni invariably ate
+from one to two pounds of cheese the day he was to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span>
+sing. He said it strengthened his voice. Many
+of them affected garlic." It is necessary, of
+course, that a singer should know what foods
+agree with him. He must keep himself in excellent
+physical condition: small wonder that many
+artists are superstitious in this regard.</p>
+
+<p>Charles Santley, who was so fond of eating and
+drinking himself, offers some excellent advice
+on the subject in "Student and Singer": "How
+the voice is produced or where, except that it is
+through the passage of the throat, is unimportant;
+it is reasonable to say that the passage must
+be kept clear, otherwise the sound proceeding from
+it will not be clear. I have known many instances
+of singers undergoing very disagreeable operations
+on their throats for chronic diseases of various
+descriptions; now, my observation and experience
+assure me that, in ninety-nine cases out
+of a hundred, the root of the evil is chronic inattention
+to food and raiment. It is a common
+thing to hear a singer say, 'I never touch such-and-such
+food on the days I sing.' My dear
+young friend, unless you are an absolute idiot,
+you would not partake of anything on the days
+you sing which might disagree with you, or over-tax
+your digestive powers; it is on the days you
+do not sing you ought more particularly to exercise<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span>
+your judgment and self-denial. I do not offer
+the pinched-up pilgarlic who dines off a wizened
+apple and a crust of bread as a model for
+imitation; at the same time, I warn you seriously
+against following the example of the gobbling
+glutton who swallows every dish that tempts his
+palate."</p>
+
+<p>Rossini, after he had composed <i>Guillaume Tell</i>,
+retired. He was thirty-seven, a man in perfect
+health, and he lived thirty-nine years longer, to
+the age of seventy-six, yet he never wrote another
+opera, hardly indeed did he dip his pen in ink at
+all. These facts have seriously disconcerted his
+biographers, who are at a loss to assign reasons
+for his actions. W. F. Apthorp gives us an ingenious
+explanation in "The Opera Past and
+Present." He says that after <i>Tell</i> Rossini's pride
+would not allow him to return to his earlier Italian
+manner, while the hard work needed to produce
+more <i>Tells</i> was more than his laziness could stomach....
+Perhaps, but it must be remembered
+that Rossini did not retire to his library or his
+music room, but to his kitchen. The simple explanation
+is that he preferred cooking to composing,
+a fact easy to believe (I myself vastly prefer
+cooking to writing). He could cook <i>risotto</i> better
+than any one else he knew. He was dubbed a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span>
+"hippopotamus in trousers," and for six years before
+he died he could not see his toes, he was so fat.
+Sir Arthur Sullivan relates an anecdote which
+shows that Rossini was conscious of his grossness.
+Once in Paris Sullivan introduced Chorley to Rossini,
+when the Italian said, "<i>Je vois, avec plaisir,
+que monsieur n'a pas de ventre</i>." Chorley indeed
+was noticeably slender. Rossini could write more
+easily, so his biographers tell us, when he was under
+the influence of champagne or some light wine.
+His provision merchant once begged him for an
+autographed portrait. The composer gave it to
+him with the inscription, "To my stomach's best
+friend." The tradesman used this souvenir as an
+advertisement and largely increased his business
+thereby, as such a testimonial from such an acknowledged
+epicure had a very definite value. J.
+B. Weckerlin asserts that when Rossini dined at
+the Rothschild's he first went to the kitchen to pay
+his respects to the <i>chef</i>, to look over the menu, and
+even to discuss the various dishes, after which he
+ascended to the drawing room to greet the family
+of the rich banker. Mme. Alboni told Weckerlin
+that Rossini had dedicated a piece of music to the
+Rothschild's <i>chef</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Anfossi, we are informed, could compose only
+when he was surrounded by smoking fowls and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span>
+Bologna sausages; their fumes seemed to inflame
+his imagination, to feed his muse; his brain was
+stimulated first through his nose and then through
+his stomach. When Gluck wrote music he betook
+himself to the open fields, accompanied by at least
+two bottles of champagne. Salieri told Michael
+Kelly that a comic opera of Gluck's being performed
+at the Elector Palatine's theatre, at
+Schwetzingen, his Electoral Highness was struck
+with the music, and inquired who had composed
+it; on being informed that he was an honest German
+who loved <i>old wine</i>, his Highness immediately
+ordered him a tun of Hock. Beethoven, on the
+contrary, seems to have fed on his thoughts occasionally,
+although there is evidence that he was not
+only a good eater but also a good cook (the
+mothers of both Beethoven and Schubert were
+cooks in domestic service). There is a story related
+of him that about the time he was composing
+the <i>Sixth Symphony</i> he walked into a Viennese
+restaurant and ordered dinner. While it was
+being prepared, he became involved in thought,
+and when the waiter returned to serve him, he
+said: "Thank you, I have dined!" laid the price
+of the dinner on the table, and took his departure.
+Gr&eacute;try, too, lost his appetite when he was composing.
+There are numerous references to eating and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span>
+drinking in Mendelssohn's letters. His particular
+preferences, according to Sir George Grove,
+were for rice milk and cherry pie. Dussek was a
+famous eater, and it is said that his ruling passion
+eventually killed him. His patron, the Prince of
+Benevento, paid the composer eight hundred napoleons
+a year, with a free table for three persons,
+at which, as a matter of fact, one person
+usually presided. A musical historian tells us that
+in the summer of 1797 he was dining with three
+friends at the Ship Tavern in Greenwich, when
+the waiter came and laid a cloth for one person at
+the next table, placing thereon a dish of boiled
+eels, one of fried flounders, a bowled fowl, a dish
+of veal cutlets, and a couple of tarts. Then Dussek
+entered and made away with the lot, leaving
+but the bones! In W. T. Parke's "Musical
+Memoirs" justice is done to the appetite of one
+C. F. Baumgarten, for many years leader of the
+band and composer at Covent Garden Theatre.
+Once at supper after the play he and a friend ate
+a full-grown hare between them. He would never
+condescend to drink out of anything but a quart
+pot. On one occasion, at the request of his
+friends, Baumgarten was weighed before and after
+dinner. There was eight pounds difference! William
+Shield, the composer who wrote many operas<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span>
+for Covent Garden Theatre, beginning aptly
+enough with one called <i>The Flitch of Bacon</i>, was
+something of an eater. Parke tells how at a dinner
+one evening there was a brace of partridges.
+The hostess handed Shield one of these to carve
+and absent-mindedly he set to and finished it,
+while the other guests were forced to make shift
+with the other partridge. Handel was a great
+eater. He was called the "Saxon Giant," as a
+tribute to his genius, but the phrase might have
+had a satirical reference to his enormous bulk.
+Intending to dine one day at a certain tavern, he
+ordered beforehand a dinner for three. At the
+hour appointed he sat down to the table and expressed
+astonishment that the dinner was not
+brought up. The waiter explained that he would
+begin serving when the company arrived. "Den
+pring up de tinner brestissimo," replied Handel,
+"I am de gombany." Lulli never forsook the <i>casserole</i>.
+Paganini was as good a cook as he was
+a violinist. Parke tells a story of Weichsell, not
+too celebrated a musician, but the father of Mrs.
+Billington and Charles Weichsell, the violinist:
+"He would occasionally supersede the labours of
+his cook, and pass a whole day in preparing his
+favourite dish, rump-steaks, for the stewing pan;
+and after the delicious viand had been placed on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span>
+the dinner-table, together with early green peas
+of high price, if it happened that the sauce was not
+to his liking he has been known to throw rump-steaks,
+and green peas, and all, out of the window,
+whilst his wife and children thought themselves fortunate
+in not being thrown after them."</p>
+
+<p>Is there a cooking theme in <i>Siegfried</i> to describe
+Mime's brewing? Lavignac and others, who have
+listed the <i>Ring motive</i>, have neglected to catalogue
+it, but it is mentioned by Old Fogy. Practically
+a whole act is taken up in <i>Louise</i> with the preparation
+for and consumption of a dinner. Scarpia
+eats in <i>Tosca</i> and the heroine kills him with a
+table knife. There is much talk of food in <i>H&auml;nsel
+und Gretel</i> and there is a supper in <i>The Merry
+Wives of Windsor</i>. There are drinking songs in
+<i>Don Giovanni</i>, <i>Lucrezia Borgia</i>, <i>Hamlet</i>, <i>La Traviata</i>,
+<i>Girofl&eacute;-Girofla</i>.... The reference to whiskey
+and soda in <i>Madama Butterfly</i> is celebrated.
+J. E. Cox, the author of "Musical Recollections,"
+describes Herr Pischek in the supper scene of <i>Don
+Giovanni</i> as "out-heroding Herod by swallowing
+glass after glass of champagne like a sot, and
+gnawing the drumstick of a fowl, which he held
+across his mouth with his fingers, just as any of
+his own middle-class countrymen may be seen any
+day of the week all the year round at the <i>mit-tag</i><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span>
+or <i>abend-essen</i> feeding at one of their largely frequented
+<i>tables-d'h&ocirc;te</i>." Eating or drinking on the
+stage is always fraught with danger, as Charles
+Santley once discovered during Papageno's supper
+scene in <i>The Magic Flute</i>: "The supper which
+Tamino commands for the hungry Papageno consisted
+of pasteboard imitations of good things, but
+the cup contained real wine, a small draught of
+which I found refreshing on a hot night in July,
+amid the dust and heat of the stage. On the
+occasion in question I was putting the cup to lips,
+when I heard somebody call to me from the wings;
+I felt very angry at the interruption, and was
+just about to swallow the wine when I heard an
+anxious call not to drink. Suspecting something
+was wrong, I pretended to drink, and deposited the
+cup on the table. Immediately after the scene I
+made inquiries about the reason for the caution I
+received, and was informed that as each night the
+carpenters, who had no right to it, finished what
+remained of the wine before the property men,
+whose perquisite it was, could lay hold of the cup,
+the latter, to give their despoilers a lesson, had
+mingled castor-oil with my drink!"</p>
+
+<p>A young husband of my acquaintance once bemoaned
+to me the fact that his wife seemed destined
+to become a great singer. "She is such a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span>
+remarkable cook!" he explained to account for his
+despondency. I reassured him: "She will cook
+with renewed energy when she begins to sing <i>Sieglinde</i>
+and <i>Tosca</i>.... She will practise <i>Vissi
+d'Arte</i> over the gumbo soup and <i>Du herstes
+Wunder</i>! while the Frankfurters are sizzling. Her
+trills, her chromatic scales, and her <i>messa di voce</i>
+will come right in the kitchen; she will equalize her
+scale and learn to breathe correctly bending over
+the oven. It is even likely that she will improve
+her knowledge of <i>portamento</i> while she is washing
+dishes. When she can prepare a succulent roast
+suckling pig she will be able to sing <i>Ocean, thou
+mighty monster</i>! and she will understand <i>Abscheulicher</i>
+when she understands the mysteries of old-fashioned
+strawberry shortcake. If you hear her
+shrieking <i>Suicidio</i>! invoking Agamemnon, or appealing
+to the <i>Casta Diva</i> among the kettles and
+pots be not alarmed.... For the love you bear
+of good food, man, do not discourage your wife's
+ambition. The more she loves to sing, the better
+she will cook!"</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>July 17, 1917.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="Interrupted" id="Interrupted"></a>An Interrupted Conversation</h3>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="center"><i>"We can never depend upon any right adjustment
+of emotion to circumstance."</i></p>
+
+<p class="author">
+Max Beerbohm.<br />
+</p></div>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="An_Interrupted_Conversation" id="An_Interrupted_Conversation"></a>An Interrupted Conversation</h2>
+
+
+<p>Ordinarily one does not learn things
+about oneself from Edmund Gosse, but my
+discovery that I am a Pyrrhonist is due to
+that literary man. A Pyrrhonist, says Mr. Gosse,
+is "one who doubts whether it is worth while to
+struggle against the trend of things. The man
+who continues to cross the road leisurely, although
+the cyclists' bells are ringing, is a Pyrrhonist&mdash;and
+in a very special sense, for the ancient philosopher
+who gives his name to the class made himself
+conspicuous by refusing to get out of the way
+of careering chariots." Now the most unfamiliar
+friend I have ever walked with knows my extreme
+impassivity at the corners of streets, remembers
+the careless attitude with which I saunter from
+kerb to kerb, whether it be across the Grand Boulevard,
+Piccadilly, or Fifth Avenue. Only once
+has this nonchalant defiance of traffic caused me
+to come to even temporary grief; that was on the
+last night of the year 1913, when, in crossing
+Broadway, I became entangled, God knows how,
+in the wheels of a swiftly passing vehicle, and
+found myself, top hat and all, in the most ignominious
+position before I was well aware of what<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span>
+had really happened. Then a policeman stooped
+over me, book and pencil in hand, and another
+held the chauffeur of the victorious taxi-cab at
+bay some yards further up the street. But I was
+not hurt and I waved them all away with a magnanimous
+gesture.... It is owing to this habit
+of mine that I often make interesting <i>rencontres</i>
+in the middle of streets. It accounts, in fact, for
+my running, quite absent-mindedly, plump into
+Dickinson Sitgreaves, who is more American than
+his name sounds, one August day in Paris.</p>
+
+<p>It was one of those charming days which make
+August perhaps the most delightful month to spend
+in Paris, although the facts are not known to
+tourists. Many a sly French pair, however, bored
+with Trouville, or the season at Aix, take advantage
+of the allurements of a Paris August to return
+surreptitiously to the boulevards. On this
+particular day almost all the seduction of an October
+day was in the air, a splendid dull warm-cool
+crispness, which filtered down through the
+faded chestnut leaves from the sunlight, and left
+pale splotches of purple and orange on the
+<i>trottoirs</i> ... a really marvellous day, which I
+was spending in that most excellent occupation in
+Paris of gazing into shops and, passing caf&eacute;s, staring
+into the faces of those who sat on the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span><i>terrasses</i>....
+But this is an occupation for one
+alone; so, when I met Sitgreaves, we joined a <i>terrasse</i>
+ourselves. We were near the Napolitain
+and there he and I sat down and began to talk as
+only we two can talk together after long separation.
+He explained in the beginning how I
+had interrupted him.... There was a <i>fille</i>, some
+little Polish beauty who had captivated his senses
+a day or so before, brought to him quite by accident
+in an hotel where the <i>patron</i> furnished his
+clients with such pleasure as the town and his address
+book afforded.... I knew the <i>patron</i> myself,
+a fluent, amusing sort of person, who had been
+a <i>cuirassier</i> and who resembled Mayol ... a <i>caf&eacute;-concert</i>
+proprietor of an hotel.... It was his
+boast that he had never disappointed a client and
+it is certain that he would promise anything.
+Some have said that his stock in trade was one
+pretty girl, who assumed costumes, ages, hair, and
+accents, to please whatever demand was made upon
+her, but this I do not believe. There must have
+been at least two of them. The Grand Duchess
+Anastasia, it was rumoured, had dined with Marcel
+at one time, in his little hotel, and certainly
+one king had been seen to go there, and one member
+of the English royal family, but Marcel remained
+simple and obliging.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"When will you look up the little <i>Polonaise</i>?"
+I asked, as we sipped <i>Amer Picon</i> and stared with
+fresh interest at each new boot and ankle that
+passed. Paris in August is like another place in
+May.</p>
+
+<p>"Why don't you come along?" queried Sitgreaves
+in reply, "and we could go at once....
+Oh, I know that you are in no mood for pleasure.
+You see the point is that I shall have to wait.
+Marcel will have to send for the <i>fille</i>. It is a bore
+to wait in a room with red curtains and a picture
+of <i>Amour et Psyche</i> on the walls.... What have
+you been doing?" He paid the <i>consommation</i>
+and started to leave without waiting for a reply,
+because he knew of my complaisance. I rose with
+him and we walked down the boulevard.</p>
+
+<p>"What is there to do in Paris in August but
+to enjoy oneself?" I asked. "I have made friends
+with an <i>apache</i> and his <i>gigolette</i>. We eat bread
+and cheese and drink bad wine on the fortifications....
+In the afternoon I walk. Sometimes I go to
+the Luxembourg gardens to hear the band bray
+sad music, or to watch the little boys play <i>diavolo</i>,
+or sail their tiny boats about the fountain pond;
+sometimes I walk quite silently up the Avenue
+Gabriel, with its <i>triste</i> line of trees, and dream
+that I am a Grand Duke; in the evening there are<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span>
+again the <i>terrasses</i> of the caf&eacute;s, dinner in Montmartre
+at the Clou, or the Cou-Cou, a <i>revue</i> at La
+Cigale, but it is all governed, my day and my night,
+by what happens and by whom I meet.... Have
+you seen Jacques Blanche's portrait of Nijinsky?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think it is Picasso that interests me now,"
+Sitgreaves was saying. "He puts wood and pieces
+of paper into his composition; architecture, that's
+what it is.... I don't go to Blanche's any more.
+It's too delightfully perfect, the atmosphere there....
+The books are by all the famous writers, and
+they are all dedicated to Blanche; the pictures are
+all of the great men of today, and they are all
+painted by Blanche; the music is played by the
+best musicians.... Do you know, I think
+Blanche is the one man who has made a successful
+profession of being an amateur&mdash;unless one
+excepts Robert de la Condamine.... You can
+scarcely call a man who does so much a dilettante.
+Yes, I think he is an amateur in the best sense."</p>
+
+<p>"I met the Countess of Jena there the other
+day," I responded. "She had scarcely left the
+room before three people volunteered, <i>sans rancune</i>,
+to tell her story. She is a devout Catholic,
+and her husband contrived in some way to substitute
+a spy for the priest in the confessional. He
+acquired an infinite amount of information, but it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span>
+didn't do him any good. She is so witty that
+every one invites her everywhere in spite of her
+reputation, and he is left to dine alone at the
+Meurice. Dull men simply are not tolerated in
+Paris.</p>
+
+<p>"It was at Blanche's last year that I met
+George Moore," I continued. "You know I have
+just seen him in London. He is at work on <i>The
+Apostle</i>, making a novel of it, to be called 'The
+Brook Kerith.' ... For a time he thought of finishing
+it up as a play because a novel meant a
+visit to Palestine and that was distasteful to him,
+but it finally became a novel. He went to Palestine
+and stayed six weeks, just long enough to find
+a monastery and to study the lay of the country.
+For he says, truly enough, that one cannot imagine
+landscapes; one does not know whether there is a
+high or low horizon. There may be a brook which
+all the characters must cross. It is necessary to
+see these things. Besides he had to find a monastery....
+He told me of his thrill when he discovered
+an order of monks living on a narrow ledge
+of cliff, with 500 feet sheer rise and descent above
+and below it ... and when he had found this
+his work was done and he returned to England to
+write the book, a reaction, for he told me that he
+was getting tired of being personal in literature.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span>
+The book will exhibit a conflict between two types:
+Christ, the disappointed mystic, and Paul; Christ,
+who sees that there is no good to be served in saving
+the world by his death, and Paul, full of hope,
+idealism, and illusions. It is the drama of the
+conflict between the nature which is affected by
+externals and that which is not, he told me."</p>
+
+<p>"It's a subject for Anatole France," said Sitgreaves.
+"Moore, in my opinion, is not a novelist.
+His great achievements are his memoirs. I was
+interested in 'Evelyn Innes' and 'Esther Waters,'
+but something was lacking. There is nothing
+lacking in the three volumes of 'Hail and Farewell.'
+They grow in interest. Moore has found
+his <i>m&eacute;tier</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"But he insists," I explained, before the door
+of the little hotel, "that 'Hail and Farewell' is a
+novel. He is infuriated when some one suggests
+that it is a book after the manner of, say, 'The
+Reminiscences of Lady Randolph Churchill.' ..."</p>
+
+<p>We entered and walked up the little staircase.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you mean that the incidents are untrue?"</p>
+
+<p>We were at the door of the <i>concierge</i> and there
+stood Marcel, his apron spread neatly over his
+ample paunch. It was early in the afternoon and
+the room beyond him, sometimes filled with possibilities
+for customers, was empty.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"<i>Ah, monsieur est revenu!</i>" he exclaimed in his
+piping voice. "<i>C'est pour la petite Polonaise
+sans doute que monsieur revient?</i>"</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Oui</i>," answered Sitgreaves, "<i>faut-il attendre
+longtemps?</i>"</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Mais non, monsieur, un petit moment. Elle
+habite en face. Je vais envoyer le gar&ccedil;on la
+chercher tout de suite. Et pour monsieur, votre
+ami?</i>"</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Je ne desire rien</i>," I replied.</p>
+
+<p>Marcel bowed humbly.... "<i>Comme monsieur
+voudra.</i>" Then a doubt assailed him. "<i>Peut-&ecirc;tre
+que la petite Polonaise vous suffira &agrave; tous les
+deux?</i>"</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Jamais de la vie!</i>" I shouted, "<i>Fl&ucirc;te, Mercure,
+allez! Je suis puceau!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>Marcel was equal to this. "<i>Et ta soeur?</i>" he
+demanded as he disappeared down the staircase.</p>
+
+<p>He had put us meanwhile in the very chamber
+with the red curtains and the picture of Cupid and
+Psyche that Sitgreaves had described. Perhaps
+all the rooms were similarly decorated. I lounged
+on the bed while Sitgreaves sat on a chair and
+smoked....</p>
+
+<p>I answered his last question, "No, they are
+true, but there is selection and form."</p>
+
+<p>"While other memoirs have neither selection nor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span>
+form and usually are not altogether accurate in
+the bargain...."</p>
+
+<p>"Especially Madame Melba's...."</p>
+
+<p>"Especially," agreed Sitgreaves delightedly,
+"Madame Melba's."</p>
+
+<p>"Moore is really right," I went on. "He says
+that some people insist that Balzac was greater
+than Turgeniev, because the Frenchman took his
+characters from imagination, the Russian his from
+life. You will remember, however, that Edgar
+Saltus says, 'The manufacture of fiction from
+facts was begun by Balzac.' Moore's point is
+that all great writers write from observation.
+There is no other way. A character may have
+more or less resemblance to the original; it may
+be derived and bear a different name; still there
+must have been something.... In a letter which
+Moore once wrote me stands the phrase, 'Memory
+is the mother of the Muses.' 'Hail and Farewell'
+is just as much a work of imagination, according
+to Moore, as 'A Nest of Noblemen' or 'Les Illusions
+Perdues.'"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course," admitted Sitgreaves. "No
+writer but what has suffered from the recognition
+of his characters. Dickens got into trouble. Oscar
+Wilde is said to have done himself in 'Dorian
+Gray,' and Meredith's models for 'The Tragic<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span>
+Comedians' and 'Diana of the Crossways' are
+well known."</p>
+
+<p>"All Moore has done is to call his characters
+by their real names and he has reported their
+conversations as he remembered them, but, mind
+you, he has not put into the book all their conversations,
+or even all the people he knew at that
+period. Arthur Symons, for instance, a great
+friend of Moore's at that time, is scarcely mentioned,
+and with reason: he has no part in the
+form of the book; its plot is not concerned with
+him.</p>
+
+<p>"All artists create only in the image of the
+things they have seen, reduced to terms of art
+through their imagination. The paintings of Mina
+Loy seem to the beholder the strange creations of
+a vagrant fancy. I remember one picture of hers
+in which an Indian girl stands poised before an
+oriental palace, the most fantastic of palaces, it
+would seem. But the artist explained to me that
+it was simply the fa&ccedil;ade of Hagenbeck's menagerie
+in Hamburg, seen with an imaginative eye. The
+girl was a model.... One day on the beach at the
+Lido she saw a young man in a bathing suit lying
+stretched on the sand with his head in the lap of a
+beautiful woman. Other women surrounded the
+two. The group immediately suggested a composition<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span>
+to her. She went home and painted. She
+took the young man's bathing suit off and gave
+him wings; the women she dressed in lovely floating
+robes, and she called the picture, <i>l'Amour Dorlot&eacute;
+par les Belles Dames</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"And once I asked Frank Harris to explain to
+me the origin of his vivid story, 'Montes the Matador.'
+'It's too simple,' he said, 'the model for
+Montes was a little Mexican greaser whom I met
+in Kansas. He was one of many in charge of
+cattle shipped up from Mexico and down from the
+States. All the white cattle men, the gringos,
+held him in great contempt. But,' continued
+Harris, speaking deliberately with his beautifully
+modulated voice, and his eyes twinkling with the
+memory of the thing, 'I soon found that the
+greaser's contempt for the gringos was immeasureably
+greater than their's for him. "Bah," he
+would say, "they know nothing." And it was so.
+He could go into a cattle car on a pitch dark
+night and make the bulls stand up, a feat that
+none of the white men would have attempted. I
+asked him how he did this and he told me the
+answer in three words, "I know them." He could
+go into a herd of cattle just let loose together and
+pick out their leader immediately, pick him out
+before the cattle themselves had! There was the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span>
+origin of "Montes the Matador." He was
+named, of course, after the famous <i>torero</i> described
+by Gautier in his "Voyage en Espagne."
+When I was in Madrid sometime later I went to a
+number of bull-fights before I put the story together.'
+'But,' I asked Harris, 'Is it possible
+for an <i>espada</i> to stand in the bull ring with his
+back to the bull, during a charge, as you have
+made him do frequently in the story?' 'Of
+course not,' he answered me at once, smiling his
+frankly malevolent smile, 'Of course not. That
+part was put in to show how much the public will
+stand for in a work of fiction. I believe one of
+the <i>espadas</i> tried it some time after the book appeared
+and was immediately killed.'</p>
+
+<p>"Fiction, history, poetry, criticism, at their
+best, are all the same thing. When they inflame
+the imagination and stir the pulse they are identical:
+all creative work. It does not matter what
+a man writes about. It matters how he writes it.
+Subject is nothing. Should we regard Velasquez
+as less important than Murillo because the former
+painted portraits of contemporaries, whom in his
+fashion he criticized, while the Spanish Bouguereau
+disguised his models as the Virgin? Walter
+Pater's description of the <i>Monna Lisa</i> would live
+if the picture disappeared. Indeed it has created<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span>
+a factitious interest in da Vinci's masterwork.
+Even more might be said for Huysmans's description
+of Moreau's <i>Salom&eacute;</i>, which actually puts the
+figures in the picture in motion! The critic, the
+historian at their best are creative artists as the
+writers of fiction are creative artists. Should we
+regard, for example, 'Imperial Purple' less a work
+of creative art than 'The Rise of Silas Lapham'?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am getting your meaning more and more,"
+said Sitgreaves. "And it occurs to me that perhaps
+I have been unjust in rating Moore low as
+a novelist. Perhaps I should have said that he is
+more successful in those books which depend more
+on his memory and less on his imaginative instinct.
+He cannot, after all, have known Jesus and
+Paul...."</p>
+
+<p>"You are quite wrong," I said. "At least from
+his point of view. He says that he knows Paul
+better than he has ever known any one else. He
+even finds hair on Paul's chest. He can describe
+Paul, I believe, to the last mole. He knows his
+favourite colours, and whether he prefers artichokes
+to alligator pears. As for Christ, everybody
+professes to know Christ these days. Since
+the world has become distinctly un-Christian
+it has become comparatively easy to discuss<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span>
+Christ. He is regarded as an historical character,
+and a much more simple one than Napoleon.
+I have heard anarchists in bar-rooms talk about
+him by the hour, sometimes very graphically and
+always with a certain amount of wit. No, it is all
+the same.... Moore, now that he has been to
+Palestine and read the gospels, feels as well acquainted
+with Christ and Paul as he does with
+Edward Martyn and Yeats and Lady Gregory."</p>
+
+<p>"I must fall back on the personal then," said
+Sitgreaves, now really at bay, "and say that I am
+less moved and interested when Moore is describing
+Evelyn Innes, than when he tells of his affair with
+Doris at Orelay."</p>
+
+<p>"I am glad that you mentioned 'Evelyn Innes'
+again," I said, "because it is in this very book
+that he is said to have painted so many of his
+friends. Ulick Dean is undoubtedly Yeats. It
+has been suggested that Arnold Dolmetsch posed
+for the portrait of Evelyn's father. Dolmetsch's
+testimony on this point goes farther. He says
+that he dictated certain passages in the
+book...."</p>
+
+<p>"What is it, then? What is the difference?
+There is some difference, of that I am sure...."</p>
+
+<p>"The difference is&mdash;" I began when the door
+opened and Marcel entered, the most amazingly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span>
+comprehensive smile on his countenance. "<i>Mademoiselle
+vous attend</i>," he said, and he looked the
+question. "Shall I bring her in here?"</p>
+
+<p>Sitgreaves answered it immediately, "<i>Je viens</i>."
+And then to me, "Wait," as he vanished through
+the doorway.... I walked to the window, drew
+aside the red curtains, and looked out into the
+fountain-splashed court below....</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>"What is the difference?"</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose it is that you prefer the new Moore
+to the old Moore, the author of the later and better
+written books to the author of the earlier ones.
+'Evelyn Innes' was many times rewritten.
+Moore has said that he could never get it to suit
+him, but he has also said, recently, that he would
+never rewrite another book (a resolution he has
+not kept). 'Memoirs of My Dead Life' and
+'Hail and Farewell' do not need rewriting.
+They are written to stand. 'The Brook Kerith,'
+perhaps, you will find equally to your taste. It
+will be the newest Moore...."</p>
+
+<p>"You have explained to me," said Sitgreaves,
+"the difference: it is one of development. Now
+that I think of it I don't believe that Anatole
+France could write 'The Brook Kerith.'... It
+would be too symbolical, too cynical, in his hands.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span>
+Moore will perhaps make it more human, by knowing
+the characters. I wonder," he continued musingly,
+as we left the room, and descended the
+stairs, "if he told you whether that hair on
+Paul's chest was red or black...."</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>February 1, 1915.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3>The Authoritative Work on<br />
+American Music</h3>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="The_Authoritative_Work" id="The_Authoritative_Work"></a>The Authoritative Work<br />
+on American Music</h2>
+
+
+<p>H. L. Mencken pointed out to me recently,
+in his most earnest and persuasive
+manner, that it was my duty to
+write a book about the American composers, exposing
+their futile pretensions and describing their
+flaccid <i>opera</i>, stave by stave. It was in vain that
+I urged that this would be but a sleeveless errand,
+arguing that I could not fight men of straw, that
+these our composers had no real standing in the
+concert halls, and that pushing them over would be
+an easy exercise for a child of ten. On the contrary,
+he retorted, they belonged to the academies;
+certain people believed that they were important;
+it was necessary to dislodge this belief.
+I suggested, with a not too heavily assumed humility,
+that I had already done something of the
+sort in an essay entitled "The Great American
+Composer." "A good beginning," asserted Col.
+Mencken, "but not long enough. I won't be satisfied
+with anything less than a book." "But if I
+wrote a book about Professors Parker, Chadwick,
+Hadley, and the others I could find nothing different
+to say about them; they are all alike. Neither<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span>
+their lives nor their music offer opportunities for
+variations." "An excellent idea!" cried Major
+Mencken, enthusiastically, "Write one chapter
+and then repeat it verbatim throughout the book,
+changing only the name of the principal character.
+Then clap on a preface, explaining your reason
+for this procedure." My last protest was the
+feeblest of all: "I can't spend a year or a
+month or a week poring over the scores of these
+fellows; I can't go to concerts to hear their music.
+I might as well go to work in a coal mine." "I'll
+do it for you!" triumphantly checkmated General
+Mencken. "I'll read the scores and you shall
+write the book!" And so he left me, as on a
+similar occasion the fiend, having exhibited his
+prospectus, vanished from the eyes of our Lord.
+And I returned to my home sorely troubled, finding
+that the words of the man were running about in
+my head like so many little Japanese waltzing
+mice.</p>
+
+<p>And, after much cogitation, I went to such and
+such a book case and took down a certain volume
+written by Louis Charles Elson (a very large red
+tome) and another by Rupert Hughes, to see if
+their words of praise for our weak musical brothers
+would stir me to action. I found that they did
+not. My heart action remained normal; no film<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span>
+covered my eyes; foam did not issue from my
+mouth. Indeed I read, quite calmly, in Mr.
+Hughes's "American Composers" that A. J.
+Goodrich is "recognized among scholars abroad as
+one of the leading spirits of our time"; that
+"(Henry Holden) Huss has ransacked the piano
+and pillaged almost every imaginable fabric of
+high colour.... The result is gorgeous and purple";
+that "The thing we are all waiting for is
+that American grand opera, <i>The Woman of
+Marblehead</i> (by Louis Adolphe Coerne). It is
+predicted that it will not receive the marble
+heart"; that "I know of no modern composer who
+has come nearer to relighting the fires that burn
+in the old gavottes and fugues and preludes (than
+Arthur Foote). His two gavottes are to me away
+the best since Bach"; that "the song (<i>Israfel</i> by
+Edgar Stillman-Kelley) is in my fervent belief, a
+masterwork of absolute genius, one of the very
+greatest lyrics in the world's music"; and in "The
+History of American Music" by Louis C. Elson
+that "Music has made even more rapid strides
+than literature among us," and that "he (George
+W. Chadwick) has reconciled the symmetrical
+(sonata) form with modern passion." But it
+was in the fourth volume of "The Art of Music,"
+published by the National Society of Music, that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span>
+I found the supreme examples of this kind of
+writing. The volume was edited by Arthur Farwell
+and W. Dermot Darby. Therein I read with
+a sort of awed astonishment that one of the songs
+of Frederick Ayres "reveals a poignancy of imagination
+and a perception and apprehension of
+beauty seldom attained by any composer." I
+learned that T. Carl Whitmer has a "spiritual
+kinship" with Arthur Shepherd, Hans Pfitzner,
+and Vincent d'Indy. His music is "psychologically
+subtle and spiritually rarefied: in colour
+it corresponds to the violet end of the spectrum."
+I turned the pages until I came to the name of
+Miss Gena Branscombe: "Inexhaustible buoyancy,
+a superlative emotional wealth, and wholly
+singular gift of musical intuition are the qualities
+which have shaped the composer's musical personality
+(without much effort of the imagination we
+might say that they are the qualities that shaped
+Beethoven's musical personality).... Her impatient
+melodies leap and dash with youthful life,
+while her accompaniments abound in harmonic
+hairbreadth escapes." Before he became acquainted
+with the later French idiom Harvey W.
+Loomis "spontaneously breathed forth the quality
+of spirit which we now recognize in a Debussy or a
+Ravel."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Curiously enough, however, these statements did
+not annoy me. I found no desire arising in me to
+deny them and doubtless, though mayhap with a
+guilty conscience, I should have ditched the undertaking,
+consigned it to that heap of undone
+duties, where already lie notes on a comparison of
+Andalusian mules with the mules of Liane de
+Pougy, a few scribbled memoranda for a treatise
+on the love habits of the mole, and a half-finished
+biography of the talented gentleman who signed
+his works, "Nick Carter," if my by this time quite
+roving eye had not alighted, entirely fortuitously,
+on one of the forgotten glories of my library, a
+slender volume entitled "Popular American Composers."</p>
+
+<p>I recalled how I had bought this book. Happening
+into a modest second-hand bookshop on
+lower Third Avenue, maintained chiefly for the
+laudable purpose of redistributing paper novels
+of the Seaside and kindred libraries, of which, alas,
+we hear very little nowadays, I asked the proprietor
+if by chance he possessed any literature relating
+to the art of music. By way of answer, he
+retired to the very back of his little room, searched
+for a space in a litter on the floor, and then returned
+with a pile of nine volumes or so in his
+arms. The titles, such as "Great Violinists,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span>
+"Harmony in Thirteen Lessons," and "How to
+Sing," did not intrigue me, but in idly turning the
+pages of this "Popular American Composers" I
+came across a half-tone reproduction of a photograph
+of Paul Dresser, the only less celebrated
+brother of Theodore Dreiser, with a short biography
+of the composer of <i>On the Banks of the
+Wabash</i>. As Sir George Grove in his excellent
+dictionary neglected to mention this portentous
+name in American Art and Letters (although he
+devoted sixty-seven pages, printed in double columns,
+to Mendelssohn) I saw the advantage of adding
+the little book to my collection. The bookseller,
+when questioned, offered to relinquish the
+volume for a total of fifteen cents, and I carried
+it away with me. Once I had become more thoroughly
+acquainted with its pages I realized that I
+would willingly have paid fifteen dollars for it.</p>
+
+<p>This book, indeed, cannot fail to delight General
+Mencken. There is no reference in its pages
+to Edgar Stillman-Kelley, Miss Gena Branscombe,
+Louis Adolphe Coerne, Henry Holden
+Huss, T. Carl Whitmer, Arthur Farwell, Arthur
+Foote, or A. J. Goodrich. In fact, if we overlook
+brief notices of John Philip Sousa, Harry
+von Tilzer, Paul Dresser, Charles K. Harris, and
+Hattie Starr (whom you will immediately recall as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span>
+the composer of <i>Little Alabama Coon</i>), the author,
+Frank L. Boyden, has not hesitated to go to the
+roots of his subject, pushing aside the college professors
+and their dictums, and has turned his attention
+to figures in the art life of America, from
+whom, Mencken himself, I feel sure, would not take
+a single paragraph of praise, so richly is it deserved.
+I am unfamiliar with the causes contributing
+to this book's comparative obscurity;
+perhaps, indeed, they are similar to those responsible
+for the early failure of "Sister Carrie."
+May not we even suspect that the odium cast by
+the Doubledays on the author of that romance
+might have been actively transferred in some
+degree to a work which contained a biographical
+notice and a picture of his brother? At any rate,
+"Popular American Composers," published in
+1902, fell into undeserved oblivion and so I make
+no apology for inviting my readers to peruse its
+pages with me.</p>
+
+<p>Opening the book, then, at random, I discover on
+page 96 a biography of Lottie A. Kellow (her
+photograph graces the reverse of this page). In
+a few well-chosen words (almost indeed in "gipsy
+phrases") Mr. Boyden gives us the salient details
+of her career. Mrs. Kellow is a resident of
+Cresco, Iowa, a church singer of note, and the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span>
+possessor of a contralto voice of great volume.
+As a composer she has to her credit "marches,
+cakewalks, schottisches, and other styles of instrumental
+music." We are given a picture of Mrs.
+Kellow at work: "Mrs. Kellow's best efforts are
+made in the evening, and in darkness, save the
+light of the moonbeams on the keys of her piano."
+We are also told that "she is happy in her inspirations
+and a sincere lover of music. All of
+her compositions show a decided talent and possess
+musical elements which are only to be found in
+the works of an artist. Mrs. Kellow's musical
+friends are confident of her success as a composer
+and predict for her a brilliant future."</p>
+
+<p>Let us turn to the somewhat more extensive
+biography of W. T. Mullin on Page 4 (his photograph
+faces this page). Almost in the first
+line the author rewards our attention: "To him
+may be applied the simplest and grandest eulogy
+Shakespeare ever pronounced: 'He was a man.'"
+We are also informed that he was born of a cultured
+family, that his inherited nobility of character
+has been carefully fostered by a thorough
+education, and told that one finds in him the unusual
+combination of genius wedded to sound common
+sense and practical business capacity. His
+family moved to Colorado, Texas, while he was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span>
+still a lad and here his musical talent began to
+display itself. "The inventive faculties of the
+small boy, and the innate harmony of the musician,
+combined to improvise a crude instrument
+which emitted the notes of the scale. Successful
+at drawing forth a concord of sweet sounds,
+he continued to experiment upon everything
+which would emit musical vibrations. (Even
+the pigs, I take it, did not escape.) He
+consequently discovered the laws of vibrating
+chords before he had mastered the intricacies of
+the multiplication table. Yet strange as it may
+seem, his musical education was neglected. A four
+months' course in piano instruction was interrupted
+and then resumed for two months more.
+Upon this meagre foundation rested his subsequent
+phenomenal progress." I pause to point
+out to the astonished and breathless reader that
+even Mozart and Schubert, infant prodigies that
+they were, received more training than this.</p>
+
+<p>I continue to quote: "At the age of thirteen
+he joined The Colorado (Texas) Cornet Band as
+a charter member. The youngest member of the
+band, he soon outstripped his comrades by virtue
+of his superior natural ability. His position was
+that of second tenor. Wearying of the monotony
+of playing, he determined to venture on solo work.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span>
+The boy felt the impetus of restless power and
+the following incident illustrates his remarkable
+originality. Taking the piano score of a favourite
+melody he transposed it within the compass of
+the second tenor. This feat evoked admiring applause
+because of his extreme youth and untrained
+abilities. The band-master remarked that elderly
+and experienced heads could hardly have accomplished
+this.</p>
+
+<p>"From boyhood to manhood he has remained
+with the Colorado (Texas) band as one of its most
+efficient members, composing in his leisure moments,
+marches, ragtimes, waltzes, song and dance schottisches,
+etc. Of his many meritorious compositions
+only one has so far been given to the public:&mdash;<i>The
+West Texas Fair March</i>, composed for
+and dedicated to the management of the West
+Texas Fair and Round-up. This institution holds
+its annual meetings at Abilene, Texas. There the
+march was played for the first time at their October,
+1899, meet with great success, and again
+at their September, 1900, meet by the Stockman
+band of Colorado, Texas, which has furnished
+music for the West Texas Fair during their 1899
+and 1900 meetings. Mr. Mullin's position in the
+Stockman band is that of euphonium soloist. He
+is a proficient performer upon all band instruments<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span>
+from cornet to tuba, including slide trombone,
+his favourites being the baritone and the
+trombone.</p>
+
+<p>"He plays many stringed instruments, as well
+as the piano and organ. He is the proud possessor
+of a genuine Stradivarius violin&mdash;a family
+heirloom&mdash;which he naturally prizes beyond the
+intrinsic value. The feat of playing on several
+instruments at once presents no difficulty to him.</p>
+
+<p>"This briefly sketches Mr. Mullin's life, character
+and ability as a musician. His accompanying
+photograph reveals his superb physique. Personally
+he possesses charming, agreeable manners
+and Chesterfieldan courteousness, which vastly
+contributes to his popularity. Sincere devotion
+to his art has been rewarded by that elevating
+nobility of soul, which alone can penetrate the blue
+expanse of space and revel in the music of the
+spheres."</p>
+
+<p>What more is there to say? I can only assure
+the reader that Mullin stands unique among all
+musicians, creative and interpretative, in being
+able to play the organ, many stringed instruments,
+and all the instruments in a brass band (several of
+them simultaneously; it would be interesting to
+know which and how) after studying the piano for
+six months. I sincerely hope that the mistake he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span>
+made in withholding all his compositions, save one,
+from the public, has been rectified.</p>
+
+<p>Helen Kelsey Fox, like so many of our talented
+men and women, has a European strain in her
+blood. She is a lineal descendant on her mother's
+side of a French nobleman and a German princess.
+Nevertheless she continues to reside in Vermilion,
+Ohio. She is of a "decided poetic nature and
+lives in an atmosphere of her own. She dwells in
+a world of thought peopled by the creations of an
+active and lyric mentality." She is so imbued
+with the poetic spark that, as she expresses it, she
+"speaks in rhyme half the time."</p>
+
+<p>John Z. Macdonald, strictly speaking, is not
+an American composer. He was born in Scotland
+and came to America in 1881 at the age of 21, but
+as he is one of the very few composers since Nero
+to enter public political life he well deserves a place
+in this collection. In 1890 he was elected city
+clerk of Brazil, Indiana, a position which he held
+for seven years. In 1898 he was elected treasurer
+of Clay County, Indiana. This county is democratic
+"by between five and six hundred" but Mr.
+Macdonald was elected on the republican ticket
+by a majority of 133. He was the only republican
+elected. Among the best known of Mr. Macdonald's
+compositions is his famous "expansion"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span>
+song, in which he predicted the fate of Aguinaldo.
+He has autograph letters, praising this song, from
+the late President McKinley, Col. Roosevelt, General
+Harrison, Admiral Schley, John Philip Sousa
+and other "eminent gentlemen."</p>
+
+<p>Edward Dyer, born in Washington, was the son
+of a marble cutter who "helped to erect the
+U. S. Treasury, Patent Office, and Capitol....
+In the majority of his compositions there is a
+tinge of sadness which appeals to his auditors....
+Mr. Dyer never descends to coarseness or
+vulgarity in his productions; he writes pure, clean
+words, something that can be sung in the home,
+school and on the stage to refined respectable people."</p>
+
+<p>We learn much of the study years of Mrs. Lucy
+L. Taggart: "From earliest childhood she received
+valuable musical instruction from her
+father (Mr. Longsdon) who, coming from England
+in 1835, purchased the first piano that came to
+Chicago, an elegant hand-carved instrument that
+is still treasured in the old home." Later "she
+studied under Prof. C. E. Brown, of Owego, N. Y.,
+Prof. Heimburger, of San Francisco and Herr
+Chas. Goffrie. Mrs. Taggart was also for five
+years a pupil of Senor Arevalo, the famous guitar
+soloist of Los Angeles.... Mrs. Taggart has in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span>
+preparation (1902) <i>Methought He Touched the
+Strings</i>, an idyl for piano in memory of the late
+Senor M. S. Arevalo."</p>
+
+<p>David Weidley, born in Philadelphia, is the composer
+of the following songs, <i>Old Spooney Spooppalay</i>,
+<i>Jennie Ree</i>, <i>Autumn Leaves</i>, <i>Hannah Glue</i>,
+and <i>Uncle Reuben and Aunt Lucinda</i>. "He has
+done much to create and elevate a taste for music
+in the community where he resides and where he is
+known as 'Dave.' Even the little children call
+him 'Dave' as freely and innocently as those who
+have known him for years, and there can be no
+greater compliment for any man than that he is
+known and loved by the children. Mr. Weidley is
+by profession a sheet metal worker. He is a P. G.
+of the I. O. O. F., and a P. C. in the Knights of
+Pythias. He is not identified with any church, but
+loves and serves his fellow-men."</p>
+
+<p>In the biography of Delmer G. Palmer we are
+assured that "Versatility is a trait with which
+musical composers are not excessively burdened.
+There are few performers who can include <i>The
+Moonlight Sonata</i> and Schubert's <i>Serenade</i> with
+selections from <i>The Merry-go-round</i>, and do justice
+to the expression of each, much less would
+such adaptability be looked for among composers.
+As most rules have exceptions, in this there is one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span>
+who stands in a class occupied by no one else, Mr.
+Delmer G. Palmer, the 'Green Mountain Composer,'
+who at present resides in Kansas City.</p>
+
+<p>"As recently as 1899 Mr. Palmer wrote a song
+in the popular 'ragtime,' <i>My Sweetheart is a Midnight
+Coon</i> and almost in the same breath also
+wrote the heavy sacred solo, <i>Christ in Gethsemane</i>.
+The first is of the usual light order characteristic
+of this class of music. The latter is as far removed
+to the contrary as is comedy from tragedy.
+The 'coon' song entered the bubbling effervescing
+cauldron of what is termed 'ragtime' music
+among the multitudinous others, and soon was seen
+peeping through at the surface among the lightest
+and most catchy.... The sacred solo found its
+level among the heavier in its class, and if the term
+may be here applied, it was also a hit."</p>
+
+<p>S. Duncan Baker, born August 25, 1855, still
+lives (1902) in the old family residence at Natchez,
+Miss. "In this house is located the den
+where he has spent many hours with his collection
+of banjos and pictures and in writing for and
+playing on the instrument which he adopted as a
+favourite during its dark days (about 1871)."
+We are told that he composed an "artistic banjo
+solo," entitled, <i>Memories of Farland</i>. "Had this
+production or its companion piece, <i>Thoughts of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span>
+the Cadenza</i>, been written by an old master for
+some other instrument and later have been adapted
+by a modern composer to the banjo, either or both
+of them would have been pronounced classic, barring
+some slight defects in form."</p>
+
+<p>I cannot stop to quote from the delightful accounts
+offered us of the lives and works of Albert
+Matson, George D. Tufts, D. O. Loy, Lavinia
+Pascoe Oblad, and forty or fifty other American
+singers, but it seems to me that I have done
+enough, Mencken, to prove to you that the great
+book on American music has been written. Without
+one single mention of the names of Horatio
+Parker, George W. Chadwick, Frederick Converse,
+or Henry Hadley, by a transference of the emphasis
+to the place where it belongs, the author
+of this undying book has answered your prayer.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>December 11, 1917.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="Old_Days" id="Old_Days"></a>Old Days and New</h3>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="Old_Days_and_New" id="Old_Days_and_New"></a>Old Days and New</h2>
+
+
+<p>Some toothless old sentimentalist or other
+periodically sets up a melancholy howl for
+"the good old days of comic opera," whatever
+or whenever they were. Perhaps none of us,
+once past forty, is guiltless in this respect. Nothing,
+not even the smell of an apple-blossom from
+the old homestead, the sight of a daguerreotype of
+a miss one kissed at the age of ten, or a taste of a
+piece of the kind of pie that "mother used to
+make" so arouses the sensibility of a man of middle
+age as the memory of some musical show which
+he saw in his budding manhood. That is why revivals
+of these venerable institutions are frequently
+projected and, some of them, very successfully
+accomplished. When a manager revives
+an old drama he must appeal to the interest of his
+audience; it may not be the identical interest which
+held the original spectators of the piece spell-bound,
+but, none the less, it must be an interest.
+When a manager revives an old musical comedy he
+appeals directly to sentiment.</p>
+
+<p>Of course, the exact date of the good old days
+is a variable quantity. I have known a vain regretter
+to turn no further back than to the nights<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span>
+of <i>The Merry Widow</i>, <i>The Waltz Dream</i>, <i>The
+Chocolate Soldier</i>, <i>The Girl in the Train</i>, and <i>The
+Dollar Princess</i>, in other words to the Viennese
+renaissance; another, in using the phrase, is subconsciously
+conjuring up pictures of <i>La Belle
+H&eacute;l&egrave;ne</i>, <i>Orph&eacute;e aux Enfers</i>, or <i>La Fille de Madame
+Angot</i>, good fodder for memory to feed on here;
+a third will instinctively revert to the Johann
+Strauss operetta period, the era of <i>The Queen's
+Lace Handkerchief</i> and <i>Die Fledermaus</i>; a fourth
+cries, "Give us Gilbert and Sullivan!" A fifth,
+when his ideas are chased to their lair, will rhapsodize
+endlessly over the charms of the London
+Gaiety when <i>The Geisha</i>, <i>The Country Girl</i>, and
+<i>The Circus Girl</i> were in favour; a sixth, it seems,
+finds his pleasure in Americana, <i>Robin Hood</i>,
+<i>Wang</i>, <i>The Babes in Toyland</i>, and <i>El Capitan</i>;
+a seventh becomes maudlin to the most
+utter degree when you mention <i>Les Cloches de
+Corneville</i>, or <i>La Mascotte</i>, products of a decadent
+stage in the history of French op&eacute;ra-bouffe. Not
+long ago I heard a man speak of the cadet operas
+in Boston (did a man named Barnet write them?)
+as the last of the great musical pieces; and every
+one of you who reads this essay will have a
+brother, or a son, or a friend who went to see
+<i>Sybil</i> forty-three times and <i>The Girl from Utah</i><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span>
+seventy-six. Twenty years from now, as he sits
+before the open fire, the mere mention of <i>They
+Wouldn't Believe Me</i> will cause the tears to course
+down his cheeks as he pats the pate of his infant
+son or daughter and weepingly describes the never-to-be-forgotten
+fascination of Julia Sanderson, the
+(in the then days) unattainable agility of Donald
+Brian.</p>
+
+<p>In no other form of theatrical entertainment is
+the appeal to softness so direct. The man who
+attends a performance of a musical farce goes in a
+good mood, usually with a couple of friends, or
+possibly with <i>the</i> girl. If he has dined well and
+his digestion is in working order and he is young
+enough, the spell of the lights and the music is
+irresistible to his receptive and impressionable
+nature. There are those young men, of course,
+who are constant attendants because of the altogether
+too wonderful hair of the third girl from
+the right in the front row. Others succumb to the
+dental perfection of the prima donna or to the
+shapely legs of the soubrette. All of us, I am
+almost proud to admit, at some time or other, are
+subject to the contagion. I well remember the
+year in which I considered myself as a possible
+suitor for the hand of Della Fox. Photographs
+and posters of this deity adorned my walls. I was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span>
+an assiduous collector of newspaper clippings referring
+to her profoundly interesting activities, although
+my sophistication had not reached the
+stage where I might appeal to Romeike for assistance.
+The mere mention of Miss Fox's name
+was sufficient cause to make me blush profusely.
+Eventually my father was forced to take steps in
+the matter when I began, in a valiant effort to
+summon up the spirit of the lady's presence, to disturb
+the early morning air with vocal assaults on
+<i>She Was a Daisy</i>, which, you will surely remember,
+was the musical gem of <i>The Little Trooper</i>.
+Here are the words of the refrain:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"She was a daisy, daisy, daisy!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Driving me crazy, crazy, crazy!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Helen of Troy and Venus were to her cross-eyed crones!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">She was dimpled and rosy, rosy, rosy!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Sweet as a posy, posy, posy!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">How I doted upon her, my Ann Jane Jones!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>You will admit, I think, at first glance, the
+superior literary quality of these lines; you will
+perceive at once to what immeasurably higher class
+of art they belong than the lyrics that librettists
+forge for us today.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Wall Street broker, poet, green grocer, soldier,
+banker, lawyer, whatever you are, confess the facts
+to yourself: you were once as I. You have suffered
+the same feelings that I suffered. Perhaps
+with you it was not Della Fox.... Who then?
+Did saucy Marie Jansen awaken your admiration?
+Was pert Lulu Glaser the object of your secret
+but persistent attention? How many times did
+you go to see Marie Tempest in <i>The Fencing Master</i>,
+or Alice Nielsen in <i>The Serenade</i>? Was Virginia
+Earle in <i>The Circus Girl</i> the idol of your
+youth or was it Mabel Barrison in <i>The Babes in
+Toyland</i>? Theresa Vaughn in <i>1492</i>, May Yohe in
+<i>The Lady Slavey</i>, Hilda Hollins in <i>The Magic
+Kiss</i>, or Nancy McIntosh in <i>His Excellency</i>?
+Madge Lessing in <i>Jack and the Beanstalk</i>, Edna
+May in <i>The Belle of New York</i>, Phyllis Rankin in
+<i>The Rounders</i>, or Gertrude Quinlan in <i>King Dodo</i>?</p>
+
+<p>What do you whistle in your bathtub when you
+are in a reminiscent mood? Is it <i>The Typical
+Tune of Zanzibar</i>, or <i>Baby, Baby, Dance My Darling
+Baby</i>, or <i>Starlight, Starbright</i>, or <i>Tell Me,
+Pretty Maiden</i>, or <i>A Simple Little String</i>, or
+<i>J'aime les Militaires</i> (if you whistle this, ten to
+one your next door neighbour thinks you have been
+to an orchestra concert and heard Beethoven's
+<i>Seventh Symphony</i>), or <i>Sister Mary Jane's Top<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span>
+Note</i>, or <i>A Wandering Minstrel I</i>, or <i>See How It
+Sparkles</i>, or the <i>Lullaby</i> from <i>Erminie</i>, which Pauline
+Hall used to sing as if she herself
+were asleep, and which Emma Abbott interpolated
+in <i>The Mikado</i>, or <i>A Pretty Girl,
+A Summer Night</i>, or the <i>Policeman's Chorus</i>
+from <i>The Pirates of Penzance</i>, or <i>The Soldiers in
+the Park</i>, or <i>My Angeline</i>, or the <i>Letter Song</i> from
+<i>The Chocolate Soldier</i>, or <i>I'm Little Buttercup</i>,
+or the <i>Gobble Song</i> from <i>The Mascot</i>, or the <i>Anna
+Song</i> from <i>Nanon</i>, or the march from <i>Fatinitza</i>,
+or <i>I'm All the Way from Gay Paree</i>, or <i>Love
+Comes Like a Summer Sigh</i>, or <i>In the North Sea
+Lived a Whale</i>, or <i>Jusqu'l&agrave;</i>, or <i>The Harmless Little
+Girlie With the Downcast Eyes</i>, or <i>They All
+Follow Me</i>, or <i>The Amorous Goldfish</i>, or <i>Don't Be
+Cross</i>, or <i>Slumber On, My Little Gypsy Sweetheart</i>,
+or <i>Good-bye Flo</i>, or <i>La L&eacute;gende de la M&egrave;re
+Angot</i>, or <i>My Alamo Love</i>?</p>
+
+<p>There is a very subtle and fragrant charm about
+these old recollections which the sight or sound of a
+score, a view of an old photograph of Lillian Russell
+or Judic, or a dip in the <i>Th&eacute;&acirc;tre Complet</i> of
+Meilhac and Hal&eacute;vy will reawaken. But it is
+only at a revival of one of our old favourites that
+we can really bathe in sentimentality, drink in
+draughts of joy from the past, allow memory full<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span>
+away. You whose hair is turning white will be in
+Row A, Seat No. 1 for the first performance of a
+revival of <i>Robin Hood</i>. You will not hear Edwin
+Hoff in his original r&ocirc;le; Jessie Bartlett Davis is
+dead and, alas, Henry Clay Barnabee is no longer
+on the boards, but the newcomers, possibly, are respectable
+substitutes and the airs and lines remain.
+You can walk about in the lobby and say proudly
+that you attended the <i>first</i> performance of the
+opera ever so long ago when operettas had tune
+and reason. "Yes sir, there were plots in those
+days, and composers, and the singers could <i>act</i>.
+Times have certainly changed, sir. Come to the
+corner and have a Manhattan.... There were
+no cocktails in those days.... There is no singer
+like Mrs. Davis today!"</p>
+
+<p>Well the poor souls who cannot feel tenderly
+about a past they have not yet experienced have
+their recompenses. For one thing I am certain
+that the revivals of the Gilbert and Sullivan
+operettas to which De Wolf Hopper devoted his
+best talents were better, in many respects, than
+the original London productions; just as I am
+equally certain that the representations of <i>Aida</i>
+at the Metropolitan Opera House are way ahead
+of the original performance of that work given
+at Cairo before the Khedive of Egypt.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Then there is the musical revue, a form which
+we have borrowed from the French, but which
+we have vastly improved upon and into which
+we have poured some of our most national feeling
+and expression. The interpretation of these
+frivolities is a new art. Gaby Deslys may be
+only half a loaf compared to Marie Jansen, but
+I am sure that Elsie Janis is more than three-quarters.
+Frank Tinney and Al Jolson can, in
+their humble way, efface memories of Digby Bell
+and Dan Daly. Adele Rowland and Marie
+Dressler have their points (and curves). Irving
+Berlin, Louis A. Hirsch, and Jerome Kern are
+not to be sniffed at. Neither is P. G. Wodehouse.
+Harry B. Smith we have always with us: he is
+the Sarah Bernhardt of librettists.</p>
+
+<p>Joseph Urban has wrought a revolution in
+stage settings for this form of entertainment.
+Louis Sherwin has offered us convincing evidence
+to support his theory that the new staging in
+America is coming to us by way of the revue and
+not through the serious drama. Melville Ellis,
+Lady Duff-Gordon, and Paul Poiret have done
+their bit for the dresses. In fact, my dear young
+man&mdash;who are reading this article&mdash;you will
+feel just as tenderly in twenty years about the
+<i>Follies of 1917</i> as your father does now about<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span>
+<i>Wang</i>. Only, and this is a very big ONLY, the
+<i>Follies of 1917</i>, depending as it does entirely on
+topical subjects and dimpled knees, cannot be
+revived. Fervid and enlivening as its immediate
+impression may be it cannot be lasting. You
+can never recapture the thrills of this summer by
+sitting in Row A, Seat No. 1 at any 1937 <i>reprise</i>.
+There can never be anything of the sort. The
+revue, like the firefly, is for a night only. We
+take it in with the daily papers ... and the next
+season, already old-fashioned, it goes forth to
+show Grinnell and Davenport how Mlle. Manhattan
+deported herself the year before.</p>
+
+<p>So if the youth of these days chooses to be sentimental
+in the years to come over the good old
+days of Urban scenery and Olive Thomas, the Balloon
+Girls of the Midnight Frolic and the chorus of
+the Winter Garden, he will be obliged to give way
+to the mood at home in front of the fire, see the pictures
+in the smoke, and hear the tunes in the dropping
+of the coals. Which is perhaps as it should
+be. For in 1937 the youth of that epoch can sit
+in Row A, Seat No. 1 himself and not be ousted
+from his place by a sentimental gentleman of middle
+age who longs to hear <i>Poor Butterfly</i> again.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>April 25, 1917.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="Playwrights" id="Playwrights"></a>Two Young American Playwrights</h3>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><i>"Gautier had a theory to the effect that to be a
+member of the Academy was simply and solely a
+matter of predestination. 'There is no need to do
+anything,' he would say, 'and so far as the writing of
+books is concerned that is entirely useless. A man is
+born an Academician as he is born a bishop or a
+cook. He can abuse the Academy in a dozen pamphlets
+if it amuses him, and be elected all the same;
+but if he is not predestined, three hundred volumes
+and ten masterpieces, recognized as such by the genuflections
+of an adoring universe, will not aid him to
+open its doors.' Evidently Balzac was not predestined
+but then neither was Moli&egrave;re, and there must
+have been some consolation for him in that."</i></p>
+
+<p class="author">
+Edgar Saltus.<br />
+</p>
+</div>
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="Two_Young_American_Playwrights" id="Two_Young_American_Playwrights"></a>Two Young American Playwrights</h2>
+
+
+<p>In the newspaper reports relating to the death
+of Auguste Rodin I read with some astonishment
+that if the venerable sculptor, who lacked
+three years of being eighty when he died, had lived
+two weeks longer he would have been admitted to
+the French Academy! In other words, the greatest
+stone-poet since Michael Angelo, internationally
+famous and powerful, the most striking artist
+figure, indeed, of the last half century, was to be
+permitted, in the extremity of old age, to inscribe
+his name on a scroll, which bore the signatures of
+many inoffensive nobodies. I could not have been
+more amused if the newspapers, in publishing the
+obituary notices of John Jacob Astor, had announced
+that if the millionaire had not perished
+in the sinking of the <i>Titanic</i>, his chances of being
+invited to join the Elks were good; or if "Variety"
+or some other tradespaper of the music
+halls, had proclaimed, just before Sarah Bernhardt's
+d&eacute;but at the Palace Theatre, that if her
+appearances there were successful she might expect
+an invitation to membership in the White Rats....
+These hypothetical instances would seem
+ridiculous ... but they are not. The Rodin<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span>
+case puts a by no means seldom-recurring phenomenon
+in the centre of the stage under a calcium
+light. The ironclad dreadnaughts of the academic
+world, the reactionary artists, the dry-as-dust
+lecturers are constantly ignoring the most
+vital, the most real, the most important artists
+while they sing polyphonic, antiphonal, Palestrinian
+motets in praise of men who have learned to
+imitate comfortably and efficiently the work of
+their predecessors.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>If there are other contemporary French sculptors
+than Rodin their names elude me at the
+moment; yet I have no doubt that some ten or
+fifteen of these hackmen have their names emblazoned
+in the books of all the so-called "honour"
+societies in Paris. It is a comfort, on the whole,
+to realize that America is not the only country
+in which such things happen. As a matter of fact,
+they happen nowhere more often than in France.</p>
+
+<p>If some one should ask you suddenly for a list
+of the important playwrights of France today,
+what names would you let roll off your tongue,
+primed by the best punditic and docile French
+critics? Henry Bataille, Paul Hervieu, and
+Henry Bernstein. Possibly Rostand. Don't<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span>
+deny this; you know it is true, unless it happens
+you have been doing some thinking for yourself.
+For even in the works of Remy de Gourmont (to
+be sure this very clairvoyant mind did not often
+occupy itself with dramatic literature) you will
+find little or nothing relating to Octave Mirbeau
+and Georges Feydeau. True, Mirbeau did not do
+his best work in the theatre. That stinging, cynical
+attack on the courts of Justice (?) of France
+(nay, the world!), "Le Jardin de Supplice" is
+not a play and it is probably Mirbeau's masterpiece
+and the best piece of critical fiction written in
+France (or anywhere else) in the last fifty years.
+However Mirbeau shook the pillars of society even
+in the playhouse. <i>Le Foyer</i> was hissed repeatedly
+at the Th&eacute;&acirc;tre Fran&ccedil;ais. Night after night the
+proceedings ended in the ejection and arrest of
+forty or fifty spectators. Even to a mere outsider,
+an idle bystander of the boulevards, this
+complete exposure of the social, moral, and political
+hypocricies of a nation seemed exceptionally
+brutal. <i>Le Foyer</i> and "Le Jardin" could only
+have been written by a man passionately devoted
+to the human ideal ("each as she may," as Gertrude
+Stein so beautifully puts it). <i>Les Affaires
+sont les Affaires</i> is pure theatre, perhaps, but it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span>
+might be considered the best play produced in
+France between Becque's <i>La Parisienne</i> and
+Brieux's <i>Les Hannetons</i>.</p>
+
+<p>It is not surprising, on the whole, to find the
+critical tribe turning for relief from this somewhat
+unpleasant display of Gallic closet skeletons
+to the discreet exhibition of a few carefully chosen
+bones in the plays of Bernstein and Bataille, direct
+descendants of Scribe, Sardou, <i>et Cie</i>, but I may
+be permitted to indulge in a slight snicker of polite
+amazement when I discover these gentlemen applying
+their fingers to their noses in no very pretty-meaning
+gesture, directed at a grandson of
+Moli&egrave;re. For such is Georges Feydeau. His
+method is not that of the Seventeenth Century master,
+nor yet that of Mirbeau; nevertheless, aside
+from these two figures, Beaumarchais, Marivaux,
+Becque, Brieux at his best, and Maurice Donnay
+occasionally, there has not been a single writer in
+the history of the French theatre so inevitably <i>au
+courant</i> with human nature. His form is frankly
+farcical and his plays are so funny, so enjoyable
+merely as <i>good shows</i> that it seems a pity to raise
+an obelisk in the playwright's honour, and yet the
+fact remains that he understands the political,
+social, domestic, amorous, even cloacal conditions
+of the French better than any of his contemporaries,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span>
+always excepting the aforementioned
+Mirbeau. In <i>On Purge B&eacute;b&eacute;</i> he has written
+saucy variations on a theme which Rabelais, Boccaccio,
+George Moore, and Moli&egrave;re in collaboration
+would have found difficult to handle. It is
+as successful an experiment in bravado and bravura
+as Mr. Henry James's "The Turn of the
+Screw." And he has accomplished this feat with
+nimbleness, variety, authority, even (granting the
+subject) delicacy. Seeing it for the first time you
+will be so submerged in gales of uncontrollable
+laughter that you will perhaps not recognize at
+once how every line reveals character, how every
+situation springs from the foibles of human nature.
+Indeed in this one-act farce Feydeau, with
+about as much trouble as Zeus took in transforming
+his godship into the semblance of a swan, has
+given you a well-rounded picture of middle-class
+life in France with its external and internal implications....
+And how he understands the
+buoyant French <i>grue</i>, unselfconscious and undismayed
+in any situation. I sometimes think that
+<i>Occupe-toi d'Am&eacute;lie</i> is the most satisfactory play
+I have ever seen; it is certainly the most delightful.
+I do not think you can see it in Paris again.
+The Nouveaut&eacute;s, where it was presented for over
+a year, has been torn down; an English translation<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span>
+would be an insult to Feydeau; nor will you
+find essays about it in the yellow volumes in which
+the French critics tenderly embalm their <i>feuilletons</i>;
+nor do I think Arthur Symons or George
+Moore, those indefatigable diggers in Parisian
+graveyards, have discovered it for their English
+readers. Reading the play is to miss half its
+pleasure; so you must take my word in the matter
+unless you have been lucky enough to see it yourself,
+in which case ten to one you will agree with
+me that one such play is worth a kettleful of
+boiled-over drama like <i>Le Voleur</i>, <i>Le Secret</i>, <i>Samson</i>,
+<i>La Vierge Folle</i>, <i>et cetera</i>, <i>et cetera</i>. In the
+pieces I have mentioned Feydeau, in representation,
+had the priceless assistance of a great comic
+artist, Armande Cassive. If we are to take Mr.
+Symons's assurance in regard to de Pachmann
+that he is the world's greatest pianist because he
+does one thing more perfectly than any one else,
+by a train of similar reasoning we might confidently
+assert that Mlle. Cassive is the world's
+greatest actress.</p>
+
+<p>When you ask a Frenchman to explain why he
+does not like Mirbeau (and you will find that
+Frenchmen invariably do not like him) he will
+shrug his shoulders and begin to tell you that Mirbeau
+was not good to his mother, or that he drank<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span>
+to excess, or that he did not wear a red, white, and
+blue coat on the Fourteenth of July, or that he
+did not stand for the French spirit as exemplified
+in the eating of snails on Christmas. In other
+words, he will immediately place himself in a position
+in which you may be excused for regarding
+him as a person whose opinion is worth nothing,
+whereas his ratiocinatory powers on subjects with
+which he is more in sympathy may be excellent. I
+know why he does not like Mirbeau. Mirbeau is
+the reason. In his life he was not accustomed to
+making compromises nor was he accustomed to
+making friends (which comes after all to the same
+thing). He did what he pleased, said what he
+pleased, wrote what he pleased. His armorial
+bearings might have been a cat upsetting a cream
+jug with the motto, "<i>Je m'en fous</i>." The author
+of "Le Jardin de Supplice" would not be in high
+favour anywhere; nevertheless I would willingly
+relinquish any claims I might have to future popularity
+for the privilege of having been permitted
+to sign this book.</p>
+
+<p>Feydeau is distinctly another story; his plays
+are more successful than any others given in Paris.
+They are so amusing that even while he is pointing
+the finger at your own particular method of living
+you are laughing so hard that you haven't time<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span>
+to see the application.... So the French critics
+have set him down as another popular figure, only
+a nobody born to entertain the boulevards, just
+as the American critics regard the performances
+of Irving Berlin with a steely supercilious impervious
+eye. The Viennese scorned Mozart because
+he entertained them. "A gay population," wrote
+the late John F. Runciman, "always a heartless
+master, holds none in such contempt as the servants
+who provide it with amusement."</p>
+
+<p>The same condition has prevailed in England
+until recently. A few seasons ago you might have
+found the critics pouring out their glad songs
+about Arthur Wing Pinero and Henry Arthur
+Jones. Bernard Shaw has, in a measure, restored
+the balance to the British theatre. He is not only
+a brilliant playwright; he is a brilliant critic as
+well. Foreseeing the fate of the under man in
+such a struggle he became his own literary huckster
+and by outcriticizing the other critics he easily
+established himself as the first English (or Irish)
+playwright. When he thus rose to the top, by
+dint of his own exertions, he had strength enough
+to carry along with him a number of other important
+authors. As a consequence we may regard
+the Pinero incident closed and in ten years
+his theatre will be considered as old-fashioned and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span>
+as inadept as that of Robertson or Bulwer-Lytton.</p>
+
+<p>Having no Shaw in America, no man who can
+write brilliant prefaces and essays about his own
+plays until the man in the street is obliged perforce
+to regard them as literature, we find ourselves
+in the condition of benighted France. Dulness
+is mistaken for literary flavour; the injection
+of a little learning, of a little poetry (so-called)
+into a theatrical hackpiece, is the signal for a good
+deal of enthusiasm on the part of the journalists
+(there are two brilliant exceptions). Which of
+our playwrights are taken seriously by the pundits?
+Augustus Thomas and Percy MacKaye:
+Thomas the dean, and MacKaye the poet laureate.
+I have no intention of wrenching the laurel
+wreathes from these august brows. Let them remain.
+Each of these gentlemen has a long and
+honourable career in the theatre behind him, from
+which he should be allowed to reap what financial
+and honourary rewards he may be able. But I
+would not add one leaf to these wreathes, nor one
+crotchet to the songs of praise which vibrate
+around them. I turn aside from their plays in
+the theatre and in the library as I turn aside from
+the fictions of Pierre de Coulevain and Arnold Bennett.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>I love to fashion wreathes of my own and if two
+young men will now step forward to the lecturer's
+bench I will take delight in crowning them with
+my own hands. Will the young man at the back
+of the hall please page Avery Hopwood and Philip
+Moeller?... No response! They seem to have
+retreated modestly into the night. Nevertheless
+they shall not escape me!</p>
+
+<p>I speak of Mr. Hopwood first because he has
+been writing for our theatre for a longer period
+than has Mr. Moeller, and because his position,
+such as it is, is assured. Like Feydeau in France
+he has a large popular following; he has probably
+made more money in a few years than Mr. Thomas
+has made during his whole lifetime and the managers
+are always after him to furnish them with
+more plays with which to fill their theatres. For
+his plays do fill the theatres. <i>Fair and Warmer</i>,
+<i>Nobody's Widow</i>, <i>Clothes</i>, and <i>Seven Days</i>, would
+be included in any list of the successful pieces produced
+in New York within the past ten years.
+Two of these pieces would be near the very top
+of such a list. An utterly absurd allotment of
+actors is sufficient to explain the failures of <i>Sadie
+Love</i> and <i>Our Little Wife</i> and it might be well if
+some one should attempt a revival of one of his
+three serious plays, <i>This Woman and This Man</i>,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span>
+in which Carlotta Nillson appeared for a brief
+space.</p>
+
+<p>This author, mainly through the beneficent
+offices of a gift of supernal charm, contrives to do
+in English very much what Feydeau does in French.
+It is his contention that you can smite the Puritans,
+even in the American theatre, squarely on
+the cheek, provided you are sagacious in your
+choice of weapon. In <i>Fair and Warmer</i> he provokes
+the most boisterous and at the same time the
+most innocent laughter with a scene which might
+have been made insupportably vulgar. A perfectly
+respectable young married woman gets very drunk
+with the equally respectable husband of one of
+her friends. The scene is the mainstay, the <i>raison
+d'&ecirc;tre</i>, of the play, and it furnishes the material
+for the better part of one act; yet young and old,
+rich and poor, philistine and superman alike, delight
+in it. To make such a situation irresistible
+and universal in its appeal is, it seems to me, undoubtedly
+the work of genius. What might, indeed
+should, have been disgusting, was not only in
+intention but in performance very funny. Let
+those who do not appreciate the virtuosity of this
+undertaking attempt to write as successful a scene
+in a similar vein. Even if they are able to do so,
+and I do not for a moment believe that there is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span>
+another dramatic author in America who can, they
+will be the first to grant the difficulty of the
+achievement. With an apparently inexhaustible
+fund of fantasy and wit Mr. Hopwood passes his
+wand over certain phases of so-called smart life,
+almost always with the happiest results. With a
+complete realization of the independence of his
+medium he often ignores the realistic conventions
+and the traditional technique of the stage, but his
+touch is so light and joyous, his wit so free from
+pose, that he rarely fails to establish his effect.
+His pen has seldom faltered. Occasionally, however,
+the heavy hand of an uncomprehending stage
+director or of an aggressive actor has played
+havoc with the delicate texture of his fabric.
+There is no need here for the use of hammer or
+trowel; if an actress must seek aid in implements,
+let her rather rely on a soft brush, a lacy handkerchief,
+or a sparkling spangled fan.</p>
+
+<p>Philip Moeller has achieved distinction in another
+field, that of elegant burlesque, of sublimated
+caricature. His stage men and women are as
+adroitly distorted (the better to expose their
+comic possibilities) as the drawings of Max Beerbohm.
+Beginning with the Bible and the Odyssey
+(<i>Helena's Husband</i> and <i>Sisters of Susannah</i> for
+the Washington Square Players) he has at length,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span>
+by way of Shakespeare and Bacon (<i>The Roadhouse
+in Arden</i>) arrived at the Romantic Period
+in French literature and in <i>Madame Sand</i>, his first
+three-act play, he has established himself at once
+as a dangerous rival of the authors of <i>C&aelig;sar and
+Cleopatra</i> and <i>The Importance of Being Earnest</i>,
+both plays in the same <i>genre</i> as Mr. Moeller's
+latest contribution to the stage. The author has
+thrown a very high light on the sentimental adventures
+of the writing lady of the early Nineteenth
+Century, has indeed advised us and convinced us
+that they were somewhat ridiculous. So they must
+have appeared even to her contemporaries, however
+seriously George took herself, her romances,
+her passions, her petty tragedies. A less adult, a
+less seriously trained mind might have fallen into
+the error of making a sentimental play out of
+George's affairs with Alfred de Musset, Dr. Pagello,
+and Chopin (Mr. Moeller contents himself
+with these three passions, selected from the somewhat
+more extensive list offered to us by history).
+Such an author would doubtless have written
+<i>Great Catherine</i> in the style of <i>Disraeli</i> and <i>Androcles
+and the Lion</i> after the manner of <i>Ben Hur</i>!
+Whether love itself is always a comic subject, as
+Bernard Shaw would have us believe, is a matter
+for dispute, but there can be no alternative opinion<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span>
+about the loves of George Sand. A rehearsal of
+them offers only laughter to any one but a sentimental
+school girl.</p>
+
+<p>The piece is conceived on a true literary level;
+it abounds in wit, in fantasy, in delightful situations,
+but there is nothing precious about its
+progress. Mr. Moeller has carefully avoided the
+traps expressly laid for writers of such plays.
+For example, the enjoyment of <i>Madame Sand</i> is in
+no way dependent upon a knowledge of the books
+of that authoress, De Musset, and Heine, nor yet
+upon an acquaintance with the music of Liszt and
+Chopin. Such matters are pleasantly and lightly
+referred to when they seem pertinent, but no insistence
+is laid upon them. Occasionally our author
+has appropriated some phrase originally
+spoken or written by one of the real characters,
+but for that he can scarcely be blamed. Indeed,
+when one takes into consideration the wealth of
+such material which lay in books waiting for him,
+it is surprising that he did not take more advantage
+of it. In the main he has relied on his
+own cleverness to delight our ears for two hours
+with brilliant conversation.</p>
+
+<p>There is, it should be noted, in conclusion, nothing
+essentially American about either of these
+young authors. Both Mr. Hopwood and Mr.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span>
+Moeller might have written for the foreign stage.
+Several of Mr. Hopwood's pieces, indeed, have already
+been transported to foreign climes and there
+seems every reason for belief that Mr. Moeller's
+comedy will meet a similarly happy fate.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>November 29, 1917.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="Cantorum" id="Cantorum"></a>De Senectute Cantorum</h3>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i4"><i>"All'et&agrave; di settanta</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i4"><i>Non si ama, n&egrave; si canta."</i><br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i10">Italian proverb.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="De_Senectute_Cantorum" id="De_Senectute_Cantorum"></a>De Senectute Cantorum</h2>
+
+
+<p>"I am not sure," writes Arthur Symons in his
+admirable essay on Sarah Bernhardt, "that
+the best moment to study an artist is not
+the moment of what is called decadence. The
+first energy of inspiration is gone; what remains
+is the method, the mechanism, and it is that which
+alone one can study, as one can study the mechanism
+of the body, not the principle of life itself.
+What is done mechanically, after the heat of the
+blood has cooled, and the divine accidents have
+ceased to happen, is precisely all that was consciously
+skilful in the performance of an art. To
+see all this mechanism left bare, as the form of a
+skeleton is left bare when age thins the flesh upon
+it is to learn more easily all that is to be learnt of
+structure, the art which not art but nature has
+hitherto concealed with its merciful covering."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Symons, of course, had an actress in mind,
+but his argument can be applied to singers as well,
+although it is safest to remember that much of
+the true beauty of the human voice inevitably departs
+with the youth of its owner. Still style in
+singing is not noticeably affected by age and an
+artist who possesses or who has acquired this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span>
+quality very often can afford to make lewd gestures
+at Father Time. If good singing depended
+upon a full and sensuous tone, such artists as Ronconi,
+Victor Maurel, Max Heinrich, Ludwig
+W&uuml;llner, and Maurice Renaud would never have
+had any careers at all. It is obvious that any
+true estimate of their contribution to the lyric
+stage would put the chief emphasis on style, and
+this is usually the explanation for extended success
+on the opera or concert stage, although occasionally
+an extraordinary and exceptional singer
+may continue to give pleasure to her auditors, despite
+the fact that she has left middle age behind
+her, by the mere lovely quality of the tone she
+produces.</p>
+
+<p>In the history of opera there may be found the
+names of many singers who have maintained their
+popularity and, indeed, a good deal of their art,
+long past fifty, and there is recorded at least one
+instance in which a singer, after a long absence
+from the theatre, returned to the scene of her
+earlier triumphs with her powers unimpaired, even
+augmented. I refer, of course, to Henrietta Sontag,
+born in 1805, who retired from the stage of
+the King's Theatre in London in 1830 in her
+twenty-fifth year and who returned twenty years
+later in 1849. She had, in the meantime, become<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span>
+the Countess Rossi, but although she had abandoned
+the stage her reappearance proved that she
+had not remained idle during her period of retirement.
+For she was one of those artists in whom
+early "inspiration" counted for little and
+"method" for much. She was, indeed, a mistress
+of style. She came back to the public in <i>Linda
+di Chaminoux</i> and H. F. Chorley ("Thirty Years'
+Musical Recollections") tells us that "all went
+wondrously well. No magic could restore to her
+voice an upper note or two which Time had taken;
+but the skill, grace, and precision with which she
+turned to account every atom of power she still
+possessed,&mdash;the incomparable steadiness with
+which she wrought out her composer's intentions&mdash;she
+carried through the part, from first to last,
+without the slightest failure, or sign of weariness&mdash;seemed
+a triumph. She was greeted&mdash;as she
+deserved to be&mdash;as a beloved old friend come
+home again in the late sunnier days.</p>
+
+<p>"But it was not at the moment of Madame
+Sontag's reappearance that we could advert to all
+the difficulty which added to the honour of its
+success.&mdash;She came back under musical conditions
+entirely changed since she left the stage&mdash;to
+an orchestra far stronger than that which had
+supported her voice when it was younger; and to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span>
+a new world of operas.&mdash;Into this she ventured
+with an intrepid industry not to be overpraised&mdash;with
+every new part enhancing the respect of
+every real lover of music.&mdash;During the short period
+of these new performances at Her Majesty's
+Theatre, which was not equivalent to two complete
+Opera seasons, not merely did Madame Sontag
+go through the range of her old characters&mdash;Susanna,
+Rosina, Desdemona, Donna Anna, and
+the like&mdash;but she presented herself in seven or
+eight operas which had not existed when she left
+the stage&mdash;Bellini's <i>Sonnambula</i>, Donizetti's
+<i>Linda</i>, <i>La Figlia del Reggimento</i>, <i>Don Pasquale</i>;
+<i>Le Tre Nozze</i>, of Signor Alary, <i>La Tempesta</i>, by
+M. Hal&eacute;vy&mdash;the last two works involving what
+the French call 'creation,' otherwise the production
+of a part never before represented.&mdash;In one
+of the favourite characters of her predecessor, the
+elder artist beat the younger one hollow.&mdash;This
+was as Maria, in Donizetti's <i>La Figlia</i>, which
+Mdlle. Lind may be said to have brought to England,
+and considered as her special property....
+With myself, the real value of Madame Sontag
+grew, night after night&mdash;as her variety, her conscientious
+steadiness, and her adroit use of diminished
+powers were thus mercilessly tested. In one
+respect, compared with every one who had been<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span>
+in my time, she was alone, in right, perhaps of
+the studies of her early days&mdash;as a singer of
+Mozart's music."</p>
+
+<p>It was after these last London seasons that
+Mme. Sontag undertook an American tour. She
+died in Mexico.</p>
+
+<p>The great Mme. Pasta's ill-advised return to
+the stage in 1850 (when she made two belated appearances
+in London) is matter for sadder comment.
+Chorley, indeed, is at his best when he
+writes of it, his pen dipped in tears, for none had
+admired this artist in her prime more passionately
+than he. Here was a particularly good opportunity
+to study the bare skeleton of interpretative
+art; the result is one of the most striking
+passages in all literature:</p>
+
+<p>"Her voice, which at its best, had required
+ceaseless watching and practice, had been long ago
+given up by her. Its state of utter ruin on the
+night in question passes description.&mdash;She had
+been neglected by those who, at least, should have
+presented her person to the best advantage admitted
+by Time.&mdash;Her queenly robes (she was to
+sing some scenes from <i>Anna Bolena</i>) in nowise
+suited or disguised her figure. Her hair-dresser
+had done some tremendous thing or other with her
+head&mdash;or rather had left everything undone. A<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span>
+more painful and disastrous spectacle could hardly
+be looked on.&mdash;There were artists present, who
+had then, for the first time, to derive some impression
+of a renowned artist&mdash;perhaps, with the
+natural feeling that her reputation had been exaggerated.&mdash;Among
+these was Rachel&mdash;whose
+bitter ridicule of the entire sad show made itself
+heard throughout the whole theatre, and drew attention
+to the place where she sat&mdash;one might
+even say, sarcastically enjoying the scene.
+Among the audience, however, was another gifted
+woman, who might far more legitimately have
+been shocked at the utter wreck of every musical
+means of expression in the singer&mdash;who might
+have been more naturally forgiven, if some humour
+of self-glorification had made her severely just&mdash;not
+worse&mdash;to an old <i>prima donna</i>;&mdash;I mean
+Madame Viardot.&mdash;Then, and not till then, she
+was hearing Madame Pasta.&mdash;But Truth will always
+answer to the appeal of Truth. Dismal as
+was the spectacle&mdash;broken, hoarse, and destroyed
+as was the voice&mdash;the great style of the singer
+spoke to the great singer. The first scene was
+Ann Boleyn's duet with Jane Seymour. The old
+spirit was heard and seen in Madame Pasta's
+<i>Sorgi!</i> and the gesture with which she signed to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span>
+her penitent rival to rise. Later, she attempted
+the final mad scene of the opera&mdash;that most complicated
+and brilliant among the mad scenes on
+the modern musical stage&mdash;with its two <i>cantabile</i>
+movements, its snatches of recitative, and its <i>bravura</i>
+of despair, which may be appealed to as an
+example of vocal display, till then unparagoned,
+when turned to the account of frenzy, not frivolity&mdash;perhaps
+as such commissioned by the superb
+creative artist.&mdash;By that time, tired, unprepared,
+in ruin as she was, she had rallied a little. When&mdash;on
+Ann Boleyn's hearing the coronation music
+of her rival, the heroine searches for her own
+crown on her brow&mdash;Madame Pasta turned in the
+direction of the festive sounds, the old irresistible
+charm broke out;&mdash;nay, even in the final song,
+with its <i>roulades</i>, and its scales of shakes, ascending
+by a semi-tone, the consummate vocalist and
+tragedian, able to combine form with meaning&mdash;the
+moment of the situation, with such personal
+and musical display as form an integral part of
+operatic art&mdash;was indicated: at least to the apprehension
+of a younger artist.&mdash;'You are right!'
+was Madame Viardot's quick and heartfelt response
+(her eyes were full of tears) to a friend
+beside her&mdash;'You are right! It is like the <i>Cenacolo</i><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span>
+of Da Vinci at Milan&mdash;a wreck of a picture,
+but the picture is the greatest picture in the
+world!'"</p>
+
+<p>The great Mme. Viardot herself, whose intractable
+voice and noble stage presence inevitably remind
+one of Mme. Pasta, took no chances with
+fate. The friend of Alfred de Musset, the model
+for George Sand's "Consuelo," the "creator" of
+Fid&egrave;s in <i>Le Proph&egrave;te</i>, and the singer who, in the
+revival of <i>Orph&eacute;e</i> at the Th&eacute;&acirc;tre Lyrique in 1859,
+resuscitated Gluck's popularity in Paris, retired
+from the opera stage in 1863 at the age of 43,
+shortly after she had appeared in <i>Alceste!</i> (She
+sang in concert occasionally until 1870 or later.)
+Thereafter she divided her time principally between
+Baden and Paris and became the great
+friend of Turgeniev. His very delightful letters
+to her have been published. Idleness was abhorrent
+to this fine woman and in her middle and old
+age she gave lessons, while singers, composers, and
+conductors alike came to her for help and advice.
+She died in 1910 at the age of 89. Her less celebrated
+brother, Manuel Garcia (less celebrated as
+a singer; as a teacher he is given the credit for
+having restored Jenny Lind's voice. Among his
+other pupils Mathilde Marchesi and Marie Tempest
+may be mentioned), had died in 1906 at the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span>
+age of 101. Her sister, Mme. Malibran, died very
+young, in the early Nineteenth Century, before, in
+fact, Mme. Viardot had made her d&eacute;but.</p>
+
+<p>Few singers have had the wisdom to follow Mme.
+Viardot's excellent example. The great Jenny
+Lind, long after her voice had lost its quality, continued
+to sing in oratorio and concert. So did
+Adelina Patti. Muriel Starr once told me of a parrot
+she encountered in Australia. The poor bird
+had arrived at the noble age of 117 and was entirely
+bereft of feathers. Flapping his stumpy
+wings he cried incessantly, "I'll fly, by God, I'll
+fly!" So, many singers, having lost their voices,
+continue to croak, "I'll sing, by God, I'll sing!"
+The Earl of Mount Edgcumbe, himself a man of
+considerable years when he published his highly
+diverting "Musical Reminiscences," gives us some
+extraordinary pictures of senility on the stage at
+the close of the Eighteenth Century. There was,
+for example, the case of Cecilia Davis, the first
+Englishwoman to sustain the part of prima donna
+and in that situation was second only to Gabrielli,
+whom she even rivalled in neatness of execution.
+Mount Edgcumbe found Miss Davies in Florence,
+unengaged and poor. A concert was arranged at
+which she appeared with her sister. Later she returned
+to England ... too old to secure an <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span>engagement.
+"This unfortunate woman is now (in
+1834) living in London, in the extreme of old age,
+disease, and poverty," writes the Earl. He also
+speaks of a Signora Galli, of large and masculine
+figure and contralto voice, who frequently filled the
+part of second man at the Opera. She had been
+a principal singer in Handel's oratorios when conducted
+by himself. She afterwards fell into extreme
+poverty, and at the age of about seventy
+(!!!!), was induced to come forward to sing again
+at the oratorios. "I had the curiosity to go, and
+heard her sing <i>He was despised and rejected of
+men</i> in <i>The Messiah</i>. Of course her voice was
+cracked and trembling, but it was easy to see her
+school was good; and it was a pleasure to observe
+the kindness with which she was received and listened
+to; and to mark the animation and delight
+with which she seemed to hear again the music in
+which she had formerly been a distinguished performer.
+The poor old woman had been in the
+habit of coming to me annually for a trifling
+present; and she told me on that occasion that
+nothing but the severest distress should have compelled
+her so to expose herself, which after all, did
+not answer to its end, as she was not paid according
+to her agreement. She died shortly after."
+In 1783 the Earl heard a singer named Allegranti<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span>
+in Dresden, then at the height of her powers.
+Later she returned to England and reappeared in
+Cimarosa's <i>Matrimonio Segreto</i>. "Never was
+there a more pitiable attempt: she had scarcely a
+thread of voice remaining, nor the power to sing
+a note in tune: her figure and acting were equally
+altered for the worse, and after a few nights she
+was obliged to retire and quit the stage altogether."
+The celebrated Madame Mara, after a
+long sojourn in Russia, suddenly returned to England
+and was announced for a benefit performance
+at the King's Theatre after everybody had forgotten
+her existence. "She must have been at
+least seventy; but it was said that her voice had
+miraculously returned, and was as good as ever.
+But when she displayed those wonderfully revived
+powers, they proved, as might have been expected,
+lamentably deficient, and the tones she produced
+were compared to those of a <i>penny trumpet</i>.
+Curiosity was so little excited that the concert
+was ill attended ... and Madame Mara was
+heard no more. I was not so lucky (or so unlucky)
+as to hear these her last notes, as it was
+early in the winter, and I was not in town. She
+returned to Russia, and was a great sufferer by
+the burning of Moscow. After that she lived at
+Mitlau, or some other town near the Baltic, where<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span>
+she died at a great age, not many years ago."</p>
+
+<p>Here is Michael Kelly's account of the same
+event: "With all her great skill and knowledge
+of the world, Madame Mara was induced, by the
+advice of some of her mistaken friends, to give a
+public concert at the King's Theatre, in her
+seventy-second year, when, in the course of nature
+her powers had failed her. It was truly grievous
+to see such transcendent talents as she once possessed,
+so sunk&mdash;so fallen. I used every effort in
+my power to prevent her committing herself, but in
+vain. Among other arguments to draw her from
+her purpose, I told her what happened to Monbelli,
+one of the first tenors of his day, who lost
+all his well-earned reputation and fame, by rashly
+performing the part of a lover, at the Pergola
+Theatre, at Florence, in his seventieth year, having
+totally lost his voice. On the stage, he was hissed;
+and the following lines, lampooning his attempt,
+were chalked on his house-door, as well as upon
+the walls of the city:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0"><i>'All' et&agrave; di settanta</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Non si ama, n&egrave; si canta.'"</i><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>W. T. Parke, forty years principal oboe player
+at Covent Garden Theatre, is kinder to Madame<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span>
+Mara in his "Musical Memoirs," but it must be
+taken into account that he is kinder to every one
+else, too. There is little of the acrimonious or the
+fault-finding note in his pages. This is his version
+of the affair: "That extraordinary singer of
+former days, Madame Mara, who had passed the
+last eighteen years in Russia, and who had lately
+arrived in England, gave a concert at the King's
+Theatre on the 6th of March (1820), which highly
+excited the curiosity of the musical public. On
+that occasion she sang some of her best airs; and
+though her powers were greatly inferior to what
+they were in her zenith, yet the same pure taste
+pervaded her performance. Whether vanity or
+interest stimulated Mara at her time of life to that
+undertaking, it would be difficult to determine; but
+whichsoever had the ascendency, her reign was
+short; for by singing one night afterwards at the
+vocal concert, the veil which had obscured her
+judgment was removed, and she retired to enjoy
+in private life those comforts which her rare talent
+had procured for her."</p>
+
+<p>Parke also speaks of a Mrs. Pinto, "the once
+celebrated Miss Brent, the original Mandane in
+Arne's <i>Artaxerxes</i>," who appeared in 1785 at the
+age of nearly seventy in Milton's <i>Mask of Comus</i>
+at a benefit for a Mr. Hull, "the respectable stage-manager<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span>
+of Covent Garden Theatre." She was to
+sing the song of Sweet Echo and as Parke was to
+play the responses to her voice on the oboe he repaired
+to her house for rehearsal. "Although
+nearly seventy years old, her voice possessed the
+remains of those qualities for which it had been so
+much celebrated,&mdash;power, flexibility, and sweetness.
+On the night <i>Comus</i> was performed she
+sung with an unexpected degree of excellence, and
+was loudly applauded. This old lady, as a
+singer, gave me the idea of a fine piece of ruins,
+which though considerably dilapidated, still displayed
+some of its original beauties."</p>
+
+<p>The celebrated Faustina, whose quarrel with
+Cuzzoni is as famous in the history of music as the
+war between Gluck and Piccinni, was less daring.
+Dr. Burney visited her when she was seventy-two
+years old and asked her to sing. "Alas, I cannot,"
+she replied, "I have lost all my faculties."</p>
+
+<p>La Camargo, the favourite dancer of Paris in
+the early Eighteenth Century, the inventor, indeed
+of the short ballet skirt, and the possessor of
+many lovers, retired from the stage in 1751 with
+a large fortune, besides a pension of fifteen hundred
+francs. Thenceforth she led a secluded life.
+She was an assiduous visitor to the poor of her
+parish and she kept a dozen dogs and an angora<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span>
+cat which she overwhelmed with affection. In that
+quaint book, "The Powder Puff," by Franz Blei,
+you may find a most charming description of a
+call paid to the lady in 1768 in her little old house
+in the Rue St. Thomas du Louvre, by Duclos,
+Grimm, and Helvetius, who had come in bantering
+mood to ask her whom, in her past life, she had
+loved best. Her reply touched these men, who
+took their leave. "Helvetius told Camargo's
+story to his wife; Grimm made a note of it for his
+Court Journal; and as for Duclos, it suggested
+some moral reflections to him, for when, two years
+later, Mlle. Marianne Camargo was carried to her
+grave, he remarked: 'It is quite fitting to give
+her a white pall like a virgin.'"</p>
+
+<p>Sophie Arnould, one of the most celebrated actresses
+and singers of the Eighteenth Century, died
+in poverty at the age of 63 and there is no record
+of her burial place. She had been the friend
+of Voltaire, Rousseau, d'Alembert, Diderot, Helvetius,
+and the Baron d'Holbach. She had "created"
+Gluck's <i>Iphig&eacute;nie en Aulide</i> and the composer
+had said of her, "If it had not been for the
+voice and elocution of Mlle. Arnould, my <i>Iphig&eacute;nie</i>
+would never have been performed in France."
+In her youth she had interested not only Marie
+Antoinette but also the King, and she had been<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span>
+the object of Mme. de Pompadour's suspicion and
+Mme. du Barry's rage. Garrick declared her a
+better actress than Clairon. She was as famous
+for her wit as for her singing and acting. When
+Mme. Laguerre appeared drunk in <i>Iphig&eacute;nie en
+Tauride</i> she exclaimed, "Why this is <i>Iphig&eacute;nie en
+Champagne</i>!" Indeed, she made so many remarks
+worthy of preservation that shortly after
+her death in 1802, a book called "Arnoldiana,"
+devoted to her epigrams, was issued.... Nevertheless,
+this lady was hissed at the age of 36, when,
+after a short absence from the stage she reappeared
+as Iphig&eacute;nie in 1776. She was neither old
+nor ugly and if her voice may have lost something
+her nineteen years of stage life in Paris might
+have weighed against that. On one occasion, according
+to La Harpe, when she had the line to sing,
+"You long for me to be gone," the audience applauded
+vociferously. To protect Sophie, Marie
+Antoinette sat in a box on several nights and
+stemmed the storm of disapproval, but in the end
+even the presence of the queen herself was insufficient
+to quell the hissing. One sad story completes
+the picture. In 1785, when her financial
+troubles were beginning, her two sons, who bore
+her no love, called for money. She had none to
+give them. "There are two horses left in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span>
+stable," she said. "Take those." They rode
+away on the horses.</p>
+
+<p>Latin audiences are notoriously unfaithful to
+their stage favourites. In "The Innocents
+Abroad" Mark Twain tells us of the bad manners
+of an Italian audience. The singer he mentions
+is Erminia Frezzolini, born at Orvieto in 1818.
+She sang both in England and America. Chorley
+said of her: "She was an elegant, tall woman,
+born with a lovely voice, and bred with great vocal
+skill (of a certain order); but she was the first
+who arrived of the 'young Italians'&mdash;of those
+who fancy that driving the voice to its extremities
+can stand in the stead of passion. But she was,
+nevertheless, a real singer, and her art stood her
+in stead for some years after nature broke down.
+When she had left her scarce a note of her rich and
+real soprano voice to scream with, Madame Frezzolini
+was still charming." She died in Paris,
+November 5, 1884. Now for Mark Twain:</p>
+
+<p>"I said I knew nothing against the upper classes
+from personal observation. I must recall it. I
+had forgotten. What I saw their bravest and
+their fairest do last night, the lowest multitude
+that could be scraped out of the purlieus of Christendom
+would blush to do, I think. They assembled
+by hundreds, and even thousands, in the great<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span>
+Theatre of San Carlo to do&mdash;what? Why simply
+to make fun of an old woman&mdash;to deride, to
+hiss, to jeer at an actress they once worshipped,
+but whose beauty is faded now, and whose voice
+has lost its former richness. Everybody spoke of
+the rare sport there was to be. They said the
+theatre would be crammed because Frezzolini was
+going to sing. It was said she could not sing well
+now, but then the people liked to see her, anyhow.
+And so we went. And every time the woman sang
+they hissed and laughed&mdash;the whole magnificent
+house&mdash;and as soon as she left the stage they
+called her on again with applause. Once or twice
+she was encored five and six times in succession,
+and received with hisses when she appeared, and
+discharged with hisses and laughter when she had
+finished&mdash;then instantly encored and insulted
+again! And how the high-born knaves enjoyed
+it! White-kidded gentlemen and ladies laughed
+till the tears came, and clapped their hands in
+very ecstasy when that unhappy old woman would
+come meekly out for the sixth time, with uncomplaining
+patience, to meet a storm of hisses! It
+was the cruellest exhibition&mdash;the most wanton,
+the most unfeeling. The singer would have conquered
+an audience of American rowdies by her
+brave, unflinching tranquillity (for she answered<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span>
+encore after encore, and smiled and bowed pleasantly,
+and sang the best she possibly could, and
+went bowing off, through all the jeers and hisses,
+without ever losing countenance or temper); and
+surely in any other land than Italy her sex and her
+helplessness must have been an ample protection
+for her&mdash;she could have needed no other. Think
+what a multitude of small souls were crowded into
+that theatre last night!"</p>
+
+<p>English audiences, on the other hand, are notoriously
+friendly to their old favourites. When Dr.
+Hanslick, the Viennese critic, visited England and
+heard Sims Reeves singing before crowded houses
+as he had been doing for forty or fifty years, he
+remarked, "It is not easy to win the favour of the
+English public; to lose it is quite impossible."</p>
+
+<p>Mme. Grisi made her last appearance in London
+in 1866 at the theatre she had left twenty years
+previously, Her Majesty's. The opera was <i>Lucrezia
+Borgia</i>. At the end of the first act she
+miscalculated the depth of the apron and the descending
+curtain left her outside on her knees.
+She had stiffness in her joints and was unable to
+rise without assistance.... This situation must
+have been very embarassing to a singer who previously
+had been an idol of the public. In the passionate
+duet with the tenor she made an unsuccessful<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span>
+attempt to reach the A natural. Notwithstanding
+the fact that she was well received and
+that she got through with the greater part of the
+opera with credit, her impressario, J. H. Mapleson,
+relates in his "Memoirs" that after the final
+curtain had fallen she rushed to tell him that it
+was all over and that she would never appear
+again. In "Student and Singer" Charles Santley
+writes of the occasion: "I had been singing
+at the Crystal Palace concert in the afternoon,
+and after dining there I went up to the theatre
+to see a little of the performance. I felt very
+sorry for Grisi that she had been induced to appear
+again; it was a sad sight for any one who had
+known her in her prime, and even long past it."</p>
+
+<p>However, even English audiences can be cold.
+John E. Cox, in his "Musical Recollections," recalls
+an earlier occasion when Grisi sang at the
+Crystal Palace without much success (July 31,
+1861): "On retiring from the orchestra, after a
+peculiarly cold reception&mdash;as unkind as it was inconsiderate,
+seeing what the career of this remarkable
+woman had been&mdash;there was not a single person
+at the foot of the orchestra to receive or to
+accompany her to her retiring room! I could imagine
+what her feelings at that moment must have
+been&mdash;she who had in former years been accustomed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span>
+to be thronged, wherever she appeared, and
+to be the recipient of adulation&mdash;often as exaggerated
+as it was fulsome&mdash;but who was now
+literally deserted. With Grisi&mdash;although I had
+been once or twice introduced to her&mdash;I never had
+any personal acquaintance. I could not, however,
+resist the impulse of preceding her, without obtruding
+myself on her notice, and opening the door
+of the retiring room for her, which was situated at
+some considerable distance from the orchestra.
+Her look as I did this, and she passed out of sight,
+is amongst the most painful of my 'Recollections.'"</p>
+
+<p>German audiences are usually kind to their
+favourites. In America we adopt neither the attitude
+of the English and Germans, nor yet that
+of the Italians and French. We simply stay away
+from the theatre. Mark Twain has put it succinctly,
+"When a singer has lost his voice and a
+jumper his legs, those parties fail to draw."</p>
+
+<p>Benjamin Lumley in his "Reminiscences of the
+Opera," quoting an anonymous friend, relates a
+touching story regarding Catalani, who was born
+in 1779 and who retired from the stage in 1831.
+When Jenny Lind visited Paris in the spring of
+1849 she learned to her astonishment that Catalani
+was in the French capital. The old singer,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span>
+who resided habitually in Florence, had come to
+Paris with her daughter who, as the widow of a
+Frenchman, was obliged to go through certain
+legal forms before taking possession of her share
+of her husband's property. Through a friend of
+both ladies it was arranged that the two should
+meet at a dinner at the home of the Marquis of
+Normansby, the English ambassador to the Tuscan
+court, but the Swedish singer could not restrain
+her impatience and before that event she
+set out one forenoon for Mme. Catalani's apartment
+in the Rue de la Paix and sent in her name
+by a servant. The old singer hastened out to
+greet her distinguished visitor with obvious delight.
+She had known nothing of Mlle. Lind's
+presence in Paris and had feared that such a
+chance would never befall her, much as she had
+longed to see the celebrated singer who had excited
+the English public in a way which recalled
+her own past triumphs and who rivalled her in her
+purity and her charity. They talked together
+for an hour.... At the dinner the Marchioness
+of Normansby considerately refrained from asking
+Jenny Lind to sing, because no one is allowed to
+refuse such an invitation made by a representative
+of royalty. Catalani, however, had no such scruples.
+She went up to the Nightingale and begged<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span>
+her to sing, adding, "<i>C'est la vieille Catalini qui
+desire vous entendre chanter, avant de mourir!</i>"
+This appeal was irresistible. Jenny Lind sat
+down to the piano and sang <i>Non credea
+mirarti</i> and one or two other airs, including <i>Ah!
+non giunge</i>. Catalani is described as sitting on
+an ottoman in the centre of the room, rocking her
+body to and fro with delight and sympathy, murmuring,
+"<i>Ah la bella cosa che la musica, quando
+si f&agrave; di quella maniera!</i>" and again "<i>Ah! la carissima!
+quanto bellissima!</i>" A dinner at Catalani's
+apartment followed, but a few days later it
+became known that the old singer was ill, an illness
+which proved fatal. She had, however,
+heard the Swedish Nightingale sing "<i>avant de
+mourir</i>."</p>
+
+<p>William Gardiner visited Madame Catalani in
+1846. "I was surprised at the vigour of Madame
+Catalani," he says, "and how little she has altered
+since I saw her in Derby in 1828. I paid
+her a compliment on her good looks. 'Ah,' said
+she, 'I'm sixty-six!' She has lost none of that
+commanding expression which gave her such dignity
+on the stage. She is without a wrinkle, and
+appears to be no more than forty. Her breadth
+of chest is still remarkable: it is this which endowed
+her with the finest voice that ever sang.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span>
+Her speaking voice and dramatic air are still
+charming, and not in the least impaired."</p>
+
+<p>Is Christine Nilsson still alive? I think so.
+She was born August 20, 1843. In Clara Louise
+Kellogg's very entertaining, but not always trustworthy,
+"Memoirs" there is an interesting reference
+to this singer in her later career. Dates, unfortunately,
+are not furnished. "I was present,"
+declares Mme. Kellogg, "on the night ... when
+she practically murdered the high register of her
+voice. She had five upper notes the quality of
+which was unlike any other I ever heard and that
+possessed a peculiar charm. The tragedy happened
+during a performance of <i>The Magic Flute</i>
+in London.... Nilsson was the Queen of the
+Night, one of her most successful early r&ocirc;les.
+The second aria in <i>The Magic Flute</i> is more famous
+and less difficult than the first aria, and also,
+more effective. Nilsson knew well the ineffectiveness
+of the ending of the first aria in the two weakest
+notes of a soprano's voice, A natural and B
+flat. I never could understand why a master like
+Mozart should have chosen to use them as he did.
+There is no climax to the song. One has to climb
+up hard and fast and then stop short in the middle.
+It is an appalling thing to do and that night
+Nilsson took those two notes at the last in <i>chest<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span>
+tones</i>. 'Great heavens!' I gasped, 'what is she
+doing? What is the woman thinking of!' Of
+course I knew she was doing it to get volume and
+vibration and to give that trying climax some
+character. But to say that it was a fatal attempt
+is to put it mildly. She absolutely killed a certain
+quality in her voice there and then and she <i>never
+recovered it</i>. Even that night she had to cut out
+the second great aria. Her beautiful high notes
+were gone forever." As I have said, the date of
+this incident, which, so far as I know, is not recorded
+elsewhere, is not mentioned, but Christine
+Nilsson sang in New York in the early Eighties
+and continued to sing until 1891, the year of her
+final appearance in London.</p>
+
+<p>Adelina Patti, born the same year as Nilsson
+but six months before (February 10, 1843; according
+to some records, which by no means go undisputed,
+a quartet of famous singers came into the
+world this year. The other two were Ilma de
+Murska and Pauline Lucca) made many farewell
+tours of this country ... one too many in
+1903-4, when she displayed the <i>beaux restes</i> of her
+voice. She is living at present in retirement at
+Craig-y-Nos in Wales. Her greatest rival,
+Etelka Gerster, too, is alive, I believe.</p>
+
+<p>Lilli Lehmann, one of the oldest of the living<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span>
+great singers, was born May 13, 1848. She was
+a member of the famous casts which introduced
+many of the Wagner works to New York. Her
+last appearances in opera here were made, I think,
+in the late Nineties, but she has sung here since in
+concert and in Germany she has frequently assisted
+at the performances of the Mozart festivals at
+Salzburg and has even sung in <i>Norma</i> and <i>G&ouml;tterd&auml;mmerung</i>
+within recent years! Her head is now
+crowned with white hair and her noble appearance
+and magnificent style in singing have doubtless
+stood her in good stead at these belated performances,
+which probably were disappointing,
+judged as vocal exhibitions.</p>
+
+<p>Lillian Nordica had a long career. She was
+born May 12, 1859, and made her operatic d&eacute;but
+in Brescia in <i>La Traviata</i> in 1879. She continued
+to sing up to the time of her death in Batavia,
+Java, May 10, 1914. Indeed she was then undertaking
+a concert tour of the world at the age of
+55! But the artist, who in the Nineties had held
+the Metropolitan Opera House stage with honour
+in the great dramatic r&ocirc;les, had very little to offer
+in her last years. Never a great musician, defects
+in style began to make themselves evident as her
+vocal powers decreased. Her season at the Manhattan
+Opera House in 1907-8 was quickly and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span>
+unpleasantly terminated. A subsequent single appearance
+as Isolde at the Metropolitan in the
+winter of 1909-10 was even less successful. The
+voice had lost its resonance, the singer her appeal.
+Her magnificent courage and indomitable ambition
+urged her on to the end.</p>
+
+<p>Two singers whose voices have been miraculously
+preserved, who have indeed suffered little
+from the ravages of time, are Marcella Sembrich
+and Nellie Melba. Both of these singers, however,
+have consistently refrained from misusing
+their voices (if one may except the one occasion on
+which Mme. Melba attempted to sing Br&uuml;nnhilde
+in <i>Siegfried</i> with disastrous results). Mme.
+Melba (according to Grove's Dictionary, which,
+like all other books devoted to the subject of
+music, is frequently inaccurate) was born in Australia,
+May 19, 1859. Therefore she was 28
+years old when she made her d&eacute;but in Brussels as
+Gilda on October 12, 1887. She has used her
+voice carefully and well and still sings in concert
+and opera at the age of 59. With the advance of
+age, indeed, her voice began to take on colour.
+When she sang here in opera at the Manhattan
+Opera House in 1906-7 she was in her best vocal
+estate. Her voice, originally rather pale, had become
+mellow and rich, although it is possible it had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span>
+lost some of its old remarkable agility. When
+last I listened to her in concert, a few years ago at
+the Hippodrome, it seemed to me that I had never
+before heard so beautiful a voice, and yet Mme.
+Melba sang in the first performance of opera I
+ever attended (Chicago Auditorium; <i>Faust</i>, February
+22, 1899).</p>
+
+<p>According to H. T. Finck, Caruso once said,
+"When you hear that an artist is going to retire,
+don't you believe it, for as long as he keeps
+his voice he will sing. You may depend upon
+that." Sometimes, indeed, longer. Mme. Melba
+made a belated and unfortunate attempt to sing
+Marguerite in <i>Faust</i> with the Chicago Opera Company,
+Monday evening, February 4, 1918, at the
+Lexington Theatre, New York. She sang with
+some art and style; her tone was still pure and
+her wonderful enunciation still remained a feature
+of her performance but scarcely a shadow of the
+beautiful voice I can remember so well was left.
+As if to atone for vocal deficiencies the singer
+made histrionic efforts such as she had never
+deemed necessary during the height of her career.
+Her meeting with Faust in the Kermesse scene was
+accomplished with modesty that almost became
+fright. She nearly danced the jewel song and embraced
+the tenor with passion in the love duet. In<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span>
+the church scene, overcome with terror at the sight
+of M&eacute;phistoph&eacute;l&egrave;s, she flung her prayer book
+across the stage.... Her appearance was almost
+shocking and the first lines of the part of Marguerite,
+"<i>Non monsieur, je ne suis demoiselle, ni
+belle</i>" had a merciless application. However, the
+audience received her with kindness, more with a
+certain sort of enthusiasm. She reappeared again
+in the same opera on Thursday evening, February
+14, 1918, but on this occasion I did not hear her.</p>
+
+<p>Marcella Sembrich was born February 15, 1858.
+She made her d&eacute;but in Athens in <i>I Puritani</i>,
+June 8, 1877, and she made her New York
+d&eacute;but in <i>Lucia</i> October 24, 1883, at the beginning
+of the first season of the Metropolitan
+Opera House. After a long absence she returned
+to New York in 1898 as Rosina in <i>Il
+Barbiere</i>. After that year she sang pretty
+steadily at the Metropolitan until February 6,
+1909, when, at the age of 51 (or lacking nine days
+of it), she bid farewell to the New York opera
+stage in acts from several of her favourite operas.
+She subsequently sang in a few performances of
+opera in Europe and was heard in song recital in
+America. When she left the opera house she had
+no rival in vocal artistry; and she had so satisfactorily
+solved the problems of style in singing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span>
+certain kinds of songs that she also surveyed the
+field of song recital from a mountain top....
+But such a singer as Mme. Sembrich, who made
+her appeal through the expression of the milder
+emotions, who never, indeed, attempted to touch
+dramatic depths, even style, in the end, will not
+assist. Magnificent Lilli Lehmann might make a
+certain effect in <i>G&ouml;tterd&auml;mmerung</i> so long as she
+had a leg to stand on or a note to croak, but an
+adequate delivery of <i>Der Nussbaum</i> or <i>Wie Melodien</i>
+demands a vocal control which a singer past
+middle age is not always sure of possessing....
+After a long retirement, Mme. Sembrich gave a
+concert at Carnegie Hall, November 21, 1915.
+The house was crowded and the applause at the
+beginning must almost have unnerved the singer,
+who walked slowly towards the front of the platform
+as the storm burst and then bowed her head
+again and again. Her program on this occasion
+was not one of her best. She had not chosen familiar
+songs in which to return to her public.
+This may in a measure account for her lack of success
+in always calling forth steady tones. However,
+on the whole, her voice sounded amazingly
+fresh. Her high notes especially rang true and
+resonant as ever. Her middle voice showed wear.
+Her style remained impeccable, unrivalled....<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span>
+She announced, following this concert, a series of
+four recitals in a small hall and actually appeared
+at one of them. This time I did not hear her, but
+I am told that her voice refused to respond to her
+wishes. Nor was the hall filled. The remaining
+concerts were abandoned. "Mme. Sembrich has
+never been a failure and she is too old to begin
+now!" she is reported to have said to a friend.</p>
+
+<p>Emma Calv&eacute;'s date of birth is recorded as 1864
+in some of the musical dictionaries. This would
+make her 53 years old. Her singing of the <i>Marseillaise</i>
+a year ago at the Allies Bazaar at the
+Grand Central Palace proved to me that her retirement
+from the Opera was premature. Her
+performances at the Manhattan Opera House in
+1906-7 were memorable, vocally superb. Her
+Carmen was out of drawing dramatically, but her
+Anita and her Santuzza remained triumphs of
+stage craft.</p>
+
+<p>Emma Eames, born August 13, 1867, is three
+years younger than Mme. Calv&eacute;. She made her
+d&eacute;but as Juliette, March 13, 1889. She retired
+from the opera stage in 1907-8, although she has
+sung since then a few times in concert. Her last
+appearances at the Opera were made in dramatic
+r&ocirc;les, Donna Anna, Leonora (in <i>Trovatore</i>), and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span>
+Tosca, in contradistinction to the lyric parts in
+which she gained her early fame. That she was
+entirely successful in compassing the breach cannot
+be said in all justice. Yet there was a certain
+distinction in her manner, a certain acid quality in
+her voice, that gave force to these characterizations.
+Certainly, however, no one would ever
+have compared her Donna Anna favourably with
+her Countess in <i>Figaro</i>. Her performance of <i>Or
+sai chi l'onore</i> was deficient in breadth of style and
+her lack of breath control at this period gave uncertainty
+to her execution.</p>
+
+<p>Life teaches us, through experience, that no rule
+is infallible, but insofar as I am able to give a
+meaning to these rambling biographical notes, collected,
+I may as well admit, more to interest my
+reader than to prove anything, it is the meaning,
+sounded with a high note of truth, by Arthur Symons,
+in the paragraph quoted at the beginning
+of this essay. Style is a rare quality in a singer.
+With it in his possession an artist may dare much
+for a long time. Without it he exists as long as
+those qualities which are perfectly natural to him
+exist. A voice fades, but a manner of applying
+that voice (even when there is practically no voice
+to apply) to an artistic problem has an indefinite
+term of life.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Yvette Guilbert once told me that crossing the
+Atlantic with Duse on one occasion she had asked
+the Italian actress if she were going to include <i>La
+Dame aux Cam&eacute;lias</i> in her American repertory.
+"I am too old to play Marguerite ..." was the
+sad response. "She was right," said Guilbert, in
+relating the incident, "she was too old; she was
+born too old ... in spirit. Now when I am
+sixty-three I shall begin to impersonate children.
+I grow younger every year!"</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>September 12, 1917.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="Impressions_in_the_Theatre" id="Impressions_in_the_Theatre"></a>Impressions in the Theatre</h3>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="I" id="I"></a>I</h2>
+
+<h2>The Land of Joy</h2>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><i>"Dancing is something more than an amusement
+in Spain. It is part of that solemn ritual
+which enters into the whole life of the people. It
+expresses their very spirit."</i></p>
+
+<p class="author">
+Havelock Ellis.<br />
+</p></div>
+
+
+<p>An idle observer of theatrical conditions
+might derive a certain ironic pleasure from
+remarking the contradiction implied in the
+professed admiration of the constables of the
+playhouse for the unconventional and their almost
+passionate adoration for the conventional. We
+constantly hear it said that the public cries for
+novelty, and just as constantly we see the same
+kind of acting, the same gestures, the same Julian
+Mitchellisms and George Marionisms and Ned
+Wayburnisms repeated in and out of season, summer
+and winter. Indeed, certain conventions
+(which bore us even now) are so deeply rooted in
+the soil of our theatre that I see no hope of their
+being eradicated before the year 1999, at which
+date other conventions will have supplanted them
+and will likewise have become tiresome.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>In this respect our theatre does not differ materially
+from the theatres of other countries except
+in one particular. In Europe the juxtaposition
+of nations makes an interchange of conventions
+possible, which brings about slow change or
+rapid revolution. Paris, for example, has received
+visits from the Russian Ballet which almost assumed
+the proportions of Tartar invasions.
+London, too, has been invaded by the Russians
+and by the Irish. The Irish playwrights, indeed,
+are continually pounding away at British middle-class
+complacency. Germany, in turn, has been
+invaded by England (we regret that this sentence
+has only an artistic and figurative significance),
+and we find Max Reinhardt well on his way toward
+giving a complete cycle of the plays of Shakespeare;
+a few years ago we might have observed
+Deutschland groveling hysterically before Oscar
+Wilde's <i>Salome</i>, a play which, at least without its
+musical dress, has not, I believe, even yet been performed
+publicly in London. In Italy, of course,
+there are no artistic invasions (nobody cares to
+pay for them) and even the conventions of the
+Italian theatre themselves, such as the <i>Commedia
+del' Arte</i>, are quite dead; so the country remains
+as dormant, artistically speaking, as a rag rug,
+until an enthusiast like Marinetti arises to take it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span>
+between his teeth and shake it back into rags
+again.</p>
+
+<p>Very often whisperings of art life in the foreign
+theatre (such as accounts of Stanislavski's accomplishments
+in Moscow) cross the Atlantic.
+Very often the husks of the realities (as was the
+case with the Russian Ballet) are imported. But
+whispers and husks have about as much influence
+as the "New York Times" in a mayoralty campaign,
+and as a result we find the American theatre
+as little aware of world activities in the drama as
+a deaf mute living on a pole in the desert of
+Sahara would be. Indeed any intrepid foreign
+investigator who wishes to study the American
+drama, American acting, and American stage decoration
+will find them in almost as virgin a condition
+as they were in the time of Lincoln.</p>
+
+<p>A few rude assaults have been made on this
+smug eupepsy. I might mention the coming of
+Paul Orleneff, who left Alla Nazimova with us to
+be eventually swallowed up in the conventional
+American theatre. Four or five years ago a company
+of Negro players at the Lafayette Theatre
+gave a performance of a musical revue that
+boomed like the big bell in the Kremlin at Moscow.
+Nobody could be deaf to the sounds. Florenz
+Ziegfeld took over as many of the tunes and gestures<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span>
+as he could buy for his <i>Follies</i> of that
+season, but he neglected to import the one essential
+quality of the entertainment, its style, for
+the exploitation of which Negro players were indispensable.
+For the past two months Mimi
+Aguglia, one of the greatest actresses of the world,
+has been performing in a succession of classic and
+modern plays (a repertory comprising dramas by
+Shakespeare, d'Annunzio, and Giacosa) at the
+Garibaldi Theatre, on East Fourth Street, before
+very large and very enthusiastic audiences, but
+uptown culture and managerial acumen will not
+awaken to the importance of this gesture until they
+read about it in some book published in 1950....</p>
+
+<p>All of which is merely by way of prelude to what
+I feel must be something in the nature of lyric outburst
+and verbal explosion. A few nights ago a
+Spanish company, unheralded, unsung, indeed almost
+unwelcomed by such reviewers as had to
+trudge to the out-of-the-way Park Theatre, came
+to New York, in a musical revue entitled <i>The
+Land of Joy</i>. The score was written by Joaqu&iacute;n
+Valverde, <i>fils</i>, whose music is not unknown to us,
+and the company included La Argentina, a Spanish
+dancer who had given matinees here in a past season
+without arousing more than mild enthusiasm.
+The theatrical impressarii, the song publishers,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span>
+and the Broadway rabble stayed away on the first
+night. It was all very well, they might have reasoned,
+to read about the goings on in Spain, but
+they would never do in America. Spanish dancers
+had been imported in the past without awakening
+undue excitement. Did not the great Carmencita
+herself visit America twenty or more years ago?
+These impressarii had ignored the existence of a
+great psychological (or more properly physiological)
+truth: you cannot mix Burgundy and Beer!
+One Spanish dancer surrounded by Americans is
+just as much lost as the great Nijinsky himself
+was in an English music hall, where he made a
+complete and dismal failure. And so they would
+have been very much astonished (had they been
+present) on the opening night to have witnessed
+all the scenes of uncontrollable enthusiasm&mdash;just
+as they are described by Havelock Ellis, Richard
+Ford, and Chabrier&mdash;repeated. The audience,
+indeed, became hysterical, and broke into wild
+cries of <i>Ole! Ole!</i> Hats were thrown on the stage.
+The audience became as abandoned as the players,
+became a part of the action.</p>
+
+<p>You will find all this described in "The Soul of
+Spain," in "Gatherings from Spain," in Chabrier's
+letters, and it had all been transplanted to New
+York almost without a whisper of preparation,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span>
+which is fortunate, for if it had been expected,
+doubtless we would have found the way to spoil it.
+Fancy the average New York first-night audience,
+stiff and unbending, sceptical and sardonic, welcoming
+this exhibition! Havelock Ellis gives an
+ingenious explanation for the fact that Spanish
+dancing has seldom if ever successfully crossed the
+border of the Iberian peninsula: "The finest
+Spanish dancing is at once killed or degraded by
+the presence of an indifferent or unsympathetic
+public, and that is probably why it cannot be
+transplanted, but remains local." Fortunately
+the Spaniards in the first-night audience gave the
+cue, unlocked the lips and loosened the hands of
+us cold Americans. For my part, I was soon yelling
+<i>Ole!</i> louder than anybody else.</p>
+
+<p>The dancer, Doloretes, is indeed extraordinary.
+The gipsy fascination, the abandoned, perverse
+bewitchery of this female devil of the dance is not
+to be described by mouth, typewriter, or quilled
+pen. Heine would have put her at the head of his
+dancing temptresses in his ballet of <i>M&eacute;phistoph&eacute;la</i>
+(found by Lumley too indecent for representation
+at Her Majesty's Theatre, for which it was written;
+in spite of which the scenario was published
+in the respectable "Revue de Deux Mondes").<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span>
+In this ballet a series of dancing celebrities are exhibited
+by the female M&eacute;phistoph&eacute;l&egrave;s for the entertainment
+of her victim. After Salome had twisted
+her flanks and exploited the prowess of her abdominal
+muscles to perfunctory applause, Doloretes
+would have heated the blood, not only of Faust,
+but of the ladies and gentlemen in the orchestra
+stalls, with the clicking of her heels, the clacking of
+her castanets, now held high over head, now held
+low behind her back, the flashing of her ivory teeth,
+the shrill screaming, electric magenta of her smile,
+the wile of her wriggle, the passion of her performance.
+And close beside her the sinuous Mazantinita
+would flaunt a garish tambourine and
+wave a shrieking fan. All inanimate objects,
+shawls, mantillas, combs, and cymbals, become inflamed
+with life, once they are pressed into the service
+of these se&ntilde;oritas, languorous and forbidding,
+indifferent and sensuous. Against these rude gipsies
+the refined grace and Goyaesque elegance of
+La Argentina stand forth in high relief, La Argentina,
+in whose hands the castanets become as potent
+an instrument for our pleasure as the violin does in
+the fingers of Jascha Heifetz. Bilbao, too, with
+his thundering heels and his tauromachian gestures,
+bewilders our highly magnetized senses. When, in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span>
+the dance, he pursues, without catching, the elusive
+Doloretes, it would seem that the limit of dynamic
+effects in the theatre had been reached.</p>
+
+<p>Here are singers! The limpid and lovely
+soprano of the comparatively placid Maria Marco,
+who introduces figurations into the brilliant music
+she sings at every turn. One indecent (there is
+no other word for it) chromatic oriental phrase is
+so strange that none of us can ever recall it or
+forget it! And the frantically nervous Luisita
+Puchol, whose eyelids spring open like the cover
+of a Jack-in-the-box, and whose hands flutter
+like saucy butterflies, sings suggestive popular
+ditties just a shade better than any one else I
+know of.</p>
+
+<p>But <i>The Land of Joy</i> does not rely on one or
+two principals for its effect. The organization as
+a whole is as full of fire and purpose as the original
+Russian Ballet; the costumes themselves, in
+their blazing, heated colours, constitute the ingredients
+of an orgy; the music, now sentimental (the
+adaptability of Valverde, who has lived in Paris, is
+little short of amazing; there is a vocal waltz in the
+style of Arditi that Mme. Patti might have introduced
+into the lesson scene of <i>Il Barbiere</i>; there is
+another song in the style of George M. Cohan&mdash;these
+by way of contrast to the Iberian music),<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span>
+now pulsing with rhythmic life, is the best Spanish
+music we have yet heard in this country. The
+whole entertainment, music, colours, costumes,
+songs, dances, and all, is as nicely arranged in its
+crescendos and decrescendos, its prestos and
+adagios as a Mozart finale. The close of the first
+act, in which the ladies sweep the stage with long
+ruffled trains, suggestive of all the Manet pictures
+you have ever seen, would seem to be unapproachable,
+but the most striking costumes and the wildest
+dancing are reserved for the very last scene
+of all. There these bewildering se&ntilde;oritas come
+forth in the splendourous envelope of embroidered
+Manila shawls, and such shawls! Prehistoric
+African roses of unbelievable measure decorate a
+texture of turquoise, from which depends nearly a
+yard of silken fringe. In others mingle royal purple
+and buff, orange and white, black and the
+kaleidoscope! The revue, a sublimated form of
+zarzuela, is calculated, indeed, to hold you in a
+dangerous state of nervous excitement during the
+entire evening, to keep you awake for the rest
+of the night, and to entice you to the theatre the
+next night and the next. It is as intoxicating as
+vodka, as insidious as cocaine, and it is likely to
+become a habit, like these stimulants. I have
+found, indeed, that it appeals to all classes of taste,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span>
+from that of a telephone operator, whose usual
+artistic debauch is the latest antipyretic novel of
+Robert W. Chambers, to that of the frequenter of
+the concert halls.</p>
+
+<p>I cannot resist further cataloguing; details
+shake their fists at my memory; for instance, the
+intricate rhythms of Valverde's elaborately syncopated
+music (not at all like ragtime syncopation),
+the thrilling orchestration (I remember one dance
+which is accompanied by drum taps and oboe,
+nothing else!), the utter absence of tangos (which
+are Argentine), and habaneras (which are Cuban),
+most of the music being written in two-four and
+three-four time, and the interesting use of folk-tunes;
+the casual and very suggestive indifference
+of the dancers, while they are not dancing, seemingly
+models for a dozen Zuloaga paintings, the
+apparently inexhaustible skill and variety of these
+dancers in action, winding ornaments around the
+melodies with their feet and bodies and arms and
+heads and castanets as coloratura sopranos do with
+their voices. Sometimes castanets are not used;
+cymbals supplant them, or tambourines, or even
+fingers. Once, by some esoteric witchcraft, the
+dancers seemed to tap upon their arms. The
+effect was so stupendous and terrifying that I
+could not project myself into that aloof state of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span>
+mind necessary for a calm dissection of its technique.</p>
+
+<p>What we have been thinking of all these years
+in accepting the imitation and ignoring the actuality
+I don't know; it has all been down in black
+and white. What Richard Ford saw and wrote
+down in 1846 I am seeing and writing down in
+1917. How these devilish Spaniards have been
+able to keep it up all this time I can't imagine.
+Here we have our paradox. Spain has changed
+so little that Ford's book is still the best to be procured
+on the subject (you may spend many a delightful
+half-hour with the charming irony of its
+pages for company). Spanish dancing is apparently
+what it was a hundred years ago; no wind
+from the north has disturbed it. Stranger still,
+it depends for its effect on the acquirement of a
+brilliant technique. Merely to play the castanets
+requires a severe tutelage. And yet it is all as
+spontaneous, as fresh, as unstudied, as vehement
+in its appeal, even to Spaniards, as it was in the
+beginning. Let us hope that Spain will have no
+artistic reawakening.</p>
+
+<p>Aristotle and Havelock Ellis and Louis Sherwin
+have taught us that the theatre should be an outlet
+for suppressed desires. So, indeed, the ideal
+theatre should. As a matter of fact, in most<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span>
+playhouses (I will generously refrain from naming
+the one I visited yesterday) I am continually
+suppressing a desire to strangle somebody or
+other, but after a visit to the Spaniards I walk out
+into Columbus Circle completely purged of pity
+and fear, love, hate, and all the rest. It is an
+experience.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>November 3, 1917.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="II" id="II"></a>II</h2>
+
+<h2>A Note on Mimi Aguglia</h2>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><i>"Art has to do only with the creation of beauty,
+whether it be in words, or sounds, or colour, or outline,
+or rhythmical movement; and the man who writes
+music is no more truly an artist than the man who
+plays that music, the poet who composes rhythms in
+words no more truly an artist than the dancer who
+composes rhythms with the body, and the one is no
+more to be preferred to the other, than the painter is
+to be preferred to the sculptor, or the musician to the
+poet, in those forms of art which we have agreed to
+recognize as of equal value."</i></p>
+
+<p class="author">
+Arthur Symons.<br />
+</p></div>
+
+
+<p>The only George Jean, "witty, wise, and
+cruel," and the "amaranthine" Louis Sherwin,
+who understands better than anybody
+else how to plunge the rapier into the vulnerable
+spot and twist it in the wound, making the victim
+writhe, have been having some fun with the art of
+acting lately, or to be exact, with the art of
+actors. Now actor-baiting is no new game; as a
+winter sport it is as popular as making jokes about
+mothers-in-law, decrying the art of Bouguereau or
+Howard Chandler Christy, or discussing the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span>
+methods of Mr. Belasco. Ever so long ago (and
+George Henry Lewes preceded him) George Moore
+wrote an article called "Mummer Worship," holding
+the players up to ridicule, but George really
+adores the theatre and even acting, goes to the
+playhouse constantly, and writes a bad play himself
+every few years. None of these has achieved
+success on the stage. The list includes <i>Martin
+Luther</i>, written with a collaborator, <i>The Strike at
+Arlingford</i>, <i>The Bending of the Bough</i> (Moore's
+version of a play by Edwin Martyn), a dramatization
+of "Esther Waters," <i>Elizabeth Cooper</i>, and
+the fragment, <i>The Apostle</i>, on which "The Brook
+Kerith," was based. Now he is at work turning
+the novel back into another play.... When the
+Sunday editor of a newspaper is at his wit's end
+he invariably sends a competent reporter to collect
+data for a symposium on one of two topics, Is
+the author or the player more important? or Does
+the stage director make the actor? The amount
+of amusement this reporter can derive in gathering
+indignant replies from mountebanks and scribblers
+is only limited by his own sense of humour.
+Even the late Sir Henry Irving felt compelled on
+more than one occasion to defend his "noble calling."</p>
+
+<p>The actor, when he slaps back, usually overlooks<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span>
+the point at issue, but sometimes he has something
+to say over which we may well ponder.
+Witness, for example, the following passage,
+quoted from that justly celebrated compendium
+of personal opinions and broad-shaft wit called
+"Nat Goodwin's Book": "The average author
+and manager of today are prone to advertise
+themselves as conspicuously as the play (as if the
+public cared a snap who wrote the play or who
+'presents'). I doubt if five per cent of the public
+know who wrote 'The Second Mrs. Tanqueray,'
+'In Mizzoura,' or 'Richelieu,' but they know their
+stage favourites. I wonder how many mantels are
+adorned with pictures of the successful dramatist
+and those who 'present' and how many there are
+on which appear Maude Adams, Dave Warfield,
+Billie Burke, John Drew, Bernhardt, Duse, and
+hundreds of other distinguished players."</p>
+
+<p>It is principally urged against the claims of
+acting as an art that a young person without previous
+experience or training can make an immediate
+(and sometimes lasting) effect upon the
+stage, whereas in the preparation for any other
+art (even the interpretative arts) years of training
+are necessary. This premise is full of holes;
+nevertheless George Moore, and Messrs. Nathan
+and Sherwin all cling to it. It is true that almost<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span>
+any young girl, moderately gifted with charm or
+comeliness, may make an instantaneous impression
+on our stage, especially in the namby-pamby r&ocirc;les
+which our playwrights usually give her to play.
+But she is soon found out. She may still attract
+audiences (as George Barr McCutcheon and Alma
+Tadema still attract audiences) but the discerning
+part of the public will take no joy in seeing her.
+Charles Frohman said (and he ought to know)
+that the average life of a female star on the American
+stage was ten years; in other words, her
+career continued as long as her youth and physical
+charms remained potent.</p>
+
+<p>We have easily accounted for the unimportant
+actors, the rank and file, but what about those who
+immediately claim positions which they hold in
+spite of their lack of previous training? These
+are rarer. At the moment, indeed, I cannot think
+of any. For while genius often manifests itself
+early in a career, the great actors, as a rule, have
+struggled for many years to learn the rudiments
+of their art before they have given indisputable
+proof of their greatness, or before they have been
+recognized. "Real acting," according to Percy
+Fitzgerald, "is a science, to be studied and mastered,
+as other sciences are studied and mastered,
+by long years of training." They may not have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span>
+had the strenuous Conservatoire and Th&eacute;&acirc;tre
+Fran&ccedil;ais training of Sarah Bernhardt. As a
+matter of fact, indeed, the actor may far better
+learn to handle his tools by manipulating them
+before an audience, than by practicing with them
+for too long a time in the closet. The technique
+of violin playing can best be acquired before the
+<i>virtuoso</i> appears in public, although no amount
+of training in itself will make a great violinist, but
+the basic elements of acting, grace, diction, etc.,
+can just as well be acquired behind the footlights
+and so many great actors have acquired them, as
+many of the greatest have ignored them. There
+can be no hard and fast rules laid down for this
+sort of thing. Can we thank nine months with
+Mme. Marchesi for the instantaneous success and
+subsequent brilliant career of Mme. Melba?
+Against this training offset the years and years of
+road playing and the more years of study at home
+in retirement to account for the career of Mrs.
+Fiske. The Australian soprano was born with a
+naturally-placed and flexible voice. Her shake
+is said to have been perfection when she was a
+child; her scale was even; her intonation impeccable.
+She had very little to learn except the r&ocirc;les
+in the operas she was to sing and her future was
+very clearly marked from the night she made her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span>
+d&eacute;but as Gilda in <i>Rigolett&ograve;</i>. Mme. Patti was
+equally gifted. Mme. Pasta and Mme. Fremstad,
+on the other hand, toiled very slowly towards fame.
+The former singer was an absolute failure when
+she first appeared in London and it took several
+years of hard work to make her the greatest lyric
+artist of her day. The great Jenny Lind retired
+from the stage completely defeated, only to return
+as the most popular singer of her time. Mischa
+Elman has told me he never practices; Leo Ornstein,
+on the other hand, spends hours every day
+at the piano. Mozart sprang, full-armed with
+genius, into the world. He began composing at
+the age of four. No training was necessary for
+him, but Beethoven and Wagner developed slowly.
+In the field of writers there are even more happy
+examples. Hundreds of boys have spent years in
+theme and literature courses in college preparing
+in vain for a future which was never to be theirs,
+while other youths with no educations have taken
+to writing as a cat takes to cat-nip. Should we
+assume that the annual output of Professor
+Baker's class at Harvard produces better playwrights
+than Moli&egrave;re or Shakespeare, neither of
+whom enjoyed Professor Baker's lectures, nor, I
+think I am safe in conjecturing, anything like
+them?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>What, after all, constitutes training? For a
+creative or interpretative genius mere existence
+seems to be sufficient. Joseph Conrad, Nicholas
+Rimsky-Korsakov, and Patrick MacGill all were
+sailors for many years before they began to write.
+We owe "Youth" and the first section of <i>Scheherazade</i>
+to this accident. MacGill also had the
+privilege of digging potatoes; he writes about it
+in "The Rat-pit." Mrs. Patrick Campbell
+learned enough about how to move about and how
+to speak in the country houses she frequented
+before she began her professional career to enable
+her immediately to take a position of importance
+on the stage. It does not seem necessary, indeed,
+that the training for any career should be prescribed
+or systematic. Some men get their training
+one way and some another. A school of acting
+may be of the greatest benefit to A, while B
+will not profit by it. Some actors are ruined by
+stock companies; others are improved by them.
+The geniuses in this interpretative art as in all
+the other interpretative and creative arts, seem to
+rise above obstructions, and to make themselves
+felt, whatever difficulties are put in their way.</p>
+
+<p>Some great actors, like some great musicians
+and authors, create out of their fulness. They
+cannot explain; they do not need to study; they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span>
+create by instinct. Others, like Beethoven and
+Olive Fremstad, work and rework their material
+in the closet until it approaches perfection, when
+they expose it. To say that there are bad actors
+following in the footsteps of both these types of
+geniuses is to be axiomatic and trite. It would
+be a foregone conclusion. Just as there are musicians
+who write as easily as Mozart but who
+have nothing to say, so there are other musicians
+who write and rewrite, work and rework, study
+and restudy, and yet what they finally offer the
+public has not the quality or the force or the inspiration
+of a common gutter-ballad.</p>
+
+<p>It has also been urged in print that as naturalness
+is the goal of the actor he should never have
+to strive for it. The names of Frank Reicher and
+John Drew are often mentioned as those of men
+who "play themselves" on the stage. A most
+difficult thing to do! Also an unfortunate choice
+of names. Each of these artists has undergone a
+long and arduous apprenticeship in order to
+achieve the natural method which has given him
+eminence in his career. Indeed, of all the qualities
+of the actor this is the least easy to acquire.</p>
+
+<p>Actors are often condemned because they are
+not versatile. Versatility is undoubtedly an admirable
+quality in an actor, valuable, especially to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span>
+his manager, but hardly an essential one. An artist
+is not required to do more than one thing well.
+Vladimir de Pachmann specializes in Chopin playing,
+but Arthur Symons once wrote that "he is the
+greatest living pianist, because he can play certain
+things better than any other pianist can play
+anything." Should we not allot similar approval
+to the actor or actress who makes a fine effect in
+one part or in one kind of part? I should not call
+Ellen Terry a versatile actress, but I should call
+her a great artist. Marie Tempest is not versatile,
+unless she should be so designated for having
+made equal successes on the lyric and dramatic
+stages, but she is one of the most satisfying artists
+at present appearing before our public. Mallarm&eacute;
+was not versatile; C&eacute;zanne was not versatile;
+nor was Thomas Love Peacock. Mascagni, assuredly,
+is not versatile. The da Vincis and Wagners
+are rare figures in the history of creative art
+just as the Nijinskys and Rachels are rare in the
+history of interpretative art.</p>
+
+<p>Someone may say that the great actor dies while
+the play goes thundering on through the ages on
+the stage and in everyman's library. This very
+point, indeed, is made by Mr. Lewes. But this,
+alas, is the reverse of the truth. We have competent
+and immensely absorbing records of the lives<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span>
+and art of David Garrick, Mrs. Siddons, Ristori,
+Clairon, Rachel, Charlotte Cushman, Edwin Booth,
+and other prominent players, while most of the
+plays in which they appeared are not only no
+longer actable, but also no longer readable. The
+brothers de Goncourt, for example, wrote an account
+of Clairon which is a book of the first interest,
+while I defy any one to get through two
+pages of most of the fustian she was compelled to
+act! The reason for this is very easily formulated.
+Great acting is human and universal. It
+is eternal in its appeal and its memory is easily
+kept alive while playwrighting is largely a matter
+of fashion, and appeals to the mob of men and
+women who never read and who are more interested
+in police news than they are in poetry. George
+Broadhurst or Henry Bernstein or Arthur Wing
+Pinero, or others like them, have always been the
+popular playwrights; a few names like Sophocles,
+Terence, Moli&egrave;re, Shakespeare, and Ibsen come
+rolling down to us, but they are precious and few.</p>
+
+<p>A great actor, indeed, can put life into perfectly
+wooden material. In the case of Sarah
+Bernhardt, who was the creator, the actress or
+Sardou? In the case of Henry Irving, who was
+the creator, the actor or the authors of <i>The Bells</i>
+and <i>Faust</i> (not, in this instance, Goethe)? Is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[Pg 303]</a></span>
+Langdon Mitchell's version of "Vanity Fair" sufficiently
+a work of art to exist without the co-operation
+of Mrs. Fiske? When Duse electrified
+her audiences in such plays as <i>The Second Mrs.
+Tanqueray</i> and <i>Fedora</i>, were the dramatists responsible
+for the effect? Arthur Symons says
+of her in the latter play, "A great actress, who is
+also a great intelligence, is seen accepting it, for
+its purpose, with contempt, as a thing to exercise
+her technical skill upon." One reads of Mrs. Siddone
+that she could move a roomful of people to
+tears merely by repeating the word "hippopotamus"
+with varying stress. Should we thank the
+behemoth for this miracle?</p>
+
+<p>Any one who understands, great acting knows
+that it is illumination. There are those who are
+born to throw light on the creations of the poets,
+just as there are others born to be poets. These
+interpreters give a new life to the works of the
+masters, &AElig;schylus, Congreve, Tchekhov. When,
+as more frequently happens, they are called upon
+to play mediocre parts it is with their own personal
+force, their atmospheric aura that they
+create something more than the author himself
+ever intended or dreamed of. How could Joseph
+Jefferson play <i>Rip Van Winkle</i> for thirty years
+(or longer) with scenery in tatters and a company<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[Pg 304]</a></span>
+of mummers which Corse Payton would have
+scorned? Was it because of the greatness of the
+play? If that were true, why is not some one else
+performing this drama today to large audiences?
+Has any one read the Joseph Jefferson acting
+version of <i>Rip Van Winkle</i>? Who wrote it?
+Don't you think it rather extraordinary that a
+play which apparently has given so much pleasure,
+and in which Jefferson was hailed as a great actor
+by every contemporary critic of note, as is in itself
+so little known? It is not extraordinary.
+It was Jefferson's performance of the title r&ocirc;le
+which gave vitality to the play.</p>
+
+<p>Of course, there are few actors who have this
+power, few great actors. What else could you
+expect? A critic might prove that playwriting
+was not an art on the majority of the evidence.
+Almost all the music composed in America could
+be piled up to prove that music was not an art.
+Should we say that there is no art of painting because
+the Germans have no great painters?</p>
+
+<p>At present, however, it is quite possible for any
+one in New York with car or taxi-cab fare to see
+one of the greatest of living actresses. She is not
+playing on Broadway. This actress has never been
+to dramatic school; she has not had the advantages<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[Pg 305]</a></span>
+of Alla Nazimova, who has worked with at least
+one fine stage director. She was simply born a
+genius, that is all; she has perfected her art by
+appearing in a great variety of parts, the method
+of Edwin Booth. Most of these parts happen to
+be in masterpieces of the drama. She is not unaccustomed
+to playing <i>Zaza</i> one evening and
+d'Annunzio's <i>Francesca da Rimini</i> the next. Her
+repertory further includes <i>La Dame aux Cam&eacute;lias</i>,
+<i>Hamlet</i>, <i>Romeo and Juliet</i>, <i>La Figlia di Iorio</i>,
+Giuseppe Giacosa's <i>Come le Foglie</i>, Sicilian folk-plays,
+and plays by Arturo Giovannitti. When I
+first saw Mimi Aguglia she was little more than a
+crude force, a great struggling light, that sometimes
+illuminated, nay often blinded, but which
+shone in unequal flashes. Experience has made of
+her an actress who is almost unfailing in her effect.
+If you asked her about the technique of her art
+she would probably smile (as Mozart and Schubert
+might have done before her); if you asked her
+about her method she would not understand you
+... but she understands the art of acting.</p>
+
+<p>Watch her, for instance, in the second act of
+<i>Zaza</i>, in the scene in which the music hall singer
+discovers that her lover has a wife and child. No
+heroics, no shrieks, no conventional posturings and
+shruggings and sobbing ... something far worse<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[Pg 306]</a></span>
+she exposes to us, a nameless terror. She stands
+with her back against a table, nonchalant and
+smilingly defiant, unwilling to return to the music
+hall with her former partner, but pleasantly jocular
+in her refusal. Stung into anger, he hurls his
+last bomb. Zaza is smoking. As she listens to
+the cruel words the corner of her mouth twitches,
+the cigarette almost falls. That is all. There is
+a moment's silence unbroken save by the heartbeats
+of her spectators. Even the babies which
+mothers bring in abundance to the Italian theatre
+are quiet. With that esoteric magnetism with
+which great artists are possessed she holds the audience
+captive by this simple gesture. I could
+continue to point out other astounding details
+in this impersonation, but not one of them, perhaps,
+would illustrate Aguglia's art as does this
+one. If no training is necessary to produce effects
+of this kind, I would pronounce acting the
+most holy of the arts, for then, surely, it is a
+direct gift from God.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>September 5, 1917.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[Pg 307]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2>
+
+<h2>The New Isadora</h2>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i4"><i>"We shift and bedeck and bedrape us,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i4"><i>Thou art noble and nude and antique;"</i><br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i10">Swinburne's "Dolores."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+<p>I have a fine memory of a chance description
+flung off by some one at a dinner in Paris; a
+picture of the youthful Isadora Duncan in her
+studio in New York developing her ideals through
+sheer will and preserving the contour of her feet
+by wearing carpet slippers. The latter detail
+stuck in my memory. It may or may not be true,
+but it could have been, <i>should</i> have been true. The
+incipient dancer keeping her feet pure for her
+coming marriage with her art is a subject for
+philosophic dissertation or for poetry. There are
+many poets who would have seized on this idea for
+an ode or even a sonnet, had it occurred to them.
+Oscar Wilde would have liked this excuse for a
+poem ... even Robert Browning, who would
+have woven many moral strophes from this text....
+It would have furnished Mr. George Moore
+with material for another story for the volume
+called "Celibates." Walter Pater might have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[Pg 308]</a></span>
+dived into some very beautiful, but very conscious,
+prose with this theme as a spring-board. Huysmans
+would have found this suggestion sufficient
+inspiration for a romance the length of "Clarissa
+Harlowe." You will remember that the author of
+"En Route" meditated writing a novel about a
+man who left his house to go to his office. Perceiving
+that his shoes have not been polished he
+stops at a boot-black's and during the operation
+he reviews his affairs. The problem was to make
+300 pages of this!... Lombroso would have
+added the detail to his long catalogue in "The Man
+of Genius" as another proof of the insanity of artists.
+Georges Feydeau would have found therein
+enough matter for a three-act farce and d'Annunzio
+for a poetic drama which he might have
+dedicated to "Isadora of the beautiful feet." Sermons
+might be preached from the text and many
+painters would touch the subject with reverence.
+Manet might have painted Isadora with one of the
+carpet slippers half depending from a bare, rosy-white
+foot.</p>
+
+<p>There are many fables concerning the beginning
+of Isadora's career. One has it that the original
+dance in bare feet was an accident.... Isadora
+was laving her feet in an upper chamber when her
+hostess begged her to dance for her other guests.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[Pg 309]</a></span>
+Just as she was she descended and met with such
+approval that thenceforth her feet remained bare.
+This is a pretty tale, but it has not the fine ring of
+truth of the story of the carpet slippers. There
+had been bare-foot dancers before Isadora; there
+had been, I venture to say, discinct "Greek
+dancers." Isadora's contribution to her art is
+spiritual; it is her feeling for the idea of the dance
+which isolates her from her contemporaries.
+Many have overlooked this essential fact in attempting
+to account for her obvious importance.
+Her imitators (and has any other interpretative
+artist ever had so many?) have purloined her costumes,
+her gestures, her steps; they have put the
+music of Beethoven and Schubert to new uses as
+she had done before them; they have unbound their
+hair and freed their feet; but the essence of her
+art, the <i>spirit</i>, they have left in her keeping; they
+could not well do otherwise.</p>
+
+<p>Inspired perhaps by Greek phrases, by the
+superb collection of Greek vases in the old Pinakotheck
+in Munich, Isadora cast the knowledge
+she had gleaned of the dancer's training from her.
+At least she forced it to be subservient to her new
+wishes. She flung aside her memory of the entrechat
+and the pirouette, the studied technique of the
+ballet; but in so doing she unveiled her own soul.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[Pg 310]</a></span>
+She called her art the renaissance of the Greek
+ideal but there was something modern about it,
+pagan though it might be in quality. Always it
+was pure and sexless ... always abstract emotion
+has guided her interpretations.</p>
+
+<p>In the beginning she danced to the piano music
+of Chopin and Schubert. Eleven years ago I saw
+her in Munich in a program of Schubert <i>impromptus</i>
+and Chopin <i>preludes</i> and <i>mazurkas</i>. A
+year or two later she was dancing in Paris to the
+accompaniment of the Colonne Orchestra, a good
+deal of the music of Gluck's <i>Orfeo</i> and the very
+lovely dances from <i>Iphig&eacute;nie en Aulide</i>. In these
+she remained faithful to her original ideal, the
+beauty of abstract movement, the rhythm of exquisite
+gesture. This was not sense echoing sound
+but rather a very delightful confusion of her own
+mood with that of the music.</p>
+
+<p>So a new grace, a new freedom were added to the
+dance; in her later representations she has added a
+third quality, strength. Too, her immediate interpretations
+often suggest concrete images....
+A passionate patriotism for one of her adopted
+countries is at the root of her fiery miming of
+the <i>Marseillaise</i>, a patriotism apparently as
+deep-rooted, certainly as inflaming, as that which
+inspired Rachel in her recitation of this hymn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[Pg 311]</a></span>
+during the Paris revolution of 1848. In times
+of civil or international conflagration the dancer,
+the actress often play important r&ocirc;les in world
+politics. Malvina Cavalazzi, the Italian <i>ballerina</i>
+who appeared at the Academy of Music during
+the Eighties and who married Charles Mapleson,
+son of the impressario, once told me of a part
+she had played in the making of United Italy.
+During the Austrian invasion the Italian flag was
+<i>verboten</i>. One night, however, during a representation
+of opera in a town the name of which I have
+forgotten, Mme. Cavalazzi wore a costume of green
+and white, while her male companion wore red, so
+that in the <i>pas de deux</i> which concluded the ballet
+they formed automatically a semblance of the
+Italian banner. The audience was raised to a
+hysterical pitch of enthusiasm and rushed from the
+theatre in a violent mood, which resulted in an
+immediate encounter with the Austrians and their
+eventual expulsion from the city.</p>
+
+<p>Isadora's pantomimic interpretation of the <i>Marseillaise</i>,
+given in New York before the United
+States had entered the world war, aroused as
+vehement and excited an expression of enthusiasm
+as it would be possible for an artist to awaken in
+our theatre today. The audiences stood up and
+scarcely restrained their impatience to cheer. At<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[Pg 312]</a></span>
+the previous performances in Paris, I am told, the
+effect approached the incredible.... In a robe
+the colour of blood she stands enfolded; she sees
+the enemy advance; she feels the enemy as it
+grasps her by the throat; she kisses her flag; she
+tastes blood; she is all but crushed under the
+weight of the attack; and then she rises, triumphant,
+with the terrible cry, <i>Aux armes, citoyens!</i>
+Part of her effect is gained by gesture, part by the
+massing of her body, but the greater part by
+facial expression. In the anguished appeal she
+does not make a sound, beyond that made by the
+orchestra, but the hideous din of a hundred raucous
+voices seems to ring in our ears. We see
+F&eacute;licien Rops's <i>Vengeance</i> come to life; we see the
+<i>sans-culottes</i> following the carts of the aristocrats
+on the way to execution ... and finally
+we see the superb calm, the majestic flowing
+strength of the Victory of Samothrace.... At
+times, legs, arms, a leg or an arm, the throat, or
+the exposed breast assume an importance above
+that of the rest of the mass, suggesting the unfinished
+sculpture of Michael Angelo, an aposiopesis
+which, of course, served as Rodin's inspiration.</p>
+
+<p>In the <i>Marche Slav</i> of Tschaikovsky Isadora
+symbolizes her conception of the Russian moujik
+rising from slavery to freedom. With her hands<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[Pg 313]</a></span>
+bound behind her back, groping, stumbling, head-bowed,
+knees bent, she struggles forward, clad only
+in a short red garment that barely covers her
+thighs. With furtive glances of extreme despair
+she peers above and ahead. When the strains of
+<i>God Save the Czar</i> are first heard in the orchestra
+she falls to her knees and you see the peasant
+shuddering under the blows of the knout. The
+picture is a tragic one, cumulative in its horrific
+details. Finally comes the moment of release and
+here Isadora makes one of her great effects. She
+does not spread her arms apart with a wide gesture.
+She brings them forward slowly and we
+observe with horror that they have practically forgotten
+how to move at all! They are crushed,
+these hands, crushed and bleeding after their long
+serfdom; they are not hands at all but claws,
+broken, twisted piteous claws! The expression of
+frightened, almost uncomprehending, joy with
+which Isadora concludes the march is another
+stroke of her vivid imaginative genius.</p>
+
+<p>In her third number inspired by the Great War,
+the <i>Marche Lorraine</i> of Louis Ganne, in which is
+incorporated the celebrated <i>Chanson Lorraine</i>,
+Isadora with her pupils, symbolizes the gaiety of
+the martial spirit. It is the spirit of the cavalry
+riding gaily with banners waving in the wind; the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[Pg 314]</a></span>
+infantry marching to an inspired tune. There is
+nothing of the horror of war or revolution in this
+picture ... only the brilliancy and dash of war
+... the power and the glory!</p>
+
+<p>Of late years Isadora has danced (in the conventional
+meaning of the word) less and less.
+Since her performance at Carnegie Hall several
+years ago of the <i>Liebestod</i> from <i>Tristan</i>, which
+Walter Damrosch hailed as an extremely interesting
+experiment, she has attempted to express
+something more than the joy of melody and
+rhythm. Indeed on at least three occasions she
+has danced a Requiem at the Metropolitan Opera
+House.... If the new art at its best is not
+dancing, neither is it wholly allied to the art of
+pantomime. It would seem, indeed, that Isadora
+is attempting to express something of the spirit of
+sculpture, perhaps what Vachell Lindsay describes
+as "moving sculpture." Her medium, of necessity,
+is still rhythmic gesture, but its development
+seems almost dream-like. More than the dance
+this new art partakes of the fluid and unending
+quality of music. Like any other new art it is
+not to be understood at first and I confess in the
+beginning it said nothing to me but eventually I
+began to take pleasure in watching it. Now Isadora's
+poetic and imaginative interpretation of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[Pg 315]</a></span>
+symphonic interlude from C&eacute;sar Franck's <i>Redemption</i>
+is full of beauty and meaning to me and during
+the whole course of its performance the interpreter
+scarcely rises from her knees. The neck,
+the throat, the shoulders, the head and arms are
+her means of expression. I thought of Barbey
+d'Aurevilly's phrase, "<i>Elle avait l'air de monter
+vers Dieu les mains toutes pleines de bonnes
+oeuvres.</i>"</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 45%;' />
+
+<p>Isadora's teaching has had its results but her influence
+has been wider in other directions. Fokine
+thanks her for the new Russian Ballet. She did
+indeed free the Russians from the conventions of
+the classic ballet and but for her it is doubtful
+if we should have seen <i>Scheherazade</i> and <i>Cl&eacute;op&acirc;tre</i>.
+<i>Daphnis et Chloe</i>, <i>Narcisse</i>, and <i>L'Apr&egrave;smidi
+d'un Faune</i> bear her direct stamp. This
+then, aside from her own appearances, has been
+her great work. Of her celebrated school of dancing
+I cannot speak with so much enthusiasm. The
+defect in her method of teaching is her insistence
+(consciously or unconsciously) on herself as a
+model. The seven remaining girls of her school
+dance delightfully. They are, in addition, young
+and beautiful, but they are miniature Isadoras.
+They add nothing to her style; they make the same<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[Pg 316]</a></span>
+gestures; they take the same steps; they have almost,
+if not quite, acquired a semblance of her
+spirit. They vibrate with intention; they have
+force; but constantly they suggest just what they
+are ... imitations. When they dance alone they
+often make a very charming but scarcely overpowering
+effect. When they dance with Isadora they
+are but a moving row of shadow shapes of Isadora
+that come and go. Her own presence suffices to
+make the effect they all make together.... I
+have been told that when Isadora watches her girls
+dance she often weeps, for then and then only she
+can behold herself. One of the griefs of an actor
+or a dancer is that he can never see himself. This
+oversight of nature Isadora has to some extent
+overcome.</p>
+
+<p>Those who like to see pretty dancing, pretty
+girls, pretty things in general will not find much
+pleasure in contemplating the art of Isadora.
+She is not pretty; her dancing is not pretty. She
+has been cast in nobler mould and it is her pleasure
+to climb higher mountains. Her gesture is
+titanic; her mood generally one of imperious grandeur.
+She has grown larger with the years&mdash;and
+by this I mean something more than the physical
+meaning of the word, for she is indeed heroic in
+build. But this is the secret of her power and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[Pg 317]</a></span>
+force. There is no suggestion of flabbiness about
+her and so she can impart to us the soul of the
+struggling moujik, the spirit of a nation, the figure
+on the prow of a Greek bark.... And when
+she interprets the <i>Marseillaise</i> she seems indeed to
+feel the mighty moment.</p>
+
+<p><span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>July 14, 1917.</i></span></p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[Pg 318]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2>
+
+<h2>Margaret Anglin Produces<br />
+<i>As You Like It</i></h2>
+
+
+<p>Of all the comedies of Shakespeare <i>As You
+Like It</i> is the one which has attracted to
+itself the most attention from actresses.
+No feminine star but what at one time or another
+has a desire to play Rosalind. Bernard Shaw
+says, "Who ever failed or could fail as Rosalind?"
+and I am inclined to think him right,
+though opinions differ. It would seem, however,
+that Rosalind is to the dramatic stage what Mimi
+in <i>La Boh&egrave;me</i> is to the lyric, a r&ocirc;le in which a
+maximum of effect can be gotten with a minimum
+of effort.</p>
+
+<p>Opinions differ however. Stung to fury by
+Mrs. Kendal's playing of the part, George Moore
+says somewhere, "Mrs. Kendal nurses children all
+day and strives to play Rosalind at night. What
+infatuation, what ridiculous endeavour! To realize
+the beautiful woodland passion and the idea of
+the transformation a woman must have sinned, for
+only through sin may we learn the charm of innocence.
+To play Rosalind a woman must have had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[Pg 319]</a></span>
+more than one lover, and if she has been made to
+wait in the rain and has been beaten she will have
+done a great deal to qualify herself for the part."
+Still another critic considers the r&ocirc;le a difficult one.
+He says: "With the exception of Lady Macbeth
+no woman in Shakespeare is so much in controversy
+as Rosalind. The character is thought to
+be almost unattainable. An ideal that is lofty but
+at the same time vague seems to possess the Shakespeare
+scholar, accompanied by the profound conviction
+that it never can be fulfilled. Only a few
+actresses have obtained recognition as Rosalind,
+chief among them being Mrs. Pritchard, Peg Woffington,
+Mrs. Dancer, Dora Jordan, Louisa Nesbitt,
+Helen Faucit, Ellen Tree, Adelaide Neilson,
+Mrs. Scott-Siddons and Miss Mary Anderson."</p>
+
+<p>Of those who have recently played Rosalind perhaps
+Mary Anderson, Ada Rehan, Henrietta Crosman
+and Julia Marlowe will remain longest in the
+memory, although Marie Wainwright, Mary Shaw,
+Mrs. Langtry and Julia Neilson are among a long
+list of those who have tried the part. Miss Rehan
+appeared in the r&ocirc;le when Augustin Daly revived
+the comedy at Daly's Theatre, December 17, 1889.
+We are told that an effort was made in this production
+to emphasize the buoyant gaiety of the
+piece. The scenery displayed the woods embellished<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[Pg 320]</a></span>
+in a springtime green, and the acting did
+away as much as possible with any of the underlying
+melancholy which flows through the comedy.</p>
+
+<p>William Winter frankly asserts&mdash;perhaps not
+unwittingly giving a staggering blow to the art of
+acting in so doing&mdash;that the reason Rosalind is
+not more often embodied "in a competent and enthralling
+manner is that her enchanting quality is
+something that cannot be assumed&mdash;it must be
+possessed; it must exist in the fibre of the individual,
+and its expression will then be spontaneous.
+Art can accomplish much, but it cannot supply the
+inherent captivation that constitutes the puissance
+of Rosalind. Miss Rehan possesses that quality,
+and the method of her art was the fluent method of
+natural grace."</p>
+
+<p>Fie and a fig for Mr. Moore's theory about being
+beaten and standing in the rain, implies Mr.
+Winter!</p>
+
+<p>To Mr. Winter I am also indebted for a description
+of Mary Anderson in <i>As You Like It</i>: "Miss
+Anderson, superbly handsome as Rosalind, indicated
+that beneath her pretty swagger, nimble
+satire and silver playfulness Rosalind is as earnest
+of Juliet&mdash;though different in temperament and
+mind&mdash;as fond as Viola and as constant as
+Imogen."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[Pg 321]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Miss Marlowe's Rosalind, somewhat along the
+same lines as Miss Anderson's, and Miss Crosman's,
+a hoydenish, tomboy sort of creature, first
+cousin to Mistress Nell and the young lady of <i>The
+Amazons</i>, should be familiar to theatregoers of the
+last two decades.</p>
+
+<p>Last Monday evening Margaret Anglin exposed
+her version of the comedy. As might have been
+expected, it has met with some unfavourable criticism.
+Preconceived notions of Rosalind are as
+prevalent as preconceived notions of Hamlet.
+And yet if <i>As You Like It</i> had been produced Monday
+night as a "new fantastic comedy," just as
+<i>Prunella</i> was, for instance, I am inclined to think
+that everybody who dissented would have been at
+Miss Anglin's charming heels.</p>
+
+<p>The scenery has been given undue prominence
+both by the management and by the writers for
+the newspapers. Its most interesting feature is
+the arrangement by which it is speedily changed
+about. There were no long waits caused by the
+settings of scenes during the acts. To say, however,
+that it has anything to do with the art of
+Gordon Craig is to speak nonsense. The scenes
+are painted in much the same manner as that to
+which we are accustomed and inured. There is a
+certain haze over the trees, caused partially by the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[Pg 322]</a></span>
+tints and partially by the lighting, which produces
+a rather charming effect, but the outlines of the
+trees are quite definite; no impressionism here.</p>
+
+<p>The acting is quite a different matter. <i>As You
+Like It</i> is one of the most modern in spirit of the
+Shakespeare plays. This air of modernity is still
+further emphasized by the fact that the play, for
+the most part, is written in prose. I feel certain
+that Bernard Shaw derived part of his inspiration
+for <i>Man and Superman</i> from <i>As You Like It</i>.
+Only in Shakespeare's play Ann Whitefield (Rosalind)
+pursues Octavius (Orlando) instead of
+Jack Tanner. I am inclined to believe that
+Shaw's psychology in this instance is the more
+sound. It seems incredible that a girl so witty,
+so beautiful, and so intelligent as Rosalind should
+waste so much time on that sentimental, uncomprehending
+creature known as Orlando. Every line
+of Orlando should have sounded the knell of his
+fate in her ears. However, it must be remembered
+that Orlando was young and good-looking, and
+that, at least in the play, men of the right stamp
+seemed to be scarce. Of course, it is out of
+Touchstone that Shaw has evolved his Jack Tanner.</p>
+
+<p>Whether Miss Anglin had this idea in mind or
+not when she produced the comedy I have no means<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[Pg 323]</a></span>
+of ascertaining. It is not essential to my point.
+At least she has emphasized it, and she has done
+the most intelligent stage directing that I have observed
+in the performance of a Shakespeare play
+for many a long season. There is consistency in
+the acting. Rosalind, Jaques, Touchstone, Celia,
+Oliver, the dukes, Charles, Sylvius, the whole lot,
+in fact, are natural in method and manner. There
+is no striving for the fantastic. Let that part of
+the comedy take care of itself, undoubtedly suggested
+Miss Anglin.</p>
+
+<p>Jaques, finely portrayed by Fuller Mellish, delivers
+that arrant bit of nonsense "The Seven
+Ages of Man" in such a manner as a man might
+tell a rather serious story in a drawing room.
+"The Seven Ages of Man," of course, is just
+as much of an aria as <i>La Donna e Mobile</i>. It
+always awakens applause, but this time the applause
+was deserved. Mr. Mellish emphasized the
+cynical side of the r&ocirc;le. He smiled in and out of
+season, and his most "melancholy" remarks were
+delivered in such a manner as to indicate that they
+were not too deeply felt. Jaques was a little bored
+with the forest and his companions, but he would
+have been quite in his element at Mme. R&eacute;camier's.
+Such was the impression that Fuller Mellish gave.
+Bravo, Mr. Mellish, for an impression!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[Pg 324]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Similarly the Touchstone of Sidney Greenstreet.
+We are accustomed to more physically attractive
+Touchstones, fools with finer bodies, and yet this
+keen-minded, stout person spoke his lines with such
+pertness and spontaneity that they rarely failed of
+their proper effect. As for Orlando, it seemed to
+me that Pedro de Cordoba was a little too rhetorical
+at times to fit in with the spirit of the performance,
+but Orlando at times does not fit into
+the play. For instance, when he utters those incredible
+lines:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"If ever you have looked on better days,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">If ever been where bells have knolled to church,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">If ever sat at any good man's feast,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">If ever from your eyelids wiped a tear...."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>I do not know whether Miss Anglin is a disciple
+of George Moore or William Winter in her acting
+of Rosalind. How she acquired her charm is not
+for us to seek into. It is only for us to credit her
+with having it in great plenty. A charming natural
+manner which made the masquerading lady
+seem more than a fantasy. Her warning to Phebe,</p>
+
+<p>
+"Sell when you can; you are not for all markets,"<br />
+</p>
+
+<p>was delicious in its effect. I remember no Rosalind
+who wooed her Orlando so delightfully. For<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[Pg 325]</a></span>
+Rosalind, as Woman the Pursuer, driven forward
+by the Life Force, is convincingly Miss Anglin's
+conception&mdash;a conception which fits the comedy
+admirably.</p>
+
+<p>As to the objections which have been raised to
+Miss Anglin's assumption of the masculine garments
+without any attempt at counterfeiting masculinity,
+I would ask my reader, if she be a woman,
+what she would do if she found it necessary to wear
+men's clothes. If she were not an actress she
+would undoubtedly behave much as she did in
+women's, suppressing unnecessary and telltale gestures
+as much as possible, but not trying to imitate
+mannish gestures which would immediately
+stamp her an impostor. There is no internal evidence
+in Shakespeare's play to prove that Rosalind
+was an actress. She might have appeared in private
+theatricals at the palace, but even that is
+doubtful. Consequently when she donned men's
+clothes it became evident to her that many men
+are effeminate in gesture and those that are do
+not ordinarily affect mannish movements. Her
+most obvious concealment was to be natural&mdash;quite
+herself. This, I think, is one of the most interesting
+and well-thought-out points of Miss
+Anglin's interpretation.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>March 20, 1914.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[Pg 327]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><a name="Modern" id="Modern"></a>The Modern Composers at a Glance</h3>
+
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[Pg 329]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="The_Modern_Composers" id="The_Modern_Composers"></a>The Modern Composers at a Glance</h2>
+
+
+<h3>An Impertinent Catalogue</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Igor Stravinsky</span>: Paul Revere rides in Russia.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Cyril Scott</span>: A young man playing Debussy in
+a Maidenhead villa.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Balilla Pratella</span>: Pretty noises in funny
+places.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Engelbert Humperdinck</span>: His master's voice.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Leo Ornstein</span>: A small boy upsetting a push-cart.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Giacomo Puccini</span>: Pinocchio in a passion.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Erik Satie</span>: A mandarin with a toy pistol firing
+into a wedding cake.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Paul Dukas</span>: A giant eating bonbons.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Riccardo Zandonai</span>: Brocade dipped in garlic.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Erich Korngold</span>: The white hope.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Arnold Schoenberg</span>: Six times six is thirty-six&mdash;and
+six is ninety-two!</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Maurice Ravel</span>: Tomorrow ... and tomorrow ...
+and tomorrow....</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Claude Debussy</span>: Chantecler crows <i>pianissimo</i>
+in whole tones.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[Pg 330]</a></span></p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Richard Strauss</span>: An ostrich <i>not</i> hiding his
+head.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Sir Edward Elgar</span>: The footman leaves his accordion
+in the bishop's carriage.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Italo Montemezzi</span>: Three Kings&mdash;but no aces.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Percy Aldridge Grainger</span>: An effete Australian
+chewing tobacco.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>August 8, 1917</i>.</span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="FOOTNOTES" id="FOOTNOTES"></a>FOOTNOTES:</h2>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> One evidence of this is that his works are eagerly sought
+after and treated tenderly by the second-hand book-sellers.
+Some of them command fancy prices.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> For an account of P&eacute;ladan see my essay on Erik Satie
+in "Interpreters and Interpretations."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> You will find an account of Balzac's interesting theory
+regarding names and letters, which may well have had a direct
+influence on Edgar Saltus, in Saltus's "Balzac," p. 29
+<i>et seq.</i> For a precisely contrary theory turn to "The Naming
+of Streets" in Max Beerbohm's "Yet Again."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> "Wit and Wisdom from Edgar Saltus" by G. F.
+Monkshood and George Gamble, and "The Cynic's Posy,"
+a collection of epigrams, the majority of which are taken
+from Saltus, may be brought forward in evidence.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> Certain books by Edgar Saltus have been announced
+from time to time but have never appeared; these include:
+"Annochiatura," "Immortal Greece," "Our Lady of
+Beauty," "Cimmeria," "Daughters of Dream," "Scaffolds
+and Altars," "Prince Charming," and "The Crimson Curtain."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> Houghton, Mifflin and Co,; 1884. Reprinted 1887 and
+1890.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> Houghton, Mifflin and Co.; 1885. Reprinted by the Belford
+Co.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> George J. Coombes; 1886. Reprinted by Brentano's.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> Scribner and Welford; 1887. Revised edition, Belford,
+Clarke and Co.; 1889.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> Brentano's; 1887.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> Benjamin and Bell; 1887.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> Belford Co.; 1888.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> Belford, Clarke and Co.; 1888.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> Belford Co.; 1889.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> Belford Co.; 1889.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Footnote_16_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> Belford, Clarke and Co.; 1889.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> Belford Co.; 1890.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> Belford Co.; 1891.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> Belford Co.; 1891. Reprinted by Mitchell Kennerley;
+1906.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> P. F. Collier; 1892; "Written especially for 'Once a
+Week Library.'"</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> Morrill, Higgins and Co;. 1893. Reprinted by Mitchell
+Kennerley; 1906.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> F. Tennyson Neely; 1893.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> Tudor Press: 1894.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_24_24" id="Footnote_24_24"></a><a href="#FNanchor_24_24"><span class="label">[24]</span></a> The Transatlantic Publishing Co.; 1895.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_25_25" id="Footnote_25_25"></a><a href="#FNanchor_25_25"><span class="label">[25]</span></a> Ainslee; 1903.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_26_26" id="Footnote_26_26"></a><a href="#FNanchor_26_26"><span class="label">[26]</span></a> A. Wessels Co.; 1905.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_27_27" id="Footnote_27_27"></a><a href="#FNanchor_27_27"><span class="label">[27]</span></a> Mitchell Kennerley; 1906.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_28_28" id="Footnote_28_28"></a><a href="#FNanchor_28_28"><span class="label">[28]</span></a> J. B. Lippincott Co.; 1906.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_29_29" id="Footnote_29_29"></a><a href="#FNanchor_29_29"><span class="label">[29]</span></a> Mitchell Kennerley; 1907.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_30_30" id="Footnote_30_30"></a><a href="#FNanchor_30_30"><span class="label">[30]</span></a> Mitchell Kennerley; 1907.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_31_31" id="Footnote_31_31"></a><a href="#FNanchor_31_31"><span class="label">[31]</span></a> Mitchell Kennerley; 1909.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_32_32" id="Footnote_32_32"></a><a href="#FNanchor_32_32"><span class="label">[32]</span></a> Pulitzer Publishing Co.; 1912.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_33_33" id="Footnote_33_33"></a><a href="#FNanchor_33_33"><span class="label">[33]</span></a> In an essay entitled "The Great American Composer" in
+my book, "Interpreters and Interpretations."</p></div>
+
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[Pg 331]</a></span></p><hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="Index" id="Index"></a>Index</h2>
+
+
+<p>
+Abbott, Emma, <a href="#Page_220">220</a><br />
+<br />
+Academy of Arts and Letters, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>, <a href="#Page_225">225</a>, <a href="#Page_227">227</a><br />
+<br />
+Acting, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>, <a href="#Page_293">293</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Adam, Villiers de l'Isle, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>, <a href="#Page_49">49</a><br />
+<br />
+Adams, Maude, <a href="#Page_295">295</a><br />
+<br />
+Adams, Oscar Fay, <a href="#Page_38">38</a><br />
+<br />
+&AElig;schylus, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a><br />
+<br />
+Agrippina, <a href="#Page_69">69</a><br />
+<br />
+Aguglia, Mimi, <a href="#Page_284">284</a>, <a href="#Page_304">304</a>, <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Ainslee's Magazine, <a href="#Page_75">75</a><br />
+<br />
+Alary, Signor, <a href="#Page_248">248</a><br />
+<br />
+Alboni, Marietta, <a href="#Page_169">169</a><br />
+<br />
+Alchemy, <a href="#Page_76">76</a><br />
+<br />
+Allegranti, Maddalena, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>, <a href="#Page_255">255</a><br />
+<br />
+Alma Tadema, <a href="#Page_296">296</a><br />
+<br />
+Alvary, Max, <a href="#Page_99">99</a><br />
+<br />
+Anderson, Mary, <a href="#Page_319">319</a>, <a href="#Page_320">320</a><br />
+<br />
+Anfossi, Pasquale, <a href="#Page_169">169</a><br />
+<br />
+Anglin, Margaret, <a href="#Page_321">321</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+d'Annunzio, G., <a href="#Page_284">284</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a><br />
+<br />
+Apaches, <a href="#Page_126">126</a>, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>, <a href="#Page_141">141</a> <i>et seq.</i>, <a href="#Page_182">182</a><br />
+<br />
+Apthorp, W. F., <a href="#Page_99">99</a>, <a href="#Page_168">168</a><br />
+<br />
+Arabanek, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Archilei, <a href="#Page_94">94</a><br />
+<br />
+Arditi, Luigi, <a href="#Page_288">288</a><br />
+<br />
+Argentina, La, <a href="#Page_284">284</a>, <a href="#Page_287">287</a><br />
+<br />
+Argus, The, <a href="#Page_54">54</a><br />
+<br />
+Aristotle, <a href="#Page_291">291</a><br />
+<br />
+Arne, <a href="#Page_257">257</a><br />
+<br />
+Arnould, Sophie, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>, <a href="#Page_259">259</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Astor, J. J., <a href="#Page_227">227</a><br />
+<br />
+Atilla, <a href="#Page_79">79</a><br />
+<br />
+Audran, <a href="#Page_216">216</a><br />
+<br />
+Augustus, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_70">70</a><br />
+<br />
+d'Aurevilly, Barbey, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>, <a href="#Page_63">63</a>, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315</a><br />
+<br />
+Ayres, Frederick, <a href="#Page_200">200</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Bach, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>, <a href="#Page_199">199</a><br />
+<br />
+Badarzewska, Th&eacute;cla, <a href="#Page_23">23</a><br />
+<br />
+Baedeker, <a href="#Page_58">58</a><br />
+<br />
+Bag-pipe, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>, <a href="#Page_136">136</a>, <a href="#Page_137">137</a><br />
+<br />
+Bahamas, <a href="#Page_136">136</a><br />
+<br />
+Baker, J. Duncan, <a href="#Page_211">211</a><br />
+<br />
+Baker, Prof., <a href="#Page_298">298</a><br />
+<br />
+Bakst, Leon, <a href="#Page_16">16</a><br />
+<br />
+Bal des Gravilliers, <a href="#Page_141">141</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Balfe, Michael William, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_165">165</a><br />
+<br />
+Bal musette, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Balzac, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>, <a href="#Page_63">63</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>, <a href="#Page_225">225</a><br />
+<br />
+Banti, Brigitta, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Bara, Theda, <a href="#Page_80">80</a><br />
+<br />
+Barnabee, Henry Clay, <a href="#Page_221">221</a><br />
+<br />
+Barnet, R. A., <a href="#Page_216">216</a><br />
+<br />
+Barrison, Mabel, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Barry, Mme. du, <a href="#Page_260">260</a><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[Pg 332]</a></span><br />
+Bassoonists, <a href="#Page_157">157</a><br />
+<br />
+Bataille, Henry, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>, <a href="#Page_232">232</a><br />
+<br />
+Bates, Katherine Lee, <a href="#Page_38">38</a><br />
+<br />
+Battistini, <a href="#Page_102">102</a><br />
+<br />
+Baudelaire, Charles, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a><br />
+<br />
+Baumgarten, C. F., <a href="#Page_171">171</a><br />
+<br />
+Bayes, Nora, <a href="#Page_110">110</a><br />
+<br />
+Beardsley, Aubrey, <a href="#Page_45">45</a><br />
+<br />
+Becque, Henry, <a href="#Page_230">230</a><br />
+<br />
+Beerbohm, Max, <a href="#Page_45">45</a>, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>, <a href="#Page_177">177</a>, <a href="#Page_238">238</a><br />
+<br />
+Beethoven, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>, <a href="#Page_219">219</a>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a>, <a href="#Page_300">300</a><br />
+<br />
+B&eacute;gu&eacute;, Bernard, <a href="#Page_156">156</a><br />
+<br />
+Belasco, David, <a href="#Page_294">294</a><br />
+<br />
+Bel canto, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>, <a href="#Page_105">105</a><br />
+<br />
+Belford's Magazine, <a href="#Page_37">37</a><br />
+<br />
+Bell, Digby, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Bellini, Vincenzo, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>, <a href="#Page_267">267</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>, <a href="#Page_273">273</a><br />
+<br />
+Bel-Marduk, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Bergstr&ouml;m, Hjalmar, 90<br />
+<br />
+Berlin, Irving, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>, <a href="#Page_234">234</a><br />
+<br />
+Berlioz, Hector, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a><br />
+<br />
+Bernacchi, Antonio, <a href="#Page_99">99</a><br />
+<br />
+Bernhardt, Sarah, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>, <a href="#Page_227">227</a>, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295</a>, <a href="#Page_297">297</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Bernstein, Henry, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>, <a href="#Page_232">232</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Bible, The, <a href="#Page_67">67</a><br />
+<br />
+Bichara, <a href="#Page_15">15</a><br />
+<br />
+Bilbao, <a href="#Page_287">287</a><br />
+<br />
+Billington, Mrs., <a href="#Page_172">172</a><br />
+<br />
+Bizet, Georges, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a><br />
+<br />
+Blanche, Jacques, <a href="#Page_183">183</a>, <a href="#Page_184">184</a><br />
+<br />
+Blei, Franz, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>, <a href="#Page_259">259</a><br />
+<br />
+B&ouml;cklin, Arnold, <a href="#Page_89">89</a><br />
+<br />
+Bonci, Alessandro, <a href="#Page_102">102</a><br />
+<br />
+Booth, Edwin, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a><br />
+<br />
+Bouguereau, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>, <a href="#Page_293">293</a><br />
+<br />
+Bourget, Paul, <a href="#Page_76">76</a><br />
+<br />
+Boyden, Frank L., <a href="#Page_203">203</a><br />
+<br />
+Boynton, Henry Walcott, <a href="#Page_38">38</a><br />
+<br />
+Brahma, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Brahms, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_274">274</a><br />
+<br />
+Brann-Brini, Mlle., <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Branscombe, Gena, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a><br />
+<br />
+Brenon, Algernon St. John, <a href="#Page_162">162</a><br />
+<br />
+Bret&oacute;n, Tom&aacute;s, <a href="#Page_113">113</a><br />
+<br />
+Brian, Donald, <a href="#Page_217">217</a><br />
+<br />
+Brice, Fannie, <a href="#Page_110">110</a><br />
+<br />
+Brieux, <a href="#Page_230">230</a><br />
+<br />
+Brignoli, Pasquale, <a href="#Page_155">155</a><br />
+<br />
+Broadhurst, George, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Bromley, Eliza, <a href="#Page_74">74</a><br />
+<br />
+Brothers of the Book, <a href="#Page_85">85</a><br />
+<br />
+Browning, Robert, <a href="#Page_307">307</a><br />
+<br />
+Bunn, Alfred, <a href="#Page_165">165</a><br />
+<br />
+Burke, Billie, <a href="#Page_295">295</a><br />
+<br />
+Burney, Dr., <a href="#Page_258">258</a><br />
+<br />
+Butler, Samuel, <a href="#Page_21">21</a><br />
+<br />
+Byzance, <a href="#Page_80">80</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Cabanel, <a href="#Page_61">61</a><br />
+<br />
+C&aelig;sar, Julius, <a href="#Page_69">69</a><br />
+<br />
+Caffarelli, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>, <a href="#Page_112">112</a><br />
+<br />
+Cahill, Marie, <a href="#Page_110">110</a><br />
+<br />
+Cairns, William B., <a href="#Page_38">38</a><br />
+<br />
+Caligula, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_79">79</a><br />
+<br />
+Calv&eacute;, Emma, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a><br />
+<br />
+Camargo, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>, <a href="#Page_259">259</a><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[Pg 333]</a></span><br />
+Campanari, Giuseppe, <a href="#Page_161">161</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a><br />
+<br />
+Campbell, Mrs. Patrick, <a href="#Page_299">299</a><br />
+<br />
+Caracalla, <a href="#Page_79">79</a><br />
+<br />
+Carestini, Giovanni, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>, <a href="#Page_96">96</a><br />
+<br />
+Carmencita, <a href="#Page_285">285</a><br />
+<br />
+Carnegie Hall, <a href="#Page_25">25</a><br />
+<br />
+Carr&eacute;, Albert, <a href="#Page_133">133</a><br />
+<br />
+Carre&ntilde;o, Teresa, <a href="#Page_153">153</a><br />
+<br />
+Caruso, Enrico, <a href="#Page_272">272</a><br />
+<br />
+Cassive, Armande, <a href="#Page_232">232</a><br />
+<br />
+Catalani, Angelica, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>, <a href="#Page_265">265</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Cato, <a href="#Page_69">69</a><br />
+<br />
+Cats, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_132">132</a>, <a href="#Page_233">233</a>, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>, <a href="#Page_259">259</a>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a><br />
+<br />
+Cavalazzi, Malvina, <a href="#Page_310">310</a><br />
+<br />
+Cesare Borgia, <a href="#Page_79">79</a><br />
+<br />
+C&eacute;zanne, <a href="#Page_301">301</a><br />
+<br />
+Chabrier, Emmanuel, <a href="#Page_285">285</a><br />
+<br />
+Chadwick, George W., <a href="#Page_197">197</a>, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>, <a href="#Page_212">212</a><br />
+<br />
+Chambers, Robert W., <a href="#Page_290">290</a><br />
+<br />
+Chaliapine, Feodor, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>, <a href="#Page_155">155</a><br />
+<br />
+Charpentier, Gustave, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_132">132</a>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>, <a href="#Page_173">173</a><br />
+<br />
+Cherubini, <a href="#Page_98">98</a><br />
+<br />
+Cherubino's question, <a href="#Page_54">54</a><br />
+<br />
+Chinese plays, <a href="#Page_103">103</a><br />
+<br />
+Chopin, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_112">112</a>, <a href="#Page_239">239</a>, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>, <a href="#Page_301">301</a>, <a href="#Page_310">310</a><br />
+<br />
+Chorley, Henry Fothergill, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>, <a href="#Page_169">169</a>, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>, <a href="#Page_249">249</a>, <a href="#Page_261">261</a><br />
+<br />
+Christ, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>, <a href="#Page_185">185</a>, <a href="#Page_191">191</a>, <a href="#Page_192">192</a><br />
+<br />
+Christianity, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>, <a href="#Page_68">68</a>, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>, <a href="#Page_83">83</a><br />
+<br />
+Christy, Howard Chandler, <a href="#Page_293">293</a><br />
+<br />
+Churchill, Lady Randolph, <a href="#Page_185">185</a><br />
+<br />
+Cimarosa, Domenico, <a href="#Page_255">255</a><br />
+<br />
+Cinderella, <a href="#Page_137">137</a><br />
+<br />
+Cicisbeism, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Clairon, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Classical music, <a href="#Page_23">23</a><br />
+<br />
+Claudius, <a href="#Page_69">69</a><br />
+<br />
+Cleopatra, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Cline, Maggie, <a href="#Page_107">107</a><br />
+<br />
+Coerne, L. A., <a href="#Page_199">199</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a><br />
+<br />
+Cohan, George M., <a href="#Page_288">288</a><br />
+<br />
+Colles, Ramsay, <a href="#Page_39">39</a><br />
+<br />
+Colonne Orchestra, <a href="#Page_310">310</a><br />
+<br />
+Coloratura singing, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a><br />
+<br />
+Columbia University, <a href="#Page_43">43</a><br />
+<br />
+Comstock, Anthony, <a href="#Page_59">59</a><br />
+<br />
+Condamine, Robert de la, <a href="#Page_183">183</a><br />
+<br />
+Congreve, <a href="#Page_303">303</a><br />
+<br />
+Conrad, Joseph, <a href="#Page_299">299</a><br />
+<br />
+Conried, Henrich, <a href="#Page_161">161</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a><br />
+<br />
+Converse, Frederick, <a href="#Page_212">212</a><br />
+<br />
+Cooking, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Cordoba, Pedro de, <a href="#Page_324">324</a><br />
+<br />
+Corneille, <a href="#Page_104">104</a><br />
+<br />
+Costa, Michael, <a href="#Page_163">163</a><br />
+<br />
+Cou-Cou Restaurant, <a href="#Page_125">125</a> <i>et seq.</i>, <a href="#Page_183">183</a><br />
+<br />
+Courts of Love, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Cox, J. E., <a href="#Page_165">165</a>, <a href="#Page_173">173</a>, <a href="#Page_264">264</a><br />
+<br />
+Cox, Kenyon, <a href="#Page_62">62</a><br />
+<br />
+Craig, Gordon, <a href="#Page_321">321</a><br />
+<br />
+Critics, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_105">105</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>, <a href="#Page_234">234</a><br />
+<br />
+Crosman, Henrietta, <a href="#Page_319">319</a>, <a href="#Page_321">321</a><br />
+<br />
+Crowest, Frederick, <a href="#Page_163">163</a>, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Current Literature, <a href="#Page_39">39</a><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[Pg 334]</a></span><br />
+Cushman, Charlotte, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Cuzzoni, Francesca, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>, <a href="#Page_258">258</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Daly, Augustin, <a href="#Page_319">319</a><br />
+<br />
+Daly, Dan, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Damrosch, Walter, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>, <a href="#Page_314">314</a><br />
+<br />
+Dancing, <a href="#Page_112">112</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_137">137</a> <i>et seq.</i>, <a href="#Page_281">281</a> <i>et seq.</i>, <a href="#Page_307">307</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Dante, <a href="#Page_76">76</a><br />
+<br />
+Darby, W. D., <a href="#Page_200">200</a><br />
+<br />
+Davis, Cecilia, <a href="#Page_253">253</a><br />
+<br />
+Davis, Jessie Bartlett, <a href="#Page_221">221</a><br />
+<br />
+Davis, Owen, <a href="#Page_93">93</a><br />
+<br />
+Debussy, Claude, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315</a>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Decoration, Interior, <a href="#Page_11">11</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Delacroix, <a href="#Page_19">19</a><br />
+<br />
+Delibes, L&eacute;o, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a><br />
+<br />
+Deslys, Gaby, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Destinn, Emmy, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>, <a href="#Page_155">155</a><br />
+<br />
+Devi, Ratan, <a href="#Page_109">109</a><br />
+<br />
+Dickens, Charles, <a href="#Page_187">187</a><br />
+<br />
+Dolmetsch, Arnold, <a href="#Page_192">192</a><br />
+<br />
+Doloretes, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>, <a href="#Page_287">287</a>, <a href="#Page_288">288</a><br />
+<br />
+Donizetti, Gaetano, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>, <a href="#Page_88">88</a>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>, <a href="#Page_173">173</a>, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>, <a href="#Page_249">249</a>, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>, <a href="#Page_263">263</a><br />
+<br />
+Doubleday, <a href="#Page_203">203</a><br />
+<br />
+Dreiser, Theodore, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>, <a href="#Page_203">203</a><br />
+<br />
+Dresser, Paul, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>, <a href="#Page_203">203</a><br />
+<br />
+Dressler, Marie, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Drew, John, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295</a>, <a href="#Page_300">300</a><br />
+<br />
+Duclos, <a href="#Page_259">259</a><br />
+<br />
+Duff-Gordon, Lady, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Dukas, Paul, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Dumas, Alexandre, <i>fils</i>, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>, <a href="#Page_205">205</a><br />
+<br />
+Duncan, Isadora, <a href="#Page_307">307</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Duse, Eleanora, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295</a>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a><br />
+<br />
+Dussek, Johann Ludwig, <a href="#Page_171">171</a><br />
+<br />
+Dyer, Edward, <a href="#Page_209">209</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Eames, Emma, <a href="#Page_275">275</a><br />
+<br />
+Earle, Virginia, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Ehrhard, Auguste, <a href="#Page_55">55</a><br />
+<br />
+Elgar, Sir Edward, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Elizabethan plays, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>, <a href="#Page_103">103</a><br />
+<br />
+Ellis, Havelock, <a href="#Page_281">281</a>, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>, <a href="#Page_291">291</a><br />
+<br />
+Ellis, Melville, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Elman, Mischa, <a href="#Page_298">298</a><br />
+<br />
+Elson, L. C., <a href="#Page_198">198</a>, <a href="#Page_199">199</a><br />
+<br />
+Elssler, Fanny, <a href="#Page_55">55</a><br />
+<br />
+Eltinge, Julian, <a href="#Page_96">96</a><br />
+<br />
+Emerson, Ralph Waldo, <a href="#Page_43">43</a><br />
+<br />
+Euripides, <a href="#Page_103">103</a><br />
+<br />
+Evertson, Admiral Kornelis, <a href="#Page_42">42</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Fall, Leo, <a href="#Page_216">216</a><br />
+<br />
+Fame, <a href="#Page_42">42</a><br />
+<br />
+Farinelli, <a href="#Page_95">95</a><br />
+<br />
+Farwell, Arthur, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a><br />
+<br />
+Faustina, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>, <a href="#Page_258">258</a><br />
+<br />
+Fawcett, Edgar, <a href="#Page_66">66</a><br />
+<br />
+F&eacute;vrier, Henry, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a><br />
+<br />
+Feydeau, Georges, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>, <a href="#Page_229">229</a>, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>, <a href="#Page_232">232</a>, <a href="#Page_233">233</a>, <a href="#Page_236">236</a>, <a href="#Page_237">237</a>, <a href="#Page_308">308</a><br />
+<br />
+Finck, H. T., <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>, <a href="#Page_272">272</a><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[Pg 335]</a></span><br />
+Fischer, Johann Christian, <a href="#Page_161">161</a><br />
+<br />
+Fiske, Mrs., <a href="#Page_297">297</a>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a><br />
+<br />
+Fitzgerald, Percy, <a href="#Page_296">296</a><br />
+<br />
+Flaubert, Gustave, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a><br />
+<br />
+Folk-song, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>, <a href="#Page_152">152</a><br />
+<br />
+Follies, The, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>, <a href="#Page_223">223</a><br />
+<br />
+Foote, Arthur, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a><br />
+<br />
+Ford, Richard, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>, <a href="#Page_291">291</a><br />
+<br />
+Formes, Karl, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Forum, The, <a href="#Page_87">87</a><br />
+<br />
+Foster, Stephen, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_152">152</a><br />
+<br />
+Fox, Della, <a href="#Page_217">217</a>, <a href="#Page_218">218</a>, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Fox, Helen Kelsey, <a href="#Page_208">208</a><br />
+<br />
+Fragonard, <a href="#Page_18">18</a><br />
+<br />
+France, Anatole, <a href="#Page_68">68</a>, <a href="#Page_185">185</a>, <a href="#Page_193">193</a><br />
+<br />
+Franck, C&eacute;sar, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315</a><br />
+<br />
+Franz, Robert, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a><br />
+<br />
+Fremstad, Olive, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a>, <a href="#Page_300">300</a><br />
+<br />
+Freud, <a href="#Page_50">50</a><br />
+<br />
+Frezzolini, Erminia, <a href="#Page_261">261</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Frohman, Charles, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>, <a href="#Page_296">296</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Gadski, Johanna, <a href="#Page_155">155</a><br />
+<br />
+Galli, Signora, <a href="#Page_254">254</a><br />
+<br />
+Galli-Curci, Amelita, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a><br />
+<br />
+Gamble, George, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_54">54</a><br />
+<br />
+Ganne, Louis, <a href="#Page_313">313</a><br />
+<br />
+Garcia, Manuel, <a href="#Page_160">160</a><br />
+<br />
+Garcia, Manuel, <i>fils</i>, <a href="#Page_252">252</a><br />
+<br />
+Garden, Mary, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a> <i>et seq.</i>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>, <a href="#Page_155">155</a><br />
+<br />
+Gardiner, William, <a href="#Page_267">267</a><br />
+<br />
+Garrick, David, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Gautier, Th&eacute;ophile, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>, <a href="#Page_225">225</a><br />
+<br />
+German music, <a href="#Page_150">150</a><br />
+<br />
+Gerome, <a href="#Page_61">61</a><br />
+<br />
+Gerster, Etelka, <a href="#Page_269">269</a><br />
+<br />
+Giacosa, <a href="#Page_284">284</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a><br />
+<br />
+Giardini, Felice de, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Gibbons, Grinling, <a href="#Page_19">19</a><br />
+<br />
+Gilbert, W. S., <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>, <a href="#Page_221">221</a><br />
+<br />
+Giovannitti, Arturo, <a href="#Page_305">305</a><br />
+<br />
+Gipsy, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_286">286</a><br />
+<br />
+Gizziello, <a href="#Page_95">95</a><br />
+<br />
+Glaser, Lulu, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Gluck, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>, <a href="#Page_232">232</a>, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>, <a href="#Page_259">259</a>, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>, <a href="#Page_310">310</a><br />
+<br />
+Goncourt, Brothers de, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Goodrich, A. J., <a href="#Page_199">199</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a><br />
+<br />
+Goodwin, Nat, <a href="#Page_295">295</a><br />
+<br />
+Gosse, Edmund, <a href="#Page_179">179</a><br />
+<br />
+Gounod, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>, <a href="#Page_273">273</a><br />
+<br />
+Gourmont, Remy de, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>, <a href="#Page_229">229</a><br />
+<br />
+Goya, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>, <a href="#Page_287">287</a><br />
+<br />
+Grainger, Percy, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_330">330</a><br />
+<br />
+Grau, Maurice, <a href="#Page_161">161</a><br />
+<br />
+Greek Plays, <a href="#Page_103">103</a><br />
+<br />
+Greenstreet, Sidney, <a href="#Page_324">324</a><br />
+<br />
+Greenwich Village, <a href="#Page_16">16</a><br />
+<br />
+Gregory, Lady, <a href="#Page_192">192</a><br />
+<br />
+Gr&eacute;try, <a href="#Page_170">170</a><br />
+<br />
+Grieg, Edvard, <a href="#Page_93">93</a><br />
+<br />
+Grimm, <a href="#Page_259">259</a><br />
+<br />
+Grisi, Giulia, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>, <a href="#Page_263">263</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Grove, Sir George, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a><br />
+<br />
+Guilbert, Yvette, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>, <a href="#Page_277">277</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Hadley, Henry, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>, <a href="#Page_212">212</a><br />
+<br />
+Hadrian, <a href="#Page_69">69</a><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[Pg 336]</a></span><br />
+Hale, Philip, <a href="#Page_33">33</a><br />
+<br />
+Hal&eacute;vy, Jacques, <a href="#Page_248">248</a><br />
+<br />
+Hall, Pauline, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Handel, George Frederick, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>, <a href="#Page_254">254</a><br />
+<br />
+Hanslick, Eduard, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_263">263</a><br />
+<br />
+Harris, Charles K., <a href="#Page_202">202</a><br />
+<br />
+Harris, Frank, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_189">189</a>, <a href="#Page_190">190</a><br />
+<br />
+Hartmann, Eduard von, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>, <a href="#Page_60">60</a><br />
+<br />
+Hawthorne vases, <a href="#Page_18">18</a><br />
+<br />
+Hay, Reverend John Stuart, <a href="#Page_72">72</a><br />
+<br />
+Haydn, <a href="#Page_28">28</a><br />
+<br />
+Heidelberg, <a href="#Page_43">43</a><br />
+<br />
+Heifetz, Jascha, <a href="#Page_287">287</a><br />
+<br />
+Heine, Heinrich, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>, <a href="#Page_287">287</a><br />
+<br />
+Heinrich, Max, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>, <a href="#Page_246">246</a><br />
+<br />
+Helen of Troy, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Heliogabolus, <a href="#Page_68">68</a>, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_72">72</a><br />
+<br />
+H&eacute;lo&iuml;se, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Helvetius, <a href="#Page_259">259</a><br />
+<br />
+Henderson, W. J., <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a><br />
+<br />
+Herbert, Victor, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>, <a href="#Page_216">216</a><br />
+<br />
+Hergesheimer, Joseph, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a><br />
+<br />
+Herodotus, <a href="#Page_86">86</a><br />
+<br />
+Hertz, Alfred, <a href="#Page_155">155</a><br />
+<br />
+Hervieu, Paul, <a href="#Page_228">228</a><br />
+<br />
+Heyse, Paul, <a href="#Page_67">67</a><br />
+<br />
+Hichens, Robert, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>, <a href="#Page_81">81</a><br />
+<br />
+Higginson, Thomas Wentworth, <a href="#Page_38">38</a><br />
+<br />
+Hirsch, Charles-Henry, <a href="#Page_141">141</a><br />
+<br />
+Hirsch, Louis A., <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Hoff, Edwin, <a href="#Page_221">221</a><br />
+<br />
+Hollins, Mabel, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Homer, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_86">86</a><br />
+<br />
+Hopper, De Wolf, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_221">221</a><br />
+<br />
+Hopwood, Avery, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>, <a href="#Page_236">236</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Horace, <a href="#Page_76">76</a><br />
+<br />
+Howells, W. D., <a href="#Page_74">74</a>, <a href="#Page_191">191</a><br />
+<br />
+Hubbard, Elbert, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_48">48</a><br />
+<br />
+Hughes, Rupert, <a href="#Page_198">198</a>, <a href="#Page_199">199</a><br />
+<br />
+Hugo, Victor, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>, <a href="#Page_105">105</a><br />
+<br />
+Humperdinck, Engelbert, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_173">173</a>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Huneker, James, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>, <a href="#Page_154">154</a>, <a href="#Page_164">164</a>, <a href="#Page_173">173</a><br />
+<br />
+Huss, Henry Holden, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a><br />
+<br />
+Huysmans, J. K., <a href="#Page_43">43</a>, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>, <a href="#Page_191">191</a>, <a href="#Page_308">308</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Ibsen, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Incest, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>, <a href="#Page_84">84</a><br />
+<br />
+d'Indy, Vincent, <a href="#Page_200">200</a><br />
+<br />
+Irving, Sir Henry, <a href="#Page_294">294</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Irwin, May, <a href="#Page_110">110</a><br />
+<br />
+Ivan the Terrible, <a href="#Page_79">79</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Jackson, Holbrook, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>, <a href="#Page_63">63</a><br />
+<br />
+James, Henry, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>, <a href="#Page_68">68</a>, <a href="#Page_231">231</a><br />
+<br />
+Janis, Elsie, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Jansen, Marie, <a href="#Page_219">219</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Jefferson, Joseph, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>, <a href="#Page_304">304</a><br />
+<br />
+Jehovah, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Jensen, Adolph, <a href="#Page_24">24</a><br />
+<br />
+Jew, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_152">152</a><br />
+<br />
+Joachim, Joseph, <a href="#Page_156">156</a><br />
+<br />
+Jolson, Al, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Jones, Henry Arthur, <a href="#Page_234">234</a><br />
+<br />
+Joseffy, Rafael, <a href="#Page_155">155</a><br />
+<br />
+Judic, <a href="#Page_220">220</a><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[Pg 337]</a></span><br />
+Jupiter, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Kaiser, The, <a href="#Page_79">79</a><br />
+<br />
+Kapila, <a href="#Page_57">57</a><br />
+<br />
+Keane, Doris, <a href="#Page_13">13</a><br />
+<br />
+Kellogg, Clara Louise, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>, <a href="#Page_268">268</a>, <a href="#Page_269">269</a><br />
+<br />
+Kellow, Lottie A., <a href="#Page_203">203</a>, <a href="#Page_204">204</a><br />
+<br />
+Kelly, Michael, <a href="#Page_159">159</a>, <a href="#Page_160">160</a>, <a href="#Page_161">161</a>, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>, <a href="#Page_256">256</a><br />
+<br />
+Kendal, Mrs., <a href="#Page_318">318</a><br />
+<br />
+Kenton, Edna, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>, <a href="#Page_53">53</a><br />
+<br />
+Ker, Ann, <a href="#Page_74">74</a><br />
+<br />
+Kern, Jerome, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Korngold, Erich, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Koven, Reginald de, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>, <a href="#Page_221">221</a><br />
+<br />
+Krehbiel, H. E., <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>, <a href="#Page_155">155</a><br />
+<br />
+Krishna, <a href="#Page_83">83</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Labatt, <a href="#Page_104">104</a><br />
+<br />
+Lablache, Luigi, <a href="#Page_163">163</a><br />
+<br />
+Laforgue, Jules, <a href="#Page_43">43</a><br />
+<br />
+Laguerre, Mme., <a href="#Page_260">260</a><br />
+<br />
+La Harpe, <a href="#Page_260">260</a><br />
+<br />
+Lalo, Pierre, <a href="#Page_33">33</a><br />
+<br />
+Lampridius, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Page_72">72</a><br />
+<br />
+Lavignac, Albert, <a href="#Page_173">173</a><br />
+<br />
+Lecocq, Charles, <a href="#Page_173">173</a>, <a href="#Page_216">216</a><br />
+<br />
+Lehar, Franz, <a href="#Page_216">216</a><br />
+<br />
+Lehmann, Lilli, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>, <a href="#Page_274">274</a><br />
+<br />
+Leoncavallo, Ruggiero, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a><br />
+<br />
+Lesbian, <a href="#Page_75">75</a><br />
+<br />
+Lessing, Madge, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Levey, Ethel, <a href="#Page_110">110</a><br />
+<br />
+Lewes, George Henry, <a href="#Page_294">294</a>, <a href="#Page_301">301</a><br />
+<br />
+Lienau's, <a href="#Page_154">154</a><br />
+<br />
+Lind, Jenny, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>, <a href="#Page_265">265</a> <i>et seq.</i>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a><br />
+<br />
+Lindsay, Vachell, <a href="#Page_314">314</a><br />
+<br />
+Lippincott's Magazine, <a href="#Page_63">63</a><br />
+<br />
+Lisle, Leconte de, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a><br />
+<br />
+Liszt, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_240">240</a><br />
+<br />
+Lombard, Jean, <a href="#Page_69">69</a><br />
+<br />
+Lombroso, <a href="#Page_308">308</a><br />
+<br />
+Loomis, Harvey W., <a href="#Page_200">200</a><br />
+<br />
+Louis XIV, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>, <a href="#Page_137">137</a><br />
+<br />
+Louis XV, <a href="#Page_12">12</a><br />
+<br />
+Love, <a href="#Page_81">81</a>, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Loy, Mina, <a href="#Page_188">188</a><br />
+<br />
+Lucca, Pauline, <a href="#Page_269">269</a><br />
+<br />
+Lulli, <a href="#Page_172">172</a><br />
+<br />
+Lumley, Benjamin, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>, <a href="#Page_286">286</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+MacDowell, Edward, <a href="#Page_25">25</a><br />
+<br />
+Macdonald, John Z., <a href="#Page_208">208</a><br />
+<br />
+MacGill, Patrick, <a href="#Page_299">299</a><br />
+<br />
+MacKaye, Percy, <a href="#Page_235">235</a><br />
+<br />
+McCutcheon, George Barr, <a href="#Page_296">296</a><br />
+<br />
+McIntosh, Nancy, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Macy, John, <a href="#Page_38">38</a><br />
+<br />
+Maeterlinck, Maurice, <a href="#Page_117">117</a><br />
+<br />
+Mahler, Gustav, <a href="#Page_28">28</a><br />
+<br />
+Male sopranos, <a href="#Page_94">94</a><br />
+<br />
+Malibran, Maria, <a href="#Page_164">164</a>, <a href="#Page_165">165</a>, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a><br />
+<br />
+Mallarm&eacute;, St&eacute;phane, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>, <a href="#Page_301">301</a><br />
+<br />
+Manet, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>, <a href="#Page_308">308</a><br />
+<br />
+Mapleson, J. H., <a href="#Page_159">159</a>, <a href="#Page_284">284</a><br />
+<br />
+Mara, Gertrude Elisabeth, <a href="#Page_255">255</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Marchesi, Mathilde, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>, <a href="#Page_297">297</a><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[Pg 338]</a></span><br />
+Marco, Maria, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_288">288</a><br />
+<br />
+Marie Antoinette, <a href="#Page_259">259</a>, <a href="#Page_260">260</a><br />
+<br />
+Marinetti, <a href="#Page_282">282</a><br />
+<br />
+Mario, <a href="#Page_102">102</a><br />
+<br />
+Marion, George, <a href="#Page_28">28</a><br />
+<br />
+Marlowe, Julia, <a href="#Page_319">319</a>, <a href="#Page_321">321</a><br />
+<br />
+Marnold, Jean, <a href="#Page_32">32</a><br />
+<br />
+Marseillaise, <a href="#Page_310">310</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Martyn, Edward, <a href="#Page_192">192</a>, <a href="#Page_294">294</a><br />
+<br />
+Mary Magdalen, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>, <a href="#Page_68">68</a><br />
+<br />
+Mascagni, Pietro, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>, <a href="#Page_301">301</a><br />
+<br />
+Massenet, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a><br />
+<br />
+Matisse, <a href="#Page_19">19</a><br />
+<br />
+Maurel, Victor, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_246">246</a><br />
+<br />
+May, Edna, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Mayhew, Stella, <a href="#Page_110">110</a><br />
+<br />
+Mazantinita, <a href="#Page_287">287</a><br />
+<br />
+Mazarin, Mariette, <a href="#Page_114">114</a><br />
+<br />
+Mazzoleni, <a href="#Page_166">166</a><br />
+<br />
+Melba, Nellie, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a> <i>et seq.</i>, <a href="#Page_297">297</a><br />
+<br />
+Mellish, Fuller, <a href="#Page_323">323</a><br />
+<br />
+Melody, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_93">93</a><br />
+<br />
+Mencken, H. L., <a href="#Page_59">59</a>, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>, <a href="#Page_198">198</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>, <a href="#Page_203">203</a>, <a href="#Page_212">212</a><br />
+<br />
+Mendelssohn, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a><br />
+<br />
+Mend&egrave;s, Catulle, <a href="#Page_43">43</a><br />
+<br />
+Meredith, George, <a href="#Page_187">187</a><br />
+<br />
+M&eacute;rim&eacute;e, Prosper, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_142">142</a><br />
+<br />
+Meyerbeer, Giacomo, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>, <a href="#Page_164">164</a>, <a href="#Page_252">252</a><br />
+<br />
+Michael Angelo, <a href="#Page_227">227</a>, <a href="#Page_312">312</a><br />
+<br />
+Michelet, <a href="#Page_76">76</a><br />
+<br />
+Milton, <a href="#Page_257">257</a><br />
+<br />
+Mirbeau, Octave, <a href="#Page_229">229</a>, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>, <a href="#Page_232">232</a>, <a href="#Page_233">233</a><br />
+<br />
+Mitchell, Julian, <a href="#Page_281">281</a><br />
+<br />
+Mitchell, Langdon, <a href="#Page_303">303</a><br />
+<br />
+Modern Orchestra, <a href="#Page_98">98</a><br />
+<br />
+Modulation, <a href="#Page_30">30</a><br />
+<br />
+Moeller, Philip, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_236">236</a>, <a href="#Page_238">238</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Moli&egrave;re, <a href="#Page_225">225</a>, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Monbelli, <a href="#Page_256">256</a><br />
+<br />
+Monkshood, G. F., <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_54">54</a><br />
+<br />
+Montaigne, <a href="#Page_150">150</a><br />
+<br />
+Montemezzi, Italo, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_330">330</a><br />
+<br />
+Montes, <a href="#Page_189">189</a><br />
+<br />
+Monteverde, <a href="#Page_102">102</a><br />
+<br />
+Montmartre, <a href="#Page_126">126</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Monvel, Boutet de, <a href="#Page_142">142</a><br />
+<br />
+Moore, George, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>, <a href="#Page_184">184</a> <i>et seq.</i>, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>, <a href="#Page_232">232</a>, <a href="#Page_294">294</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295</a>, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>, <a href="#Page_318">318</a>, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>, <a href="#Page_324">324</a><br />
+<br />
+Moors, The, <a href="#Page_65">65</a><br />
+<br />
+Moreau, Gustave, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>, <a href="#Page_89">89</a>, <a href="#Page_191">191</a><br />
+<br />
+"Morrill, Higgins, and Co.," <a href="#Page_71">71</a><br />
+<br />
+Moulin de la Galette, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a><br />
+<br />
+Mount Edgcumbe, Earl of, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>, <a href="#Page_94">94</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>, <a href="#Page_255">255</a><br />
+<br />
+Moussorgsky, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>, <a href="#Page_152">152</a><br />
+<br />
+Mozart, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>, <a href="#Page_54">54</a>, <a href="#Page_88">88</a>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>, <a href="#Page_161">161</a>, <a href="#Page_173">173</a>, <a href="#Page_174">174</a>, <a href="#Page_205">205</a>, <a href="#Page_234">234</a>, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>, <a href="#Page_268">268</a>, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a>, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a><br />
+<br />
+Mullin, W. T., <a href="#Page_204">204</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Murillo, <a href="#Page_190">190</a><br />
+<br />
+Murphy, Agnes G., <a href="#Page_155">155</a><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[Pg 339]</a></span><br />
+Murska, Ilma de, <a href="#Page_269">269</a><br />
+<br />
+Musset, Alfred de, <a href="#Page_239">239</a>, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>, <a href="#Page_252">252</a><br />
+<br />
+Musette, <a href="#Page_135">135</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Nachbaur, Franz, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Names, Theory of, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a><br />
+<br />
+Napoleon, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>, <a href="#Page_192">192</a><br />
+<br />
+Naldi, Giuseppe, <a href="#Page_160">160</a><br />
+<br />
+Nathan, George Jean, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295</a><br />
+<br />
+Nazimova, Alla, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a><br />
+<br />
+Negro Players, <a href="#Page_283">283</a><br />
+<br />
+Newman, Ernest, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_150">150</a><br />
+<br />
+Niemann, Albert, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Nero, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_72">72</a><br />
+<br />
+Nerval, G&eacute;rard de, <a href="#Page_31">31</a><br />
+<br />
+New York Times, The, <a href="#Page_233">233</a><br />
+<br />
+Nicolai, Carl, <a href="#Page_173">173</a><br />
+<br />
+Nicolini, <a href="#Page_95">95</a><br />
+<br />
+Nielsen, Alice, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Nijinsky, Waslav, <a href="#Page_112">112</a>, <a href="#Page_183">183</a>, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>, <a href="#Page_301">301</a><br />
+<br />
+Nillson, Carlotta, <a href="#Page_237">237</a><br />
+<br />
+Nilsson, Christine, <a href="#Page_268">268</a>, <a href="#Page_269">269</a><br />
+<br />
+Nordica, Lillian, <a href="#Page_270">270</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Offenbach, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Op&eacute;ra-Comique, Paris, <a href="#Page_131">131</a><br />
+<br />
+Orleneff, Paul, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a><br />
+<br />
+Ornstein, Leo, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Oysters, American, <a href="#Page_158">158</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Pacchierotti, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>, <a href="#Page_94">94</a>, <a href="#Page_95">95</a><br />
+<br />
+Pachmann, Vladimir de, <a href="#Page_301">301</a><br />
+<br />
+Paganini, <a href="#Page_172">172</a><br />
+<br />
+Palmer, Delmar G., <a href="#Page_210">210</a>, <a href="#Page_211">211</a><br />
+<br />
+Pan, Peter, <a href="#Page_137">137</a><br />
+<br />
+Parke, W. T., <a href="#Page_171">171</a>, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>, <a href="#Page_256">256</a>, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>, <a href="#Page_258">258</a><br />
+<br />
+Parker, Horatio W., <a href="#Page_23">23</a>, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>, <a href="#Page_212">212</a><br />
+<br />
+Pasta, Giuditta, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_249">249</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Pater, Walter, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>, <a href="#Page_137">137</a>, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>, <a href="#Page_307">307</a><br />
+<br />
+Pattee, Fred Lewis, <a href="#Page_38">38</a><br />
+<br />
+Patti, Adelina, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a><br />
+<br />
+Payton, Corse, <a href="#Page_304">304</a><br />
+<br />
+Peacock, Thomas Love, <a href="#Page_301">301</a><br />
+<br />
+P&eacute;ladan, Josephin, <a href="#Page_43">43</a><br />
+<br />
+Persian miniatures, <a href="#Page_19">19</a><br />
+<br />
+Pessimism, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>, <a href="#Page_65">65</a><br />
+<br />
+Petrarch, <a href="#Page_76">76</a><br />
+<br />
+Pfitzner, Hans, <a href="#Page_200">200</a><br />
+<br />
+Perfumes, <a href="#Page_79">79</a><br />
+<br />
+Phelps, William Lyon, <a href="#Page_38">38</a><br />
+<br />
+Ph&eacute;m&eacute;, <a href="#Page_86">86</a><br />
+<br />
+Philip II, <a href="#Page_79">79</a><br />
+<br />
+Philistine, The, <a href="#Page_39">39</a><br />
+<br />
+Philosophy of Edgar Saltus, <a href="#Page_54">54</a>, <a href="#Page_56">56</a><br />
+<br />
+Picasso, Pablo, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>, <a href="#Page_183">183</a><br />
+<br />
+Piccinni, Niccola, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_258">258</a><br />
+<br />
+Pinero, Arthur Wing, <a href="#Page_234">234</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>, <a href="#Page_321">321</a><br />
+<br />
+Pinto, Mrs., <a href="#Page_257">257</a><br />
+<br />
+Pischek, Johann, <a href="#Page_173">173</a><br />
+<br />
+Pistocchi, Francesco, <a href="#Page_99">99</a><br />
+<br />
+Plagiarism, <a href="#Page_79">79</a><br />
+<br />
+Poe, Edgar Allan, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a><br />
+<br />
+Pogliani, Giacomo, <a href="#Page_157">157</a><br />
+<br />
+Poiret, Paul, <a href="#Page_154">154</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Poisons, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>, <a href="#Page_64">64</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[Pg 340]</a></span><br />
+Pollard, Percival, <a href="#Page_48">48</a><br />
+<br />
+Pompadour, Mme. de, <a href="#Page_260">260</a><br />
+<br />
+Ponchielli, Amilcare, <a href="#Page_175">175</a><br />
+<br />
+Popular music, <a href="#Page_23">23</a><br />
+<br />
+Porpora, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>, <a href="#Page_99">99</a><br />
+<br />
+Pougy, Liane de, <a href="#Page_201">201</a><br />
+<br />
+Pratella, Balilla, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Puccini, Giacomo, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>, <a href="#Page_173">173</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, <a href="#Page_318">318</a>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Puchol, Luisita, <a href="#Page_288">288</a><br />
+<br />
+Puente, del, <a href="#Page_159">159</a><br />
+<br />
+Purcell, Henry, <a href="#Page_152">152</a><br />
+<br />
+Puritanism, <a href="#Page_65">65</a><br />
+<br />
+Pyrrhonist, <a href="#Page_179">179</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Quincy, de, <a href="#Page_31">31</a><br />
+<br />
+Quinlan, Gertrude, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Rabusson, <a href="#Page_63">63</a><br />
+<br />
+Rachel, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>, <a href="#Page_301">301</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a>, <a href="#Page_310">310</a><br />
+<br />
+Radcliffe, Mrs., <a href="#Page_74">74</a><br />
+<br />
+Raff, Joseph Joachim, <a href="#Page_23">23</a><br />
+<br />
+Ragtime, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>, <a href="#Page_290">290</a><br />
+<br />
+Rankin, Phyllis, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Ravel, Maurice, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315</a>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Realism in fiction, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>, <a href="#Page_88">88</a><br />
+<br />
+Realistic acting, <a href="#Page_105">105</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a><br />
+<br />
+Reeves, Sims, <a href="#Page_263">263</a><br />
+<br />
+Reger, Max, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_29">29</a><br />
+<br />
+Rehan, Ada, <a href="#Page_319">319</a>, <a href="#Page_320">320</a><br />
+<br />
+Reicher, Frank, <a href="#Page_300">300</a><br />
+<br />
+Reinhardt, Max, <a href="#Page_282">282</a><br />
+<br />
+Renan, <a href="#Page_76">76</a><br />
+<br />
+Renaud, Maurice, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_246">246</a><br />
+<br />
+Repplier, Agnes, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>, <a href="#Page_69">69</a><br />
+<br />
+Reszke, Jean de, <a href="#Page_100">100</a><br />
+<br />
+Retz, Gille de, <a href="#Page_80">80</a><br />
+<br />
+Rimbaud, Arthur, <a href="#Page_43">43</a><br />
+<br />
+Rimsky-Korsakov, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>, <a href="#Page_299">299</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315</a><br />
+<br />
+Ring, Blanche, <a href="#Page_110">110</a><br />
+<br />
+Ristori, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Rives, Mme. Am&eacute;lie, <a href="#Page_48">48</a><br />
+<br />
+Rodin, Auguste, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>, <a href="#Page_227">227</a>, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>, <a href="#Page_312">312</a><br />
+<br />
+Rome, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a><br />
+<br />
+Ronalds, Lorillard, <a href="#Page_69">69</a><br />
+<br />
+Ronconi, Giorgio, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>, <a href="#Page_246">246</a><br />
+<br />
+Ronsard, <a href="#Page_76">76</a><br />
+<br />
+Roosevelt, Theodore, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_209">209</a><br />
+<br />
+Rops, F&eacute;licien, <a href="#Page_312">312</a><br />
+<br />
+Rorer, Mrs., <a href="#Page_149">149</a><br />
+<br />
+Rossini, Gioacchino, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>, <a href="#Page_168">168</a>, <a href="#Page_169">169</a>, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>, <a href="#Page_288">288</a><br />
+<br />
+Rostand, <a href="#Page_228">228</a><br />
+<br />
+Rowland, Adele, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+R&uuml;bgam, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Rubini, Giovanni Battista, <a href="#Page_163">163</a><br />
+<br />
+Rubinstein, Anton, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_112">112</a><br />
+<br />
+Runciman, J. F., <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_234">234</a><br />
+<br />
+Russell, Lillian, <a href="#Page_160">160</a>, <a href="#Page_220">220</a><br />
+<br />
+Russian Ballet, <a href="#Page_282">282</a>, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315</a><br />
+<br />
+Rutherford, John S., <a href="#Page_63">63</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Sacr&eacute;-Coeur, Church of, <a href="#Page_126">126</a>, <a href="#Page_130">130</a><br />
+<br />
+Sagan, Princesse de, <a href="#Page_84">84</a><br />
+<br />
+St. Giorgio, Signor, <a href="#Page_159">159</a>, <a href="#Page_160">160</a><br />
+<br />
+St. Paul's School, <a href="#Page_42">42</a><br />
+<br />
+Salieri, Antonio, <a href="#Page_170">170</a><br />
+<br />
+Salome, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>, <a href="#Page_287">287</a><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[Pg 341]</a></span><br />
+Saltus, Edgar, <a href="#Page_37">37</a> <i>et seq.</i>, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>, <a href="#Page_154">154</a>, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>, <a href="#Page_191">191</a>, <a href="#Page_225">225</a><br />
+<br />
+Saltus, Francis, <a href="#Page_42">42</a><br />
+<br />
+Sanborn, Pitts, <a href="#Page_118">118</a><br />
+<br />
+Sand, George, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_239">239</a>, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>, <a href="#Page_252">252</a><br />
+<br />
+Sanderson, Julia, <a href="#Page_217">217</a><br />
+<br />
+Santley, Charles, <a href="#Page_158">158</a>, <a href="#Page_167">167</a>, <a href="#Page_174">174</a>, <a href="#Page_264">264</a><br />
+<br />
+Sappho, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Sardou, <a href="#Page_302">302</a>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a><br />
+<br />
+Satan, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>, <a href="#Page_287">287</a><br />
+<br />
+Satie, Erik, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Saturday Review, The, <a href="#Page_18">18</a><br />
+<br />
+Savoyarde, restaurant, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>, <a href="#Page_126">126</a>, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a><br />
+<br />
+Scharwenka, Xaver, <a href="#Page_155">155</a><br />
+<br />
+Scheherazade, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Schillings, Max, <a href="#Page_150">150</a><br />
+<br />
+Schoenberg, Arnold, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Schopenhauer, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>, <a href="#Page_56">56</a><br />
+<br />
+Schroeder, Edwin Albert, <a href="#Page_71">71</a><br />
+<br />
+Schroeder-Devrient, Wilhelmine, <a href="#Page_99">99</a><br />
+<br />
+Schubert, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>, <a href="#Page_205">205</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a>, <a href="#Page_310">310</a><br />
+<br />
+Schumann, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>, <a href="#Page_274">274</a><br />
+<br />
+Scott, Cyril, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Scotti, Antonio, <a href="#Page_107">107</a><br />
+<br />
+Scriptores Histori&aelig; August&aelig;, <a href="#Page_70">70</a><br />
+<br />
+Seidl, Anton, <a href="#Page_155">155</a><br />
+<br />
+Sembrich, Marcella, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>, <a href="#Page_273">273</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Senesino, <a href="#Page_95">95</a><br />
+<br />
+Shakespeare, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>, <a href="#Page_147">147</a>, <a href="#Page_284">284</a>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a>, <a href="#Page_318">318</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Sharp, Cecil J., <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_109">109</a><br />
+<br />
+Shaw, George Bernard, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>, <a href="#Page_234">234</a>, <a href="#Page_235">235</a>, <a href="#Page_239">239</a>, <a href="#Page_318">318</a>, <a href="#Page_322">322</a><br />
+<br />
+Shepherd, Arthur, <a href="#Page_200">200</a><br />
+<br />
+Sherwin, Louis, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>, <a href="#Page_291">291</a>, <a href="#Page_293">293</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295</a><br />
+<br />
+Shield, William, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>, <a href="#Page_172">172</a><br />
+<br />
+Siddons, Mrs., <a href="#Page_18">18</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a><br />
+<br />
+Simonds, W. E., <a href="#Page_38">38</a><br />
+<br />
+Singing, <a href="#Page_93">93</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Smith, Harry B., <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Snob, <a href="#Page_50">50</a><br />
+<br />
+Socrates, <a href="#Page_117">117</a><br />
+<br />
+Solomon, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Sonata form, <a href="#Page_33">33</a><br />
+<br />
+Sontag, Henrietta, <a href="#Page_246">246</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Sophocles, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Sorbonne, <a href="#Page_43">43</a><br />
+<br />
+Sousa, John Philip, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>, <a href="#Page_216">216</a><br />
+<br />
+Southeim, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Spain, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>, <a href="#Page_62">62</a>, <a href="#Page_94">94</a>, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>, <a href="#Page_189">189</a>, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>, <a href="#Page_281">281</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Spiritualism, <a href="#Page_43">43</a><br />
+<br />
+Spohr, Louis, <a href="#Page_24">24</a><br />
+<br />
+Stanislavski, <a href="#Page_283">283</a><br />
+<br />
+Stanton, Theodore, <a href="#Page_38">38</a><br />
+<br />
+Starr, Hattie, <a href="#Page_202">202</a><br />
+<br />
+Starr, Muriel, <a href="#Page_253">253</a><br />
+<br />
+Steger, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Stein, Gertrude, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>, <a href="#Page_229">229</a><br />
+<br />
+Steinlen, <a href="#Page_139">139</a><br />
+<br />
+Steinway, William, <a href="#Page_154">154</a><br />
+<br />
+Stevenson, R. L., <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_74">74</a><br />
+<br />
+Stigelli, <a href="#Page_166">166</a><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[Pg 342]</a></span><br />
+Stillman-Kelley, Edgar, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a><br />
+<br />
+Straus, Oskar, <a href="#Page_216">216</a><br />
+<br />
+Strauss, Johann, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_139">139</a>, <a href="#Page_216">216</a><br />
+<br />
+Strauss, Richard, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, <a href="#Page_330">330</a><br />
+<br />
+Stravinsky, Igor, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Stuck, Franz von, <a href="#Page_89">89</a><br />
+<br />
+Style in Singing, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>, <a href="#Page_246">246</a>, <a href="#Page_249">249</a>, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>, <a href="#Page_274">274</a>, <a href="#Page_276">276</a><br />
+<br />
+Style in Writing, <a href="#Page_45">45</a>, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_56">56</a><br />
+<br />
+Suetonius, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Page_72">72</a><br />
+<br />
+Sullivan, Sir Arthur, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_169">169</a>, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>, <a href="#Page_220">220</a>, <a href="#Page_221">221</a><br />
+<br />
+Swinburne, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_307">307</a><br />
+<br />
+Symonds, J. A., <a href="#Page_72">72</a><br />
+<br />
+Symons, Arthur, <a href="#Page_188">188</a>, <a href="#Page_232">232</a>, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>, <a href="#Page_293">293</a>, <a href="#Page_301">301</a>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a><br />
+<br />
+Synge, J. M., <a href="#Page_103">103</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Tacitus, <a href="#Page_72">72</a><br />
+<br />
+Taggart, Lucy L., <a href="#Page_209">209</a><br />
+<br />
+Tamagno, Francesco, <a href="#Page_120">120</a><br />
+<br />
+Tasso, <a href="#Page_62">62</a><br />
+<br />
+Taste, <a href="#Page_11">11</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Tchekhov, <a href="#Page_303">303</a><br />
+<br />
+Tempest, Marie, <a href="#Page_219">219</a>, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>, <a href="#Page_301">301</a><br />
+<br />
+Temps, Le, <a href="#Page_18">18</a><br />
+<br />
+Terence, <a href="#Page_302">302</a><br />
+<br />
+Terry, Ellen, <a href="#Page_301">301</a><br />
+<br />
+Tetrazzini, Luisa, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_160">160</a><br />
+<br />
+Th&egrave;bes, Mme. de, <a href="#Page_79">79</a><br />
+<br />
+Thomas, Ambroise, <a href="#Page_173">173</a><br />
+<br />
+Thomas, Augustus, <a href="#Page_235">235</a>, <a href="#Page_236">236</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295</a><br />
+<br />
+Thomas, Olive, <a href="#Page_223">223</a><br />
+<br />
+Thomas, Theodore, <a href="#Page_155">155</a><br />
+<br />
+Tiberius, <a href="#Page_69">69</a><br />
+<br />
+Tichatschek, Joseph Aloys, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Tilzer, Harry von, <a href="#Page_202">202</a><br />
+<br />
+Tinney, Frank, <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Tissot, <a href="#Page_67">67</a><br />
+<br />
+Toscanini, Arturo, <a href="#Page_156">156</a><br />
+<br />
+Tradition, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_281">281</a><br />
+<br />
+Troubetskoy, Prince, <a href="#Page_157">157</a><br />
+<br />
+Tschaikovsky, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>, <a href="#Page_312">312</a><br />
+<br />
+Turgeniev, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>, <a href="#Page_252">252</a><br />
+<br />
+Twain, Mark, <a href="#Page_261">261</a>, <a href="#Page_265">265</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Urban, Joseph, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>, <a href="#Page_223">223</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Vagaries of genius, <a href="#Page_55">55</a><br />
+<br />
+Valli&egrave;re, Louise, de la, <a href="#Page_13">13</a><br />
+<br />
+Valverde, Joaqu&iacute;n, <a href="#Page_284">284</a> <i>et seq.</i><br />
+<br />
+Vaughn, Theresa, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+Verelst, Myndart, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a><br />
+<br />
+Veiller, Bayard, <a href="#Page_68">68</a><br />
+<br />
+Velasquez, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_190">190</a><br />
+<br />
+Verdi, Giuseppe, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>, <a href="#Page_173">173</a>, <a href="#Page_221">221</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a>, <a href="#Page_323">323</a><br />
+<br />
+Verlaine, Paul, <a href="#Page_43">43</a><br />
+<br />
+Veronese, <a href="#Page_16">16</a><br />
+<br />
+Versatility in acting, <a href="#Page_300">300</a><br />
+<br />
+Vespasian, <a href="#Page_69">69</a><br />
+<br />
+Viafora, <a href="#Page_157">157</a><br />
+<br />
+Viardot, Pauline, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a><br />
+<br />
+Victory of Samothrace, The, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>, <a href="#Page_312">312</a><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">[Pg 343]</a></span><br />
+Vinci, Leonardo da, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>, <a href="#Page_191">191</a>, <a href="#Page_301">301</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Wachtel, Theodor, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Wagner, Richard, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>, <a href="#Page_173">173</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>, <a href="#Page_274">274</a>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a>, <a href="#Page_301">301</a>, <a href="#Page_314">314</a><br />
+<br />
+Walter, Eugene, <a href="#Page_68">68</a><br />
+<br />
+Walter, Gustav, <a href="#Page_164">164</a><br />
+<br />
+Warfield, David, <a href="#Page_295">295</a><br />
+<br />
+Wayburn, Ned, <a href="#Page_281">281</a><br />
+<br />
+Weber, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a><br />
+<br />
+Webster, <a href="#Page_51">51</a><br />
+<br />
+Weckerlin, J. B., <a href="#Page_169">169</a><br />
+<br />
+Weichsell, Carl, <a href="#Page_172">172</a><br />
+<br />
+Weichsell, Charles, <a href="#Page_172">172</a><br />
+<br />
+Weidley, David, <a href="#Page_210">210</a><br />
+<br />
+Wendell, Barrett, <a href="#Page_38">38</a><br />
+<br />
+Westminster Magazine, <a href="#Page_39">39</a><br />
+<br />
+Whitmer, T. Carl, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a><br />
+<br />
+Wilde, Oscar, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_63">63</a>, <a href="#Page_64">64</a>, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>, <a href="#Page_239">239</a>, <a href="#Page_282">282</a>, <a href="#Page_307">307</a><br />
+<br />
+Winter, William, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>, <a href="#Page_324">324</a><br />
+<br />
+Wodehouse, P. G., <a href="#Page_222">222</a><br />
+<br />
+Women, Saltus's opinion of, <a href="#Page_73">73</a><br />
+<br />
+W&uuml;llner, Ludwig, <a href="#Page_246">246</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Yeats, W. B., <a href="#Page_192">192</a><br />
+<br />
+Yohe, May, <a href="#Page_219">219</a><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+Zandonai, Riccardo, <a href="#Page_329">329</a><br />
+<br />
+Zeus, <a href="#Page_82">82</a><br />
+<br />
+Ziegfeld, Florenz, <a href="#Page_283">283</a><br />
+<br />
+Zuloaga, <a href="#Page_290">290</a><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+
+<hr style='width: 65%;' />
+
+<h3>Transcriber's Notes</h3>
+
+<p>Variations in spelling, hyphenation, and punctuation have been retained
+from the original book except for the following changes:</p>
+
+<p><a href="#Contents">Table of Contents</a>: Added listings for Footnotes and Index.</p>
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_189">189</a>: Changed "their's" to "theirs".</p>
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_227">227</a>: Added "Young" to the chapter title, "Two Young American
+Playwrights," to match the Table of Contents and section title.</p>
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_259">259</a>: Changed "Eightenth Century" to "Eighteenth Century".</p>
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_303">303</a>: "Mrs. Siddone" might be a typo for "Mrs. Siddons". Retained.</p>
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_320">320</a>: Capitalized "It" in "As You Like It" for consistency.</p>
+
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_331">331</a>: (Index) Changed "Aeschylus" to "&AElig;schylus" to match text.</p>
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_332">332</a>: (Index) The reference for Bergstr&ouml;m, Hjalmar, 90 was not found
+anywhere in the original book, and page 90 was a blank page.</p>
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_332">332</a>: (Index) Changed page ref. 122 to 222 for Bernhardt, Sarah.</p>
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_332">332</a>: (Index) Changed "Caesar, Julius," to "C&aelig;sar, Julius," to
+match text.</p>
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_338">338</a>: (Index) Changed page ref. 176 to 76 for Michelet.</p>
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_339">339</a>: (Index) Changed "P&eacute;ladin, Josephin" to "P&eacute;ladan, Josephin" to
+match text.</p>
+
+<p>Page <a href="#Page_341">341</a>: (Index) Changed "Scriptores Historiae Augustae" to
+"Scriptores Histori&aelig; August&aelig;" to match text.</p>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
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@@ -0,0 +1,8123 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Merry-Go-Round, by Carl Van Vechten
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Merry-Go-Round
+
+Author: Carl Van Vechten
+
+Release Date: August 15, 2008 [EBook #26320]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MERRY-GO-ROUND ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Bryan Ness, Diane Monico, and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced
+from scanned images of public domain material from the Google Print
+project.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+The
+Merry-Go-Round
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+_BOOKS BY_
+_CARL VAN VECHTEN_
+
+MUSIC AFTER THE GREAT WAR              1915
+
+MUSIC AND BAD MANNERS                  1916
+
+INTERPRETERS AND INTERPRETATIONS       1917
+
+THE MERRY-GO-ROUND                     1918
+
+THE MUSIC OF SPAIN                     1918
+
+
+
+
+The
+Merry-Go-Round
+
+_Carl Van Vechten_
+
+
+_"Tournez, tournez, bons chevaux de bois,
+  Tournez cent tours, tournez mille tours,
+  Tournez souvent et tournez toujours,
+  Tournez, tournez au sons de hautbois."_
+                      PAUL VERLAINE
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+New York   Alfred A. Knopf
+
+MCMXVIII
+
+
+
+
+COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY
+ALFRED A. KNOPF, INC.
+
+PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
+
+
+
+
+Contents
+
+
+                                                     PAGE
+
+IN DEFENCE OF BAD TASTE                                11
+
+MUSIC AND SUPERMUSIC                                   23
+
+EDGAR SALTUS                                           37
+
+THE NEW ART OF THE SINGER                              93
+
+_Au Bal Musette_                                      125
+
+MUSIC AND COOKING                                     149
+
+AN INTERRUPTED CONVERSATION                           179
+
+THE AUTHORITATIVE WORK ON AMERICAN MUSIC              197
+
+OLD DAYS AND NEW                                      215
+
+TWO YOUNG AMERICAN PLAYWRIGHTS                        227
+
+_De Senectute Cantorum_                               245
+
+IMPRESSIONS IN THE THEATRE
+
+    I _The Land of Joy_                               281
+
+    II A Note on Mimi Aguglia                         298
+
+    III The New Isadora                               307
+
+    IV Margaret Anglin Produces _As You Like It_      318
+
+THE MODERN COMPOSERS AT A GLANCE                      329
+
+FOOTNOTES                                             330
+
+INDEX                                                 331
+
+
+
+
+     Some of these essays have appeared in "The Smart Set,"
+     "Reedy's Mirror," "Vanity Fair," "The Chronicle," "The
+     Theatre," "The Bellman," "The Musical Quarterly," "Rogue,"
+     "The New York Press," and "The New York Globe." In their
+     present form, however, they have undergone considerable
+     redressing.
+
+
+
+
+In Defence of Bad Taste
+
+
+     "_It is a painful thing, at best, to live up to one's
+     bricabric, if one has any; but to live up to the bricabric
+     of many lands and of many centuries is a strain which no
+     wise man would dream of inflicting upon his constitution._"
+
+                        Agnes Repplier.
+
+
+
+
+In Defence of Bad Taste
+
+
+In America, where men are supposed to know nothing about matters of
+taste and where women have their dresses planned for them, the
+household decorator has become an important factor in domestic life.
+Out of an even hundred rich men how many can say that they have had
+anything to do with the selection or arrangement of the furnishings
+for their homes? In theatre programs these matters are regulated and
+due credit is given to the various firms who have supplied the myriad
+appeals to the eye; one knows who thought out the combinations of
+shoes, hats, and parasols, and one knows where each separate article
+was purchased. Why could not some similar plan of appreciation be
+followed in the houses of our very rich? Why not, for instance, a card
+in the hall something like the following:
+
+    _This house was furnished and decorated according
+      to the taste of Marcel of the Dilly-Billy Shop_
+
+or
+
+    _We are living in the kind of house Miss Simone
+        O'Kelly thought we should live in. The
+          decorations are pure Louis XV and
+             the furniture is authentic._
+
+It is not difficult, of course, to differentiate the personal from the
+impersonal. Nothing clings so ill to the back as borrowed finery and I
+have yet to find the family which has settled itself fondly and
+comfortably in chairs which were a part of some one else's aesthetic
+plan. As a matter of fact many of our millionaires would be more at
+home in an atmosphere concocted from the ingredients of plain pine
+tables and blanket-covered mattresses than they are surrounded by the
+frippery of China and the frivolity of France. If these gentlemen were
+fortunate enough to enjoy sufficient confidence in their own taste to
+give it a thorough test it is not safe to think of the extreme burden
+that would be put on the working capacity of the factories of the
+Grand Rapids furniture companies. We might find a few emancipated
+souls scouring the town for heavy refectory tables and divans into
+which one could sink, reclining or upright, with a perfect sense of
+ease, but these would be as rare as Steinway pianos in Coney Island.
+
+For Americans are meek in such matters. They credit themselves with no
+taste. They fear comparison. If the very much sought-after Simone
+O'Kelly has decorated Mr. B.'s house Mr. M. does not dare to struggle
+along with merely his own ideas in furnishing his. He calls in an
+expert who begins, rather inauspiciously, by painting the dining-room
+salmon pink. The tables and chairs will be made by somebody on Tenth
+Street, exact copies of a set to be found in the Musee Carnavalet. The
+legs under the table are awkwardly arranged for diners but they look
+very well when the table is unclothed. The decorator plans to hang Mr.
+M.'s personal bedroom in pale plum colour. Mr. M. rebels at this. "I
+detest," he remarks mildly, "all variants of purple." "Very well,"
+acquiesces the decorator, "we will make it green." In the end Mr. M.'s
+worst premonitions are realized: the walls are resplendent in a
+striking shade of magenta. Along the edge of each panel of Chinese
+brocade a narrow band of absinthe velvet ribbon gives the necessary
+contrast. The furniture is painted in dull ivory with touches of gold
+and beryl and the bed cover is peacock blue. Four round cushions of a
+similar shade repose on the floor at the foot of the bed. The fat
+manufacturer's wife as she enters this triumph of decoration which
+might satisfy Louise de la Valliere or please Doris Keane, is an
+anachronistic figure and she is aware of it. She prefers, on the
+whole, the brass bedsteads of the summer hotels. Mr. M. himself feels
+ridiculous. He never enters the room without a groan and a remark on
+the order of "Good God, what a colour!" His personal taste finds its
+supreme enjoyment in the Circassian walnut panelling, desk, and tables
+of the directors' room in the Millionaire's Trust and Savings Bank.
+"Rich and tasteful": how many times he has used this phrase to express
+his approval! In the mid-Victorian red plush of his club, too, he is
+comfortable. "Waiter, another whiskey and soda!"
+
+Mildred is expected home after her first year in boarding school. Her
+mother wishes to environ her, so to speak. Mildred is delicate in her
+tastes, so delicate that she scarcely ever expresses herself. Her mind
+and body are pure; her heart beats faster when she learns of distress.
+Voluptuousness, Venus, and Vice are all merely words to her. Mother
+does not explain this to the decorator. "My daughter is returning from
+school," she says, "I want her room done." "What style of room?"
+"After all you are supposed to know that. I am engaging you to arrange
+it for me." "Your daughter, I take it, is a modern girl?" "You may
+assume as much." In despair for a hint the decorator steals a look at
+a photograph of the miss, full-lipped, melting dark eyes, and
+blue-black hair. Sensing an houri he hangs the walls with a deep shade
+of Persian orange, over which flit tropical birds of emerald and
+azure; strange pomegranates bleed their seeds at regular intervals.
+The couch is an adaptation, in colour, of the celebrated _Sumurun_
+bed. The dressing table and the _chaise-longue_ are of Chinese
+lacquer. A heavy bronze incense burner pours forth fumes of Bichara's
+_Scheherazade_. From the window frames, stifling the light, depend
+flame-coloured brocaded curtains embroidered in Egyptian enamelled
+beads. It is a triumph, this chamber, of _style Ballet Russe_. Diana
+is banished ... and shrinking Mildred, returning from school, finds
+her demure soul at variance with her surroundings.
+
+A man's house should be the expression of the man himself. All the
+books on the subject and even the household decorators themselves will
+tell you that. But, if the decoration of a house is to express its
+owner, it is necessary that he himself inspire it, which implies, of
+course, the possession of ideas, even though they be bad. And men in
+these United States are not expected to display mental anguish or
+pleasure when confronted by colour combinations. In America one is
+constantly hearing young ladies say, "He's a man and so, of course,
+knows nothing about colour," or "Of course a man never looks at
+clothes." It does not seem to be necessary to argue this point. One
+has only to remember that Veronese was a man; so was Velasquez. Even
+Paul Poiret and Leon Bakst belong to the sex of Adam. Nevertheless
+most Americans still consider it a little _effemine_, a trifle
+_declasse_, for a business man (allowances are sometimes made for
+poets, musicians, actors, and people who live in Greenwich Village),
+to make any references to colour or form. He may admire, with obvious
+emphasis on the women they lightly enclose, the costumes of the
+_Follies_ but he is not permitted to exhibit knowledge of materials
+and any suddenly expressed desire on his part to rush into a shop and
+hug some bit of colour from the show window to his heart would be
+regarded as a symptom of madness.
+
+The audience which gives the final verdict on a farce makes allowances
+for the author; permits him the use of certain conventions. For
+example, he is given leave to introduce a hotel corridor into his last
+act with seven doors opening on a common hallway so that his
+characters may conveniently and persistently enter the wrong rooms.
+It may be supposed that I ask for some such license from my audience.
+"How ridiculous," you may be saying, "I know of interior decorators
+who spend weeks in reading out the secrets of their clients' souls in
+order to provide their proper settings." There doubtless are interior
+decorators who succeed in giving a home the appearance of a well-kept
+hotel where guests may mingle comfortably and freely. I should not
+wish to deny this. But I do deny that soul-study is a requirement for
+the profession. If a man (or a woman) has a soul it will not be a
+decorator who will discover its fitting housing. Others may object,
+"But bad taste is rampant. Surely it is better to be guided by some
+one who knows than to surround oneself with rocking chairs, plaster
+casts of the Winged Victory, and photographs of various madonnas." I
+say that it is _not_ better. It is better for each man to express
+himself, through his taste, as well as through his tongue or his pen,
+as he may. And it is only through such expression that he will finally
+arrive (if he ever can) at a condition of household furnishing which
+will say something to his neighbour as well as to himself. It is a
+pleasure when one leaves a dinner party to be able to observe "That is
+_his_ house," just as it is a pleasure when one leaves a concert to
+remember that a composer has expressed himself and not the result of
+seven years study in Berlin or Paris.
+
+But Americans have little aptitude for self-expression. They prefer to
+huddle, like cattle, under unspeakable whips when matters of art are
+under discussion. They fear ridicule. As a consequence many of the
+richest men in this country never really live in their own homes,
+never are comfortable for a moment, although the walls are hung double
+with Fragonards and hawthorne vases stand so deep upon the tables that
+no space remains for the "Saturday Review" or "le Temps." And they
+never, never, never, will know the pleasure which comes while
+stumbling down a side street in London, or in the mouldy corners of
+the Venetian ghetto, or in the Marche du Temple in Paris, or, heaven
+knows, in New York, on lower Fourth Avenue, or in Chinatown, or in a
+Russian brass shop on Allen Street, or in a big department store (as
+often there as anywhere) in finding just the lamp for just the table
+in just the corner, or in discovering a bit of brocade, perhaps the
+ragged remnant of a waistcoat belonging to an aristocrat of the
+Directorate, which will lighten the depths of a certain room, or a
+chair which goes miraculously with a desk already possessed, or a
+Chinese mirror which one had almost decided did not exist. Nor will
+they ever experience the joy of sudden decision in front of a picture
+by Matisse, which ends in the sale of a Delacroix. Nor can they feel
+the thrill which is part of the replacing of a make-shift rug by _the_
+rug of rugs (let us hope it was Solomon's!).
+
+I know a lady in Paris whose salon presents a different aspect each
+summer. Do her Picassos go, a new Spanish painter has replaced them.
+Have you missed the Gibbons carving? Spanish church carving has taken
+its place. "And where are your Venetian embroideries?" "I sold them to
+the Marquise de V.... The money served to buy these Persian
+miniatures." This lady has travelled far. She is not experimenting in
+doubtful taste or bad art; she is not even experimenting in her own
+taste: she is simply enjoying different epochs, different artists,
+different forms of art, each in its turn, for so long as it says
+anything to her. Her house is not a museum. Space and comfort demand
+exclusion but she excludes nothing forever that she desires.... She
+exchanges.
+
+Taste at best is relative. It is an axiom that anybody else's taste
+can never say anything to you although you may feel perfectly certain
+that it is better than your own. If more of the money of the rich
+were spent in encouraging children to develop their own ideas in
+furnishing their own rooms it would serve a better purpose than it
+does now when it is dropped into the ample pockets of the professional
+decorators. Oscar Wilde wrote, "A colour sense is more important in
+the development of the individual than a sense of right and wrong."
+Any young boy or girl can learn something about such matters; most of
+them, if not shamed out of it, take a natural interest in their
+surroundings. You will see how true this is if you attempt to
+rearrange a child's room. Those who have bad taste, relatively, should
+literally be allowed to make their own beds. On the whole it is
+preferable to be comfortable in red and green velvet upholstery than
+to be beautiful and unhappy in a household decorator's gilded cage.
+
+  _September 3, 1915._
+
+
+
+
+Music and Supermusic
+
+
+     "_To know whether you are enjoying a piece of music or not
+     you must see whether you find yourself looking at the
+     advertisements of Pears' soap at the end of the program._"
+
+                        Samuel Butler.
+
+
+
+
+Music and Supermusic
+
+
+What is the distinction in the mind of Everycritic between good music
+and bad music, in the mind of Everyman between popular music and
+"classical" music? What is the essential difference between an air by
+Mozart and an air by Jerome Kern? Why is Chopin's _G minor nocturne_
+better music than Thecla Badarzewska's _La Priere d'une Vierge_? Why
+is a music drama by Richard Wagner preferable to a music drama by
+Horatio W. Parker? What makes a melody distinguished? What makes a
+melody commonplace or cheap? Why do some melodies ring in our ears
+generation after generation while others enjoy but a brief popularity?
+Why do certain composers, such as Raff and Mendelssohn, hailed as
+geniuses while they were yet alive, soon sink into semi-obscurity,
+while others, such as Robert Franz and Moussorgsky, almost
+unrecognized by their contemporaries, grow in popularity? Are there no
+answers to these conundrums and the thousand others that might be
+asked by a person with a slight attack of curiosity?... No one _does_
+ask and assuredly no one answers. These riddles, it would seem, are
+included among the forbidden mysteries of the sphynx. The critics
+assert with authority and some show of erudition that the Spohrs, the
+Mendelssohns, the Humperdincks, and the Montemezzis are great
+composers. They usually admire the grandchildren of Old Lady Tradition
+but they neglect to justify this partiality. Nor can we trust the
+public with its favourite Piccinnis and Puccinis.... What then is the
+test of supermusic?
+
+For we know, as well as we can know anything, that there is music and
+supermusic. Rubinstein wrote music; Beethoven wrote supermusic (Mr.
+Finck may contradict this statement). Bellini wrote operas; Mozart
+wrote superoperas. Jensen wrote songs; Schubert wrote supersongs. The
+superiority of _Voi che sapete_ as a vocal melody over _Ah! non
+giunge_ is not generally contested; neither can we hesitate very long
+over the question whether or not _Der Leiermann_ is a better song than
+_Lehn' deine Wang'_. Probably even Mr. Finck will admit that the
+_Sonata Appassionata_ is finer music than the most familiar portrait
+(I think it is No. 22) in the _Kamennoi-Ostrow_ set. But, if we agree
+to put Mozart, Bach, Beethoven, Schubert, and a few others on
+marmorean pedestals in a special Hall of Fame (and this is a
+compromise on my part, at any rate, as I consider much of the music
+written by even these men to be below any moderately high standard),
+what about the rest? Mr. Finck prefers Johann Strauss to Brahms, nay
+more to Richard himself! He has written a whole book for no other
+reason, it would seem, than to prove that the author of _Tod und
+Verklarung_ is a very much over-rated individual. At times sitting
+despondently in Carnegie Hall, I am secretly inclined to agree with
+him. Personally I can say that I prefer Irving Berlin's music to that
+of Edward MacDowell and I would like to have some one prove to me that
+this position is untenable.
+
+What is the test of supermusic? I have read that fashionable music,
+music composed in a style welcomed and appreciated by its contemporary
+hearers is seldom supermusic. Yet Handel wrote fashionable music, and
+so much other of the music of that epoch is Handelian that it is often
+difficult to be sure where George Frederick left off and somebody else
+began. Bellini wrote fashionable music and _Norma_ and _La Sonnambula_
+sound a trifle faded although they are still occasionally performed,
+but Rossini, whose only desire was to please his public, (Liszt once
+observed "Rossini and Co. always close with 'I remain your very
+humble servant'"), wrote melodies in _Il Barbiere di Siviglia_ which
+sound as fresh to us today as they did when they were first composed.
+And when this prodigiously gifted musician-cook turned his back to the
+public to write _Guillaume Tell_ he penned a work which critics have
+consistently told us is a masterpiece, but which is as seldom
+performed today as any opera of the early Nineteenth Century which
+occasionally gains a hearing at all. Therefor we must be wary of the
+old men who tell us that we shall soon tire of the music of Puccini
+because it is fashionable.
+
+Popularity is scarcely a test. I have mentioned Mendelssohn. Never was
+there a more popular composer, and yet aside from the violin concerto
+what work of his has maintained its place in the concert repertory?
+Yet Chopin, whose name is seldom absent from the program of a pianist,
+was a god in his own time and the most brilliant woman of his epoch
+fell in love with him, as Philip Moeller has recently reminded us in
+his very amusing play. On the other hand there is the case of Robert
+Franz whose songs never achieved real popularity during his lifetime,
+but which are frequently, almost invariably indeed, to be found on
+song recital programs today and which are more and more appreciated.
+The critics are praising him, the public likes him: they buy his
+songs. And there is also the case of Max Reger who was not popular, is
+not popular, and never will be popular.
+
+Can we judge music by academic standards? Certainly not. Even the
+hoary old academicians themselves can answer this question correctly
+if you put it in relation to any composer born before 1820. The
+greatest composers have seldom respected the rules. Beethoven in his
+last sonatas and string quartets slapped all the pedants in the ears;
+yet I believe you will find astonishingly few rules broken by Mozart,
+one of the gods in the mythology of art music, and Berlioz, who broke
+all the rules, is more interesting to us today as a writer of prose
+than as a writer of music.
+
+Is simple music supermusic? Certainly not invariably. _Vedrai Carino_
+is a simple tune, almost as simple as a folk-song and we set great
+store by it; yet Michael William Balfe wrote twenty-seven operas
+filled with similarly simple tunes and in a selective draft of
+composers his number would probably be 9,768. The _Ave Maria_ of
+Schubert is a simple tune; so is the _Meditation_ from _Thais_. Why do
+we say that one is better than the other.
+
+Or is supermusic always grand, sad, noble, or emotional? There must be
+another violent head shaking here. The air from _Oberon, Ocean, thou
+mighty monster_, is so grand that scarcely a singer can be found today
+capable of interpreting it, although many sopranos puff and steam
+through it, for all the world like pinguid gentlemen climbing the
+stairs to the towers of Notre Dame. The _Fifth Symphony_ of Beethoven
+is both grand and noble; probably no one will be found who will deny
+that it is supermusic, but Mahler's _Symphony of the Thousand_ is
+likewise grand and noble, and futile and bombastic to boot. _Or sai
+chi l'onore_ is a grand air, but _Robert je t'aime_ is equally grand
+in intention, at least. _Der Tod und das Madchen_ is sad; so is _Les
+Larmes_ in _Werther_.... But a very great deal of supermusic is
+neither grand nor sad. Haydn's symphonies are usually as light-hearted
+and as light-waisted as possible. Mozart's _Figaro_ scarcely seems to
+have a care. Listen to Beethoven's _Fourth_ and _Eighth Symphonies_,
+_Il Barbiere_ again, _Die Meistersinger_.... But do not be misled:
+Massenet's _Don Quichotte_ is light music; so is Mascagni's
+_Lodoletta_....
+
+Is music to be prized and taken to our hearts because it is
+contrapuntal and complex? We frequently hear it urged that Bach (who
+was more or less forgotten for a hundred years, by the way) was the
+greatest of composers and his music is especially intricate. He is the
+one composer, indeed, who can _never_ be played with one finger! But
+poor unimportant forgotten Max Reger also wrote in the most
+complicated forms; the great Gluck in the simplest. Gluck, indeed, has
+even been considered weak in counterpoint and fugue. Meyerbeer, it is
+said, was also weak in counterpoint and fugue. Is he therefor to be
+regarded as the peer of Gluck? Is Mozart's _G minor Symphony_ more
+important (because it is more complicated) than the same composer's,
+_Batti, Batti_?
+
+We learn from some sources that music stands or falls by its melody
+but what is good melody? According to his contemporaries Wagner's
+music dramas were lacking in melody. _Sweet Marie_ is certainly a
+melody; why is it not as good a melody as _The Old Folks at Home_? Why
+is Musetta's waltz more popular than Gretel's? It is no better as
+melody. As a matter of fact there is, has been, and for ever will be
+war over this question of melody, because the point of view on the
+subject is continually changing. As Cyril Scott puts it in his book,
+"The Philosophy of Modernism": "at one time it (melody) extended over
+a few bars and then came to a close, being, as it were, a kind of
+sentence, which, after running for the moment, arrived at a full stop,
+or semicolon. Take this and compare it with the modern tendency: for
+that modern tendency is to argue that a melody might go on
+indefinitely almost; there is no reason why it should come to a full
+stop, for it is not a sentence, but more a line, which, like the
+rambling incurvations of a frieze, requires no rule to stop it, but
+alone the will and taste of its engenderer."
+
+Or is harmonization the important factor? Folk-songs are not
+harmonized at all, and yet certain musicians, Cecil Sharp for example,
+devote their lives to collecting them, while others, like Percy
+Grainger, base their compositions on them. On the other hand such
+music as Debussy's _Iberia_ depends for its very existence on its
+beautiful harmonies. The harmonies of Gluck are extremely simple,
+those of Richard Strauss extremely complex.
+
+H. T. Finck says somewhere that one of the greatest charms of music is
+modulation but the old church composers who wrote in the "modes" never
+modulated at all. Erik Satie seldom avails himself of this modern
+device. It is a question whether Leo Ornstein modulates. If we may
+take him at his word Arnold Schoenberg has a system of modulation. At
+least it is his very own.
+
+Are long compositions better than short ones? This may seem a silly
+question but I have read criticisms based on a theory that they were.
+Listen, for example, to de Quincy: "A song, an air, a tune,--that is,
+a short succession of notes revolving rapidly upon itself,--how could
+that by possibility offer a field of compass sufficient for the
+development of great musical effects? The preparation pregnant with
+the future, the remote correspondence, the questions, as it were,
+which to a deep musical sense are asked in one passage, and answered
+in another; the iteration and ingemination of a given effect, moving
+through subtile variations that sometimes disguise the theme,
+sometimes fitfully reveal it, sometimes throw it out tumultuously to
+the daylight,--these and ten thousand forms of self-conflicting
+musical passion--what room could they find, what opening, for
+utterance, in so limited a field as an air or song?" After this
+broadside permit me to quote a verse of Gerard de Nerval:
+
+    _"Il est un air pour qui je donnerais
+      Tout Rossini, tout Mozart, et tout Weber,
+      Un air tres-vieux, languissant et funebre,
+      Qui pour moi seul a des charmes secrets."_
+
+And now let us dispassionately, if possible, regard the evidence.
+Richard Strauss's _Alpine Symphony_, admittedly one of his weakest
+works and considered very tiresome even by ardent Straussians, plays
+for nearly an hour while any one can sing _Der Erlkonig_ in three
+minutes. Are short compositions better than long ones? Answer: _Love
+me and the World is Mine_ is a short song (although it seldom sounds
+so) while Schubert's _C major Symphony_ is called the "symphony of
+heavenly length."
+
+Is what is new better than what is old? Is what is old better than
+what is new? Schoenberg is new; is he therefor to be considered better
+than Beethoven? Stravinsky is new; is he therefor to be considered
+worse than Liszt?
+
+Is an opera better than a song? Compare _Pagliacci_ and Strauss's
+_Standchen_. Is a string quartet better than a piece for the piano?
+But I grow weary.... Under the circumstances it would seem that if you
+have any strong opinions about music you are perfectly entitled to
+them, for the critics do not agree and you will find many of them
+basing their criticism on some of the various hypotheses I have
+advanced. H. T. Finck tells us that the sonata form is illogical,
+forgetting perhaps that once it served its purpose; Jean Marnold
+dubbed _Armide_ an _oeuvre batarde_; John F. Runciman called
+_Parsifal_ "decrepit stuff," while Ernest Newman assures us that it
+is "marvellous"; Pierre Lalo and Philip Hale disagree on the subject
+of Debussy's _La Mer_ while W. J. Henderson and James Huneker wrangle
+over Richard Strauss's _Don Quixote_.
+
+The clue to the whole matter lies in a short phrase: Imitative work is
+always bad. Music that tries to be something that something else has
+been may be thrown aside as worthless. It will not endure although it
+may sometimes please the zanies and jackoclocks of a generation. The
+critic, therefor, who comes nearest to the heart of the matter, is he
+who, either through instinct or familiarity with the various phenomena
+of music, is able to judge of a work's originality. There must be
+individuality in new music to make it worthy of our attention, and
+that, after all is all that matters. For the tiniest folk-song often
+persists in the hearts and minds of the people, often stirs the pulse
+of a musician, pursuing its tuneful way through two centuries, while a
+mighty thundering symphony of the same period may lie dead and
+rotting, food for the Niptus Hololencus and the Blatta Germanica. We
+still sing _The Old Folks At Home_ and _Le Cycle du Vin_ but we have
+laid aside _Di Tanti Palpiti_. Any piece of music possessing the
+certain magic power of individuality is of value, it matters not
+whether it be symphony or song, opera or dance. What most critics
+have forgotten is that in Music matter, form, and idea are one. In
+painting, in poetry the idea, the words, the form, may be separated;
+each may play its part, but in music there is no idea without form, no
+form without idea. That is what makes musical criticism difficult.
+
+  _January 24, 1918._
+
+
+
+
+Edgar Saltus
+
+    _"O no, we never mention him,
+      His name is never heard!"_
+
+                        Old Ballad.
+
+
+
+
+Edgar Saltus
+
+
+To write about Edgar Saltus should be _vieux jeu_. The man is an
+American; he was born in 1858; he accomplished some of his best work
+in the Eighties and the Nineties, in the days when mutton-legged
+sleeves, whatnots, Rogers groups, cat-tails, peacock feathers,
+Japanese fans, musk-mellon seed collars, and big-wheeled bicycles were
+in vogue. He has written history, fiction, poetry, literary criticism,
+and philosophy, and to all these forms he has brought sympathy,
+erudition, a fresh point of view, and a radiant style. He has
+imagination and he understands the gentle art of arranging facts in
+kaleidoscopic patterns so that they may attract and not repel the
+reader. America, indeed, has not produced a round dozen authors who
+equal him as a brilliant stylist with a great deal to say. And yet
+this man, who wrote some of his best books in the Eighties and who is
+still alive, has been allowed to drift into comparative oblivion. Even
+his early reviewers shoved him impatiently aside or ignored him
+altogether; a writer in "Belford's Magazine" for July, 1888, says:
+"Edgar Saltus should have his name changed to Edgar Assaulted." Soon
+he became a literary leper. The doctors and professors would have none
+of him. To most of them, nowadays, I suppose, he is only a name. Many
+of them have never read any of his books. I do not even remember to
+have seen him mentioned in the works of James Huneker and you will not
+find his name in Barrett Wendell's "A History of American Literature"
+(1901), "A Reader's History of American Literature" by Thomas
+Wentworth Higginson and Henry Walcott Boynton (1903), Katherine Lee
+Bates's "American Literature" (1898), "A Manual of American
+Literature," edited by Theodore Stanton (1909), William B. Cairns's "A
+History of American Literature" (1912), William Edward Simonds's "A
+Student's History of American Literature" (1909), Fred Lewis Pattee's
+"A History of American Literature Since 1870" (1915), John Macy's "The
+Spirit of American Literature" (1913), or William Lyon Phelps's "The
+Advance of the English Novel" (1916). The third volume of "The
+Cambridge History of American Literature," bringing the subject up to
+1900, has not yet appeared but I should be amazed to discover that the
+editors had decided to include Saltus therein. Curiously enough he is
+mentioned in Oscar Fay Adams's "A Dictionary of American Authors"
+(1901 edition) and, of all places, I have found a reference to him in
+one of Agnes Repplier's books.
+
+You will find few essays about the man or his work in current or
+anterior periodicals. There is, to be sure, the article by Ramsay
+Colles, entitled "A Publicist: Edgar Saltus," published in the
+"Westminster Magazine" for October, 1904, but this essay could have
+won our author no adherents. If any one had the courage to wade
+through its muddy paragraphs he doubtless emerged vowing never to read
+Saltus. Besides only the novels are touched on. In 1903 G. F.
+Monkshood and George Gamble arranged a compilation from Saltus's work
+which they entitled "Wit and Wisdom from Edgar Saltus" (Greening and
+Co., London). The work is done without sense or sensitiveness and the
+prefatory essay is without salt or flavour of any sort. An anonymous
+writer in "Current Literature" for July, 1907, asks plaintively why
+this author has been permitted to remain in obscurity and quotes from
+some of the reviews. In "The Philistine" for October, 1907, Elbert
+Hubbard takes a hand in the game. He says, "Edgar Saltus is the best
+writer in America--with a few insignificant exceptions," but he
+deplores the fact that Saltus knows nothing about the cows and
+chickens; only cities and gods seem to interest him. Still there is
+some atmosphere in this study, which is devoted to one book, "The
+Lords of the Ghostland." In the New York Public Library four of
+Saltus's books and one of his translations (about one-sixth of his
+published work) are listed. You may also find there in a series of
+volumes entitled "Nations of the World" his supplementary chapters
+bringing the books up to date. That is all.
+
+All these years, of course, Saltus has had his admiring circle,[1]
+people of intelligence, of whom, unfortunately, I cannot say that I
+was one. These, who have been content to read and admire without
+spreading the news, may well be inclined to regard my performance as
+repetitive and impertinent. Of these I must crave indulgence and of
+Saltus himself too. For he, knowing how well he has done his work,
+must sit like Buddha, ironic and indulgent, smiling on the poor
+benighted who have yet to approach his altars. Once, at least, he
+spoke: "A book that pleases no one may be poor. The book that pleases
+every one is detestable."
+
+I seem to remember to have heard his name all my life, but until
+recently I have not read one line concerning or by him. I find that my
+friends, many of whom are extensive readers, are in the same sad state
+of ignorance. There is an exception and that exception is responsible
+for my conversion. For six years, no less, Edna Kenton has been urging
+me to read Edgar Saltus. She has been gently insinuating but firm.
+None of us can struggle forever against fate or a determined woman. In
+the end I capitulated, purchased a book by Edgar Saltus at random, and
+read it ... at one sitting. I sought for more. As most of his books
+are out of print and as the list in the Public Library conspicuously
+omits all but one of his best _opera_ the matter presented
+difficulties. However, a little diligent search in the old book shops
+accomplished wonders. In less than two weeks I had dug up twenty-two
+titles and in less than two weeks I had read twenty-four; since then I
+have consumed the other four. There are few writers in American or any
+other literature who can survive such a test; there are few writers
+who have given me such keen pleasure.
+
+The events of his life, mostly remain shrouded in mystery. His comings
+and goings are not reported in the newspapers; he does not make
+public speeches; and his name is seldom, if ever, mentioned "among
+those present." That he has been married and has one daughter "Who's
+Who" proclaims, together with the few biographical details mentioned
+below. That is all. May we not herein find some small explanation for
+his apparent neglect? Many thousands of lesser men have lifted
+themselves to "literary" prominence by blowing their own tubas and
+striking their own crotals. Even in the case of a man of such manifest
+genius as George Bernard Shaw we may be permitted to doubt if he would
+be so well known, had he not taken the trouble to erect monuments to
+himself on every possible occasion in every possible location. Fame is
+a quaint old-fashioned body, who loves to be pursued. She seldom, if
+ever, runs after anybody except in her well-known role of necrophile.
+
+Edgar Evertson Saltus was born in New York City June 8, 1858. He is a
+lineal descendant of Admiral Kornelis Evertson, the commander of the
+Dutch fleet, who captured New York from the English, August 9, 1673.
+Francis Saltus, the poet, was his brother. He enjoyed a cosmopolitan
+education which may be regarded as an important factor in the
+development of his tastes and ideas. From St. Paul's School in Concord
+he migrated to the Sorbonne in Paris, and thence to Heidelberg and
+Munich, where he bathed in the newer Germanic philosophies. Finally he
+took a course of law at Columbia University. The influence of this
+somewhat heterogeneous seminary life is manifest in all his future
+writing. Beginning, no doubt, as a disciple of Emerson in New England,
+he fell under the spell of Balzac in Paris, of Schopenhauer and von
+Hartmann in Germany. Pages might be brought forward as evidence that
+he had a thorough classical education. His knowledge of languages made
+it easy for him to drink deeply at many fountain heads. If Oscar Wilde
+found his chief inspiration in Huysmans's "A Rebours," it is certain
+that Saltus also quaffed intoxicating draughts at this source. Indeed
+in one of his books he refers to Huysmans as his friend. It is further
+apparent that he is acquainted with the works of Barbey d'Aurevilly,
+Josephin Peladan,[2] Baudelaire, Mallarme, Verlaine, Arthur Rimbaud,
+Catulle Mendes, and Jules Laforgue, especially the Laforgue of the
+"Moralites Legendaires." His kinship with these writers is near, but
+through this mixed blood run strains inherited from the early pagans,
+the mediaeval monks, the Germanic philosophers, and London of the
+Eighteen Nineties (although there is not one word about Saltus in
+Holbrook Jackson's book of the period), and perhaps, after all, his
+nearest literary relative was an American, Edgar Allan Poe, who
+bequeathed to him a garret full of strange odds and ends. But Saltus
+surpasses Poe in almost every respect save as a poet.
+
+Joseph Hergesheimer has expressed a theory to the effect that great
+art is always provincial, never cosmopolitan; that only provincial art
+is universal in its appeal. Like every other theory this one is to a
+large extent true, but Hergesheimer in his arbitrary summing up, has
+forgotten the fantastic. The fantastic in literature, in art of any
+kind, can never be provincial. The work of Poe is not provincial; nor
+is that of Gustave Moreau, an artist with whom Edgar Saltus can very
+readily be compared. If you have visited the Musee Moreau in Paris
+where, in the studio of the dead painter, is gathered together the
+most complete collection of his works, which lend themselves to
+endless inspection, you can, in a sense, reconstruct for yourself an
+idea of the works of Edgar Saltus. One finds therein the same
+unicorns, the same fabulous monsters, the same virgins on the rocks,
+the same exotic and undreamed of flora and fauna, the same mystic
+paganism, the same exquisitely jewelled workmanship. One can find
+further analogies in the Aubrey Beardsley of "Under the Hill," in the
+elaborate stylized irony of Max Beerbohm. Surely not provincials
+these, but just as surely artists.
+
+Moreover Saltus's style may be said to possess American
+characteristics. It is dashing and rapid, and as clear as the water in
+Southern seas. The man has a penchant for short and nervous sentences,
+but they are never jerky. They explode like so many firecrackers and
+remind one of the great national holiday!... Nevertheless Edgar Saltus
+should have been born in France.
+
+His essays, whether they deal with literary criticism, history,
+religion (which is almost an obsession with this writer),
+devil-worship, or cooking, are pervaded by that rare quality, charm.
+Somewhere he quotes a French aphorism:
+
+    _"Etre riche n'est pas l'affaire,
+      Toute l'affaire est de charmer,"_
+
+which might be applied to his own work. There is a deep and beneficent
+guile in the simplicity of his style, as limpid as a brook, and yet,
+as over a brook, in its overtones hover a myriad of sparkling
+dragon-flies and butterflies; in its depths lie a plethora of trout.
+He deals with the most obstruse and abstract subjects with such ease
+and grace, without for one moment laying aside the badge of authority,
+that they assume a mysterious fascination to catch the eye of the
+passerby. In his fictions he has sometimes cultivated a more hectic
+style, but that in itself constitutes one of the bases of its
+richness. Scarcely a word but evokes an image, a strange, bizarre
+image, often a complication of images. He is never afraid of the
+colloquial, never afraid of slang even, and he often weaves lovely
+patterns with obsolete or technical words. These lines, in which
+Saltus paid tribute to Gautier, he might, with equal justice, have
+applied to himself: "No one could torment a fancy more delicately than
+he; he had the gift of adjective; he scented a new one afar like a
+truffle; and from the Morgue of the dictionary he dragged forgotten
+beauties. He dowered the language of his day with every tint of dawn
+and every convulsion of sunset; he invented metaphors that were worth
+a king's ransom, and figures of speech that deserve the Prix Montyon.
+Then reviewing his work, he formulated an axiom which will go down
+with a nimbus through time: Whomsoever a thought however complex, a
+vision however apocalyptic, surprises without words to convey it, is
+not a writer. The inexpressible does not exist." It is impossible to
+taste at this man's table. One must eat the whole dinner to appreciate
+its opulent inevitability. Still I may offer a few olives, a branch or
+two of succulent celery to those who have not as yet been invited to
+sit down. One of his ladies walks the Avenue in a gown the "color of
+fried smelts." Such figurative phrases as "Her eyes were of that
+green-grey which is caught in an icicle held over grass," "The sand is
+as fine as face powder, _nuance_ Rachel, packed hard," "Death, it may
+be, is not merely a law but a place, perhaps a garage which the
+traveller reaches on a demolished motor, but whence none can proceed
+until all old scores are paid," "The ocean resembled nothing so much
+as an immense blue syrup," "She was a pale freckled girl, with hair
+the shade of Bavarian beer," "The sun rose from the ocean like an
+indolent girl from her bath," "Night, that queen who reigns only when
+she falls, shook out the shroud she wears for gown," are to be found
+on every page. Certain phrases sound good to him and are re-used:
+"Disappearances are deceptive," "ruedelapaixian" (to describe a
+dress), "toilet of the ring" (lifted from the bull-fight in "Mr.
+Incoul's Misadventure" to do service in an account of the arena games
+under Nero in "Imperial Purple"), but repetition of this kind is
+infrequent in his works and seemingly unnecessary. Ideas and phrases,
+endless chains of them, spurt from the point of his ardent pen.
+Standing on his magic carpet he shakes new sins out of his sleeve as a
+conjurer shakes out white rabbits and juggles words with an exquisite
+dexterity. He is, indeed, the _jongleur de notre ame_!
+
+From the beginning, his style has attracted the attention of the few
+and no one, I am sure, has ever written a three line review of a book
+by Saltus without referring to it. Mme. Amelie Rives has quoted Oscar
+Wilde as saying to her one night at dinner, "In Edgar Saltus's work
+passion struggles with grammar on every page!" Percival Pollard has
+dubbed him a "prose paranoiac," and Elbert Hubbard says, "He writes so
+well that he grows enamoured of his own style and is subdued like the
+dyer's hand; he becomes intoxicated on the lure of lines and the roll
+of phrases. He is woozy on words--locoed by syntax and prosody. The
+libation he pours is flavoured with euphues. It is all like a cherry
+in a morning Martini." A phrase which Remy de Gourmont uses to
+describe Villiers de l'Isle Adam might be applied with equal success
+to the author of "The Lords of the Ghostland": "_L'idealisme de
+Villiers etait un veritable idealisme verbal, c'est-a-dire qu'il
+croyait vraiment a la puissance evocatrice des mots, a leur vertu
+magique._" And we may listen to Saltus's own testimony in the matter:
+"It may be noted that in literature only three things count, style,
+style polished, style repolished; these imagination and the art of
+transition aid, but do not enhance. As for style, it may be defined as
+the sorcery of syllables, the fall of sentences, the use of the exact
+term, the pursuit of a repetition even unto the thirtieth and fortieth
+line. Grammar is an adjunct but not an obligation. No grammarian ever
+wrote a thing that was fit to read."
+
+At his worst--and his worst can be monstrous!--garbed fantastically in
+purple patches and gaudy rags, he wallows in muddy puddles of Burgundy
+and gold dust; even then he is unflagging and holds the attention in a
+vise. His women have eyes which are purple pools, their hair is bitten
+by combs, their lips are scarlet threads. Even the names of his
+characters, Roanoke Raritan, Ruis Ixar, Tancred Ennever, Erastus
+Varick, Gulian Verplank, Melancthon Orr, Justine Dunnellen, Roland
+Mistrial, Giselle Oppensheim, Yoda Jones, Stella Sixmuth, Violet
+Silverstairs, Sallie Malakoff, Shane Wyvell, Dugald Maule, Eden
+Menemon (it will be observed that he has a persistent, balefully
+procacious, perhaps, indeed, Freudian predilection for the letters U,
+V, and X),[3] are fantastic and fabulous ... sometimes almost
+frivolous. And here we may find our paradox. His sense of humour is
+abnormal, sometimes expressed directly by way of epigram or sly
+wording but may it not also occasionally express itself indirectly in
+these purple towers of painted velvet words, extravagant fables, and
+unbelievable characters he is so fond of erecting? Some of his work
+almost approaches the burlesque in form. He carries his manner to a
+point where he seems to laugh at it himself, and then, with a touch of
+poignant realism or a poetic phrase, he confounds the reader's
+judgment. The virtuosity of the performance is breath-taking!
+
+He is always the snob (somewhere he defends the snob in an essay):
+rich food ("half-mourning" [artichoke hearts and truffles], "filet of
+reindeer," a cygnet in its plumage bearing an orchid in its beak,
+"heron's eggs whipped with wine into an amber foam," "mashed
+grasshoppers baked in saffron"), rich clothes, rich people interest
+him. There is no poverty in his books. His creatures do not toil. They
+cut coupons off bonds. Sometimes they write or paint, but for the most
+part they are free to devote themselves exclusively to the pursuit of
+emotional experience, eating, reading, and travelling the while. And
+when they have finished dining they wipe their hands, wetted in a
+golden bowl, in the curly hair of a tiny serving boy. A character in
+"Madam Sapphira" explains this tendency: "A writer, if he happens to
+be worth his syndicate, never chooses a subject. The subject chooses
+him. He writes what he must, not what he might. That's the thing the
+public can't understand."
+
+There is always a preoccupation with ancient life, sometimes freely
+expressed as in "Imperial Purple," but more often suggested by plot,
+phrase, or scene. He kills more people than Caligula killed during the
+whole course of his bloody reign. Murders, suicides, and other forms
+of sudden death flash their sensations across his pages. Webster and
+the other Elizabethans never steeped themselves so completely in gore.
+In almost every book there is an orgy of death and he has been
+ingenious in varying its forms. The poisons of rafflesia, muscarine,
+and orsere are introduced in his fictions; somewhere he devotes an
+essay to toxicology. Daggers with blades like needles, pistols,
+drownings, asphyxiations, play their roles ... and in one book there
+is a crucifixion!
+
+Again I find that Mr. Saltus has said his word on the subject: "In
+fiction as in history it is the shudder that tells. Hugo could find no
+higher compliment for Baudelaire than to announce that the latter had
+discovered a new one. For new shudders are as rare as new vices;
+antiquity has made them all seem trite. The apt commingling of the
+horrible and the trivial, pathos and ferocity, is yet the one secret
+of enduring work--a secret, parenthetically, which Hugo knew as no one
+else."
+
+His fables depend in most instances upon sexual abberrations, curious
+coincidences, fantastic happenings. Rapes and incests decorate his
+pages. He does not ask us to believe his monstrous stories; he compels
+us to. He carries us by means of the careless expenditure of many
+passages of somewhat ribald beauty, along with him, captive to his
+pervasive charm. We are constantly reminded, in endless, almost
+wearisome, imagery, of gold and purple, foreign languages, esoteric
+philosophies, foods the names of which strike the ear as graciously
+as they themselves might strike the tongue. From Huysmans he has
+learned the formula for ravishing all our senses. Words are often used
+for their own sakes to call up images, colour flits across every page,
+across, indeed, every line. We taste, we smell, we see. There is the
+pomp and circumstance of the Roman Catholic ritual in these pages, the
+Roman Catholic ritual well supplied with mythical monsters, singing
+flowers, and blooming women. Strange scarlet and mulberry threads form
+the woof of these tapestries, threads pulled with great labour from
+all the art of the past. There is, in much of his work, an
+undercurrent of subtle sensuous erotic poison; in one of her stories
+Edna Kenton tells us that _chartreuse jaune_ and bananas form such a
+poison. There is a suggestion of _chartreuse jaune_ and bananas in
+much of the work of Edgar Saltus.
+
+He is constantly obsessed by the mysteries of love and death, the
+veils of Isis, the secrets of Moses. While others were delving in the
+American soil his soul sped afar; he is not even a cosmopolitan; he is
+a Greek, a Brahmin, a worshipper of Ishtar. There is a prodigious and
+prodigal display of genius in his work, savannahs of epigrams, forests
+of ideas, phrases enough to fill the ocean.[4] There is enough
+material in the romances of Edgar Saltus to furnish all the cinema
+companies in America with scenarios for a twelve-month.
+
+Early in the Eighties a writer in "The Argus" referred to him as "the
+prose laureate of pessimism." His philosophy may be summed up in a few
+phrases: Nothing matters, Whatever will be is, Everything is possible,
+and Since we live today let us make the best of it and live in Paris.
+And through all the _opera_ of Saltus, through the rapes and murders,
+the religious, philosophical, and social discussions, rings
+Cherubino's still unanswered question, _Che cosa e amor?_ like a
+persistent refrain.
+
+After having said so much it seems unnecessary to add that I strongly
+advise the reader to go out and buy all the books of Edgar Saltus he
+can find (and to find many will require patience and dexterity, as
+most of them are out of print). To further aid him in the matter I
+have prepared a short catalogue and with his permission I will guide
+him gently through this new land. I have also added a list of
+publishers, together with the dates of publication, although I cannot,
+in some instances, vouch for their having been the original imprints.
+It may be noted that almost all his books have been reprinted in
+England.[5]
+
+"Balzac,"[6] signed Edgar Evertson Saltus (for a time he used his full
+name) is such good literary criticism and such good personal biography
+that one wishes the author had tried the form again. He did not save
+in his prefaces to his translations, his essay on Victor Hugo, and his
+short study of Oscar Wilde. In its miniature way, for the book is
+slight, "Balzac" is as good of its kind as James Huneker's "Chopin,"
+Auguste Ehrhard's "Fanny Elssler," and Frank Harris's "Oscar Wilde."
+In style it is superior to any of these. It is a very pretty
+performance for a debut and if it is out of print, as I think it is,
+some enterprising publisher should serve it to the public in a new
+edition. The two most interesting chapters, largely anecdotal but
+continuously illuminating, are entitled "The Vagaries of Genius,"
+wherein one may find an infinitude of details concerning the manner
+in which Balzac worked, and "The Chase for Gold," but tucked in
+somewhere else is a charming digression about realism in fiction and
+the bibliography should still be of use to students. Saltus tells us
+that Balzac took all his characters' names from life, frequently from
+signs which he observed on the street. In this respect Saltus
+certainly has not followed him; in another he has been more imitative:
+I refer to the Balzacian trick of carrying people from one book to
+another.
+
+"The Philosophy of Disenchantment"[7] is an ingratiating account of
+the pessimism of Schopenhauer, a philosophy with which it would seem,
+Saltus is fully in accord. Two-thirds of the book is allotted to
+Schopenhauer, but the remainder is devoted to an exposition of the
+teachings of von Hartmann and a final essay, "Is Life an Affliction?"
+which query the author seems to answer in the affirmative. One of the
+best-known of the Saltus books, "The Philosophy of Disenchantment" is
+written in a clear, translucent style without the iridescence which
+decorates his later _opera_.
+
+"After-Dinner Stories from Balzac, done into English by Myndart
+Verelst (obviously E. S.) with an introduction by Edgar Saltus"[8]
+contains four of the Frenchman's tales, "The Red Inn," "Madame
+Firmiani," "The 'Grande Breteche'," and "Madame de Beauseant." The
+introduction is written in Saltus's most beguiling manner and may be
+referred to as one of the most delightful short essays on Balzac
+extant. The dedication is to V. A. B.
+
+"The Anatomy of Negation"[9] is Saltus's best book in his earlier
+manner, which is as free from flamboyancy as early Gothic, and one of
+his most important contributions to our literature. The work is a
+history of antitheism from Kapila to Leconte de Lisle and, while the
+writer in a brief prefatory notice disavows all responsibility for the
+opinions of others, it can readily be felt that the book is a labour
+of love and that his sympathy lies with the iconoclasts through the
+centuries. The chapter entitled, "The Convulsions of the Church," a
+brief history of Christianity, is one of the most brilliant passages
+to be found in any of the works of this very brilliant writer. Indeed,
+if you are searching for the soul of Saltus you could not do better
+than turn to this chapter. Of Jesus he says, "He was the most
+entrancing of nihilists but no innovator." Here is another excerpt:
+"Paganism was not dead; it had merely fallen asleep. Isis gave way to
+Mary; apotheosis was replaced by canonization; the divinities were
+succeeded by saints; and, Africa aiding, the Church surged from
+mythology with the Trinity for tiara." Again: "Satan was Jew from horn
+to hoof. The registry of his birth is contained in the evolution of
+Hebraic thought." Never was any book so full of erudition and ideas so
+easy to read, a fascinating _opus_, written by a true sceptic.
+Following the Baedeker system, adopted so amusingly by Henry T. Finck
+in his "Songs and Song Writers," this book should be triple-starred.
+
+"Tales before Supper, from Theophile Gautier and Prosper Merimee, told
+in English by Myndart Verelst and delayed with a proem by Edgar
+Saltus."[10] Translation again. The stories are "Avatar" and "The
+Venus of Ille." The essay at the beginning is a very charming
+performance. This book is dedicated to E. C. R.
+
+"Mr. Incoul's Misadventure,"[11] Saltus's first novel, is also the
+best of his numerous fictions. It, too, should be triple-starred in
+any guide book through this _opus_-land. In it will be found,
+super-distilled, the very essence of all the best qualities of this
+writer. It is written with fine reserve; the story holds; the
+characters are unusually well observed, felt, and expressed. Irony
+shines through the pages and the final cadence includes a murder and a
+suicide. For the former, bromide of potassium and gas are utilized in
+combination; for the latter laudanum, taken hypodermically, suffices.
+There are scenes in Biarritz and Northern Spain which include a
+thrilling picture of a bull-fight. There is an interesting glimpse of
+the Paris Opera. There is a description of an epithumetic library
+which embraces many forbidden titles, (How that "baron of moral
+endeavour ... the professional hound of heaven," Anthony Comstock,
+would have gloated over these shelves!), a vibrant page about Goya,
+and another about a Thibetian cat. Many passages could be brought
+forward as evidence that Mr. Saltus loves the fire-side sphynx. The
+Mr. Incoul of the title gives one a very excellent idea of how inhuman
+a just man can be. There is not a single slip in the skilful
+delineation of this monster. The beautiful heroine vaguely shambles
+into a tapestried background. She is _moyen age_ in her appealing
+weakness. The _jeune premier_, Lenox Leigh, is well drawn and
+lighted. Time after time the author strikes subtle harmonies which
+must have delighted Henry James. Why is this book not dedicated to
+author of "The Turn of the Screw" rather than to "E. A. S."? The pages
+are permeated with suspense, horror, information, irony, and charm,
+about evenly distributed, all of which qualities are expressed in the
+astounding title (astounding after you have read the book). There is a
+white marriage in this tale, stipulated in the hymeneal bond. In 1877
+Tschaikovsky made a similar agreement with the woman he married.
+
+"The Truth About Tristrem Varick"[12] is written with the same
+restraint which characterizes the style of "Mr. Incoul's
+Misadventure," a restraint seldom to be encountered in Saltus's later
+fictions. One of the angles of the plot in which an irate father
+attempts to suppress a marriage by suggesting incest, bobs up twice
+again in his stories, for the last time nearly thirty years later in
+"The Monster." Irony is the keynote of the work, a keynote sounded in
+the dedication, "To my master, the philosopher of the unconscious,
+Eduard von Hartmann, this attempt in ornamental disenchantment is
+dutifully inscribed." The heroine, as frequently happens with Saltus
+heroines, is veiled with the mysteries of Isis; we do not see the
+workings of her mind and so we can sympathize with Varick, who pursues
+her with persistent misunderstanding and arduous devotion through 240
+pages. He attributes her aloofness to his father's unfounded charge
+against his mother and her father. When he learns that she has borne a
+child he suspects rape and, with a needle-like dagger that leaves no
+sign, he kills the man he believes to have seduced her. Then he goes
+to the lady to receive her thanks, only to learn that she loved the
+man he has killed. Varick gives himself into the hands of the police,
+confesses, and is delivered to justice, the lady gloating. A
+strikingly pessimistic tale, only less good than "Mr. Incoul." There
+is superb writing in these pages, many delightful passages. _La
+Cenerentola_ and _Lucrezia Borgia_ are mentioned in passing. Saltus
+has (or had) an exuberant fondness for Donizetti and Rossini. Here is
+a telling bit of art criticism (attributed to a character) descriptive
+of the Paris Salon: "There was a Manet or two, a Moreau and a dozen
+excellent landscapes, but the rest represented the apotheosis of
+mediocrity. The pictures which Gerome, Cabanel, Bouguereau, and the
+acolytes of these pastry-cooks exposed were stupid and sterile as
+church doors." This required courage in 1888. One wonders where Kenyon
+Cox was at the time! Give this book at least two stars.
+
+"Eden"[13] is the third of Saltus's fictions and possibly the poorest
+of the three. Eden is the name of the heroine whose further name is
+Menemon. Stuyvesant Square is her original habitat but she migrates to
+Fifth Avenue. The tide is flowing South again nowadays. Her husband is
+almost too good, but nevertheless appearances seem against him until
+he explains that the lady with whom he has been seen in a cab is his
+daughter by a former marriage, and the young man who seems to have
+been making love to Eden is his son. Characteristic of Saltus is the
+use of the Spanish word for nightingale. There are no deaths, no
+suicides, no murders in these pages: a very eunuch of a book! A motto
+from Tasso, "_Perdute e tutto il tempo che in amor non si spende_"
+adorns the title page and the work is dedicated to "E----H
+Amicissima."
+
+With "The Pace that Kills"[14] Saltus doffs his old coat and dons a
+new and gaudier garment. Possibly he owed this change in style to the
+influence of the London movement so interestingly described in
+Holbrook Jackson's "The Eighteen-Nineties." The book begins with
+abortion and ends with a drop over a ferry-boat into the icy East
+River. There is an averted strangulation of a baby and for the second
+time in a Saltus _opus_ a dying millionaire leaves his fortune to the
+St. Nicholas Hospital. Was Saltus ballyhooing for this institution?
+The hero is a modern Don Juan. Alphabet Jones appears occasionally, as
+he does in many of the other novels. This Balzacian trick obsessed the
+author for a time. The book is dedicated to John S. Rutherford and
+bears as a motto on its title page this quotation from Rabusson:
+"_Pourquoi la mort? Dites, plutot, pourquoi la vie?_"
+
+In "A Transaction in Hearts"[15] the Reverend Christopher Gonfallon
+falls in love with his wife's sister, Claire. A New England countess,
+a subsidiary figure, suggests d'Aurevilly. This story originally
+appeared in "Lippincott's Magazine" and the editor who accepted it was
+dismissed. A year or so later a new editor published "The Picture of
+Dorian Gray." Still later Saltus tells me he met Oscar Wilde in London
+and the Irish poet asked him for news of the new editor. "He's quite
+well," answered Saltus. Wilde did not seem to be pleased: "When your
+story appeared the editor was removed; when mine appeared I supposed
+he would be hanged. Now you tell me he is quite well. It is most
+disheartening." Saltus then asked Wilde why Dorian Gray was cut by his
+friends. Wilde turned it over. "I fancy they saw him eating fish with
+his knife."
+
+"A Transient Guest and other Episodes"[16] contains three short tales
+besides the title story: "The Grand Duke's Riches," an account of an
+ingenious robbery at the Brevoort, "A Maid of Athens," and "Fausta," a
+story of love, revenge, and death in Cuba. If the final cadence of the
+book is a dagger thrust the prelude is a subtle poison, rafflesia, a
+Sumatran plant, intended for the hero, Tancred Ennever, but consumed
+with fatal results by his faithful fox terrier, Zut Alors. The story
+is arresting and, as frequently happens in Saltus romances, a man
+finds himself no match for a woman. "A Transient Guest" is dedicated
+to K. J. M.
+
+The slender volume entitled "Love and Lore"[17] contains a short
+series of slight essays, interrupted by slighter sonnets, on subjects
+which, for the most part, Saltus has treated at greater length and
+with greater effect elsewhere. He makes a whimsical plea for a modern
+revival of the Court of Love and in "Morality in Fiction" he derides
+that Puritanism in American letters whose dark scourge H. L. Mencken
+still pursues with a cat-o'-nine-tails and a hand grenade. He gives us
+a fanciful set of rules for a novelist which, happily, he has ignored
+in his own fictions. The most interesting, personal, and charming
+chapter, although palpably derived from "The Philosophy of
+Disenchantment," is that entitled "What Pessimism Is Not"; here again
+we are in the heart of the author's philosophy. Those who like to read
+books about the Iberian Peninsula can scarcely afford to miss
+"Fabulous Andalucia," in which an able brief for the race of Othello
+is presented: "Under the Moors, Cordova surpassed Baghdad. They wrote
+more poetry than all the other nations put together. It was they who
+invented rhyme; they wrote everything in it, contracts, challenges,
+treaties, treatises, diplomatic notes and messages of love. From the
+earliest khalyf down to Boabdil, the courts of Granada, of Cordova and
+of Seville were peopled with poets, or, as they were termed, with
+makers of Ghazels. It was they who gave us the dulcimer, the hautbois
+and the guitar; it was they who invented the serenade. We are
+indebted to them for algebra and for the canons of chivalry as
+well.... It was from them that came the first threads of light which
+preceded the Renaissance. Throughout mediaeval Europe they were the
+only people that thought." The book is dedicated to Edgar Fawcett,
+"perfect poet--perfect friend" and is embellished with a portrait of
+its author.
+
+"The Story Without a Name"[18] is a translation of "Une Histoire Sans
+Nom" of Barbey d'Aurevilly, and is preceded by one of Saltus's
+charming and atmospheric literary essays, the best on d'Aurevilly to
+be found in English. When this book first appeared, Mr. Saltus informs
+me, a reviewer, "who contrived to be both amusing and complimentary,"
+said that Barbey d'Aurevilly was a fictitious person and that this
+vile story was Saltus's own vile work!
+
+"Mary Magdalen,"[19] on the whole disappointing, is nevertheless one
+of the important Saltus _opera_. The opening chapters, like Oscar
+Wilde's _Salome_ (published two years later than "Mary Magdalen") owe
+much to Flaubert's "Herodias." The dance on the hands is a detail
+from Flaubert, a detail which Tissot followed in his painting of
+Salome.... From the later chapters it is possible that Paul Heyse
+filched an idea. The turning point of his drama, _Maria von Magdala_,
+hinges on Judas's love for Mary and his jealousy of Jesus. Saltus
+develops exactly this situation. Heyse's play appeared in 1899, eight
+years after Saltus's novel. However, Saltus has protested to me that
+it is an idea that might have occurred to any one. "I put it in," he
+added, "to make the action more nervous." The book begins well with a
+description of Herod's court and Rome in Judea, but as a whole it is
+unsatisfactory. Once the plot develops Saltus seems to lose interest.
+He lazily quotes whole scenes from the Bible (George Moore very
+cleverly avoided this pitfall in "The Brook Kerith"). The early
+chapters suggest "Imperial Purple," which appeared a year later and
+upon which he may well have been at work at this time. There is a
+foreshadowing, too, of "The Lords of the Ghostland" in a very amusing
+and slightly cynical passage in which Mary as a child listens to
+Sephorah the sorceress tell legends and myths of Assyria and Egypt.
+Mary interrupts with "Why you mean Moses! You mean Noah!" just as a
+child of today, if confronted with the situations in the Greek dramas
+would attribute them to Bayard Veiller or Eugene Walter. Saltus is too
+much of a scholar to find much novelty in Christianity. But aside from
+this passage cynicism is lacking from this book, a quality which makes
+another story on the same theme, "Le Procurateur de Judee," one of the
+greatest short stories in any language. Mary's sins are quickly passed
+over and we come almost immediately to her conversion. Herod Antipas,
+with his "fan-shaped beard" and vacillating Pilate, quite comparable
+to a modern politician, are the most human and best-realized
+characters in a book which should have been greater than it is. "Mary
+Magdalen" is dedicated to Henry James.
+
+"The facts in the Curious Case of H. Hyrtl, esq."[20] is a slight yarn
+in the mellow Stevenson manner, with a kindly old gentleman as the
+messenger of the supernatural who provides the wherewithal for a
+marriage between an impoverished artist, who is painting
+Heliogabolus's feast of roses, and his sweet young thing. Quite a
+departure this from the usual Saltus manner; nevertheless there are
+two deaths, one by shock, the other in a railway accident. The plot
+depends on as many impossible entrances and exits as a Palais Royal
+farce and the reader is asked to believe in many coincidences. The
+book is dedicated to Lorillard Ronalds who, the author explains in a
+few French phrases, asked him to write something "_de tres pure et de
+tres chaste, pour une jeunesse, sans doute_." He adds that the story
+is a rewriting of a tale which had appeared twenty years earlier.
+
+"Imperial Purple"[21] marks the high-tide of Saltus's peculiar genius.
+The emperors of imperial decadent Rome are led by the chains of art
+behind the chariot wheels of the poet: Julius Caesar, whom Cato called
+"that woman," Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, the wicked Agrippina, for
+whom Agnes Repplier named her cat, Claudius, Nero, Hadrian, Vespasian,
+down to the incredible Heliogabolus. Saltus, who has given us many
+vivid details concerning the lives of his predecessors, seemingly
+falters at this dread name, but only seemingly. More can be found
+about this extraordinary and perverse emperor in Lombard's "L'Agonie"
+and in Franz Blei's "The Powder Puff," but, although Saltus is brief,
+he evokes an atmosphere and a picture in a few short paragraphs. The
+sheer lyric quality of this book has remained unsurpassed by this
+author. Indeed it is rare in all literature. Page after page that
+Walter Pater, Oscar Wilde, or J. K. Huysmans might have been glad to
+sign might be set before you. The man writes with invention, with sap,
+with urge. Our eyes are not clogged with foot-notes and references. It
+is plain that our author has delved in the "Scriptores Historiae
+Augustae," that he has read Lampridius, Suetonius, and the others, but
+he does not strive to make us aware of it. The historical form has at
+last found a poet to render it supportable. Blood runs across the
+pages; gore and booty are the principal themes; and yet Beauty struts
+supreme through the horror. The author's sympathy is his password, a
+sympathy which he occasionally exposes, for he is not above pinning
+his heart to his sleeve, as, for example, when he says, "In spite of
+Augustus's boast, the city was not by any means of marble. It was
+filled with crooked little streets, with the atrocities of the
+Tarquins, with houses unsightly and perilous, with the moss and dust
+of ages; it compared with Alexandria as London compares with Paris; it
+had a splendour of its own, but a splendour that could be heightened."
+Here is a picture of squalid Rome: "In the subura, where at night
+women sat in high chairs, ogling the passer with painted eyes, there
+was still plenty of brick; tall tenements, soiled linen, the odor of
+Whitechapel and St. Giles. The streets were noisy with match-pedlars,
+with vendors of cake and tripe and coke; there were touts there too,
+altars to unimportant divinities, lying Jews who dealt in old clothes,
+in obscene pictures and unmentionable wares; at the crossings there
+were thimbleriggers, clowns and jugglers, who made glass balls appear
+and disappear surprisingly; there were doorways decorated with curious
+invitations, gossipy barber shops, where, through the liberality of
+politicians, the scum of a great city was shaved, curled and painted
+free; and there were public houses, where vagabond slaves and sexless
+priests drank the mulled wine of Crete, supped on the flesh of beasts
+slaughtered in the arena, or watched the Syrian women twist to the
+click of castanets." The account of the arena under Nero should not be
+missed, but it is too long to quote here. The book, which we give
+three stars, is dedicated to Edwin Albert Schroeder. Fortunately, of
+all Saltus's works, it is the most readily procurable.
+
+"Imperial Purple" has had a curious history. Belford, Clarke and Co.,
+who hid their identity behind the "Morrill, Higgins" imprint, failed
+shortly after they had issued the book. "Presently," Mr. Saltus writes
+me, "a Chicago bibliofilou brought it out as the work of some one else
+and called it 'The Sins of Nero.'" Meanwhile Greening published it in
+London and finally Mitchell Kennerley reprinted it in New York. In
+1911 Macmillan in London brought out "The Amazing Emperor
+Heliogabolus" by the Reverend John Stuart Hay of Oxford. In the
+preface to this book I found the following: "I have also the
+permission of Mr. E. E. Saltus of Harvard University (_sic_) to quote
+his vivid and beautiful studies on the Roman Empire and her customs. I
+am also deeply indebted to Mr. Walter Pater, Mr. J. A. Symonds, and
+Mr. Saltus for many a _tournure de phrase_ and picturesque rendering
+of Tacitus, Suetonious, Lampridius, and the rest." The Reverend Doctor
+certainly helped himself to "Imperial Purple." Words, sentences, nay
+whole paragraphs appear without the formality of quotation marks,
+without any indication, indeed, save these lines in the preface, that
+they are not part of the Doctor's own imagination, unless one compares
+them with the style in which the rest of the book is written. "In one
+instance," Mr. Saltus writes me, "he gave a paragraph of mine as his
+own. Later on he added, 'as we have already said' and repeated the
+paragraph. The plural struck me as singular."
+
+"Madam Sapphira"[22] is a vivid study in unchastened womanhood. We see
+but little of the lady in the 251 pages of this "Fifth Avenue Story";
+her character is exposed to us through the experiences of her poor
+fool husband, who colloquially would be called a simp, by denizens of
+the Low World a boob. He redeems himself to some extent by sending
+Madam Sapphira a belated bouquet of cyanide of potassium. On the
+whole, though characters and phrases in his work might be brought
+forward to prove the contrary, Mr. Saltus obviously has a low opinion
+of women and thinks that men do better without them. The greater part
+of the time he appears to agree with Posthumus:
+
+    "Could I find out
+    The woman's part in me! For there's no motion
+    That tends to vice in man but I affirm
+    It is the woman's part; be it lying, note it
+    The woman's; flattering, hers; deceiving, hers;
+    Lust and rank thoughts, hers, hers; revenges, hers;
+    Ambitions, covetings, changes of prides, disdain,
+    Nice longings, slanders, mutability,
+    All faults that may be named, nay that hell knows,
+    Why, hers, in part or all; but rather, all;
+    For even to vice
+    They are not constant, but are changing still
+    One vice of a minute old for one
+    Not half so old as that. I'll write against them,
+    Detest them, curse them.--Yet 'tis greater skill
+    In a true hate, to pray they have their will:
+    The very devils cannot plague them better."
+
+"Enthralled, a story of international life setting forth the curious
+circumstances concerning Lord Cloden and Oswald Quain":[23] a mad
+_opus_ this, an insane phantasmagoria of crime, avarice, and murder.
+For the second time in this author's novels incest plays a role. This
+time it is real. Quain is indeed the half-brother of the lady who
+desires to marry him. He is as vile and virulent a villain as any who
+stalks through the pages of Ann Ker, Eliza Bromley, or Mrs. Radcliffe.
+A Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde motive is sounded. An ugly man comes back
+from London a handsome fellow after visits to a certain doctor who
+rearranges the lines of his face. The transformation is effected every
+day now (some of our prominent actresses are said to have benefited
+by this operation), but in 1894 the mechanism of the trick must have
+been appallingly creaky. This story, indeed, borders on the burlesque
+and has almost as much claim to the title as "The Green Carnation."
+Was the author laughing at the Eighteen Nineties? The period is subtly
+evoked in one detail, constantly reiterated in Saltus's early books:
+ladies and gentlemen when they leave a room "push aside the
+portieres." Sometimes the "rings jingle." He has in most instances
+mercifully spared us further descriptions of the interiors of New York
+houses at this epoch.... At a dinner party one of the guests refers to
+Howells as the "foremost novelist who is never read." The book is
+dedicated to "Cherubina, _dulcissime rerum_." Saltus returned to the
+central theme of "Enthralled" in a story called "The Impostor,"
+printed in "Ainslee's" for May, 1917.
+
+"When Dreams Come True"[24] again brings us in touch with Tancred
+Ennever, the stupid hero of "The Transient Guest." In the meantime he
+has become an almost intolerable prig. It is probable that Saltus
+meant more by this fable than he has let appear. The roar of the waves
+on the coast of Lesbos is distinctly audible for a time and the
+denoument seems to belong to quite another story.... Ennever has
+turned author. We are informed that he has completed studies on
+Huysmans and Leconte de Lisle; he is also engaged on a "Historia
+Amoris." There is an interesting passage relating to the names of
+great writers. Alphabet Jones assures us that they are always "in two
+syllables with the accent on the first. Oyez: Homer, Sappho, Horace,
+Dante, Petrarch, Ronsard, Shakespeare, Hugo, Swinburne ... Balzac,
+Flaubert, Huysmans, Michelet, Renan." The reader is permitted to add
+... "Saltus"!
+
+"Purple and Fine Women"[25] is a misnamed book. It should be called
+"Philosophic Fables." The first two stories are French in form. Paul
+Bourget himself is the hero of one of them! In "The Princess of the
+Sun" we are offered a new and fantastic version of the Coppelia story.
+"The Dear Departed" finds Saltus in a murderous amorous mood again. In
+"The Princess of the Golden Isles" a new poison is introduced,
+muscarine. Alchemy furnishes the theme for one tale; the protagonist
+seeks an alcahest, a human victim for his crucible. We are left in
+doubt as to whether he chooses his wife, who wears a diamond set in
+one of her teeth, or a gorilla. There are dramas of dual personality
+and of death. Metaphysics and spiritualism rise dimly out of the charm
+of this book. There is a duchess who mews like a cat and somewhere we
+are assured that _Perche non posso odiarte_ from _La Sonnnambula_ is
+the most beautiful aria in the Italian repertory. Here is a true and
+soul-revealing epigram: "The best way to master a subject of which you
+are ignorant is to write it up." Certainly not Saltus at his best,
+this _opus_, but far from his worst.
+
+"The Perfume of Eros"[26] is frenzied fiction again; amnesia,
+drunkenness, white slavery, sex, are its mingled themes. There is a
+pretty picture, recognizable in any smart community, of a witty woman
+of fashion, and a full-length portrait of a bounder. "The Yellow Fay,"
+Saltus's _cliche_ for the Demon Rum, was the original title of this
+"Fifth Avenue Incident." Romance and Realism consort lovingly together
+in its pages. There is an unforgetable passage descriptive of a young
+man ridding himself of his mistress. He interrupts his flow of
+explanation to hand her a card case, which she promptly throws out of
+the window.
+
+"'That is an agreeable way of getting rid of twelve thousand dollars,'
+he remarked.
+
+"Yet, however lightly he affected to speak, the action annoyed him.
+Like all men of large means he was close. It seemed to him beastly to
+lose such a sum. He got up, went to the window and looked down. He
+could not see the case and he much wanted to go and look for it. But
+that for the moment Marie prevented."
+
+"The Pomps of Satan"[27] is replete with grace and graciousness, and
+full of charm, a quality more valuable to its possessor than
+juvenility, our author tells us in a chapter concerning the lost
+elixir of youth. Neither form nor matter assume ponderous shape in
+this volume, which in the quality of its contents reminds one faintly
+of Franz Blei's lady's breviary, "The Powder Puff," but Saltus's book
+is the more ingratiating of the two. Satan's pomps are varied; the
+author exposes his whims, his ideas, images the past, forecasts the
+future, deplores the present. There is a chapter on cooking and we
+learn that Saltus does not care for food prepared in the German style
+... nor yet in the American. He forbids us champagne: "Champagne is
+not a wine. It is a beverage, lighter indeed than brandy and soda,
+but, like cologne, fit only for demi-reps." But he seems untrue to
+himself in an essay condemning the use of perfumes. His own books are
+heavily scented. With the rare prescience and clairvoyance of an
+artist he includes the German Kaiser in a chapter on hyenas (in
+1906!); therein stalk the blood-stained shadows of Caligula,
+Caracalla, Atilla, Tamerlane, Cesare Borgia, Philip II, and Ivan the
+Terrible. The paragraph is worth quoting: "Power consists in having a
+million bayonets behind you. Its diffusion is not general. But there
+are people who possess it. For one, the German Kaiser. Not long since
+somebody or other diagnosed in him the habitual criminal. We doubt
+that he is that. But we suspect that, were it not for the press, he
+would show more of primitive man than he has thus far thought
+judicious." Has Mme. de Thebes done better? Saltus also foresaw
+Gertrude Stein. Peering into the future he wrote: "When that day comes
+the models of literary excellence will not be the long and windy
+sentences of accredited bores, but ample brevities, such as the 'N' on
+Napoleon's tomb, in which, in less than a syllable, an epoch, and the
+glory of it, is resumed." Saltus forsakes his previous choice from
+Bellini and installs _Tu che a Dio_ as his favourite Italian opera
+air. Here is another flash of self-revealment: "Byzance is rumoured
+to have been the sewer of every sin, yet such was its beauty that it
+is the canker of our heart we could not have lived there." Always this
+turning to the far past, this delving in rosetta stones and
+palimpsests, this preoccupation with the sights and sins of the
+ancient gods and kings. A chapter on poisons, another on Gille de
+Retz, which probably owes something to "La Bas," betray this
+preference. He playfully suggests that the Academy of Arts and Letters
+be filled up with young nobodies: "They have, indeed, done nothing
+yet. But therein is their charm. An academy composed of young people
+who have done nothing yet would be more alluring than one made up of
+fossils who are unable to do anything more." Herein are contained
+enough aphorisms and epigrams to make up a new book of Solomonic
+wisdom. Hardly as evenly inspired as "Imperial Purple," "The Pomps of
+Satan" is more dashing and more varied. It is also more tired.
+
+"Vanity Square"[28] in Stella Sixmuth boasts such a "vampire" as even
+Theda Bara is seldom called upon to portray. Not until the final
+chapters of this mystery story do we discover that this lady has been
+poisoning a rich man's wife, with an eye on the rich man's heart and
+hand. Oraere is this slow and subtle poison which leaves no subsequent
+trace. She is thwarted but in a subsequent attempt she is successful.
+Robert Hichens has used this theme in "Bella Donna." There is a
+suicide by pistol. An exciting story but little else, this book
+contains fewer references to the gods and the caesars than is usual
+with Saltus. To compensate there are long discussions about phobias,
+dual personalities (a girl with six is described) and theories about
+future existence. Vanity Square, we are told, is bounded by Central
+Park, Madison Avenue, Seventy-second Street and the Plaza.
+
+It will be remembered that Tancred Ennever was at work on "Historia
+Amoris"[29] in 1895, which would seem to indicate that Saltus had
+begun to collect material for it himself at that time. The title is a
+literal description of the contents of the book: it is a history of
+love. Such a work might have been made purely anecdotal or scientific,
+but Saltus's purpose has been at once more serious and more graceful,
+to show how the love currents flowed through the centuries, to show
+what effect period life had on love and what effect love had on period
+life. Beginning with Babylon and passing on through the "Song of
+Songs" we meet Helen of Troy, Scheherazade (though but briefly),
+Sappho (to whom an entire chapter is devoted), Cleopatra (whom Heine
+called "_cette reine entretenue_"), Mary Magdalen, Heloise.... The
+Courts of Love are described and deductions are drawn as to the effect
+of the Renaissance on the Gay Science. "Historia Amoris" is concluded
+by a Schopenhauerian essay on "The Law of Attraction." Cicisbeism is
+not treated in extenso, as it should be, and I also missed the
+fragrant name of Sophie Arnould. Readers of "Love and Lore," "The
+Pomps of Satan," "Imperial Purple," and "The Lords of the Ghostland"
+will find much of their material adjusted to the purposes of this
+History of Love, which, nevertheless, no one interested in Saltus can
+afford to miss.
+
+In "The Lords of the Ghostland, a history of the ideal,"[30] Saltus
+returns to the theme of "The Anatomy of Negation." The newer work is
+both more cynical and more charming. It is, of course, a history and a
+comparison of religions. With Reinach Saltus believes that
+Christianity owes much to its ancestors. Brahma, Ormuzd, Amon-Ra,
+Bel-Marduk, Jehovah, Zeus, Jupiter, and many lesser deities parade
+before us in defile. Prejudice, intolerance, tolerance even are
+lacking from this book, as they were from "Imperial Purple." "The
+Lords of the Ghostland" is neither reverent nor irreverent, it is
+unreverent. Mr. Saltus finds joy in writing about the gods, the joy of
+a poet, and if his chiefest pleasure is to extol the gods of Greece
+that is only what might be expected of this truly pagan spirit.
+Students of comparative theology can learn much from these pages, but
+they will learn it unwittingly, for the poet supersedes the teacher.
+Saltus is never professorial. The scientific spirit is never to the
+fore; no marshalling of dull facts for their own sakes. Nevertheless I
+suspect that the book contains more absorbing information than any
+similar volume on the subject. With a fascinating and guileful style
+this divine devil of an author leads us on to the spot where he can
+point out to us that the only original feature of Christianity is the
+crucifixion, and even that is foreshadowed in Hindoo legend, in which
+Krishna dies, nailed by arrows to a tree. This book should be required
+reading for the first class in isogogies.
+
+Most of the scenes of "Daughters of the Rich"[31] are laid in Paris.
+The plot hinges on mistaken identity and the whole is a very
+ingenious detective story. The book begins rather than ends with a
+murder, but that is because the tale is told backward. Through lies,
+deceit, and treachery the woman in the case, one Sallie Malakoff,
+betrays the hero into marriage with her. When he discovers her perfidy
+he cheerfully cuts her throat from ear to ear and goes to join the
+lady from whom he has been estranged. She receives him with open arms
+and suggests wedding bells. No woman, she asserts, could resist a man
+who has killed another woman for her sake. This is decidedly a Roman
+point of view! Some of the action takes place in a house on the Avenue
+Malakoff, which must have been near the _hotel_ of the Princesse de
+Sagan and the apartment occupied by Miss Mary Garden.... A fat
+manufacturer's wife confronts the proposal of a mercenary duke with an
+epic rejoinder: "Pay a man a million dollars to sleep with my
+daughter! Never!"... Again Saltus demonstrates how completely he is
+master of the story-telling gift, how surely he possesses the power to
+compel breathless attention.
+
+"The Monster"[32] is fiction, incredible, insane fiction. The monster
+is incest, in this instance _inceste manque_ because it doesn't come
+off. On the eve of a runaway marriage Leilah Ogsten is informed by
+her father that her intended husband is her own brother (he inculpates
+her mother in the scandal). Leilah disappears and to put barriers
+between her and the man she loves becomes the bride of another.
+Verplank pursues. There are two fabulous duels and a scene in which
+our hero is mangled by dogs. The stage (for we are always in some
+extravagant theatre) is frequently set in Paris and the familiar
+scenes of the capital are in turn exposed to our view. It is all mad,
+full of purple patches and crimson splotches and yet, once opened, it
+is impossible to lay the book down until it is completed. From this
+novel Mr. Saltus fashioned his only play, _The Gates of Life_, which
+he sent to Charles Frohman and which Mr. Frohman returned. The piece
+has neither been produced nor published.
+
+Last year (1917) the Brothers of the Book in Chicago published
+privately an extremely limited edition (474 copies) of a book by Edgar
+Saltus entitled, "Oscar Wilde: An Idler's Impression," which contains
+only twenty-six pages, but those twenty-six pages are very beautiful.
+They evoke a spirit from the dead. Indeed, I doubt if even Saltus has
+done better than his description of a strange occurrence in a Regent
+Street Restaurant on a certain night when he was supping with Wilde
+and Wilde was reading _Salome_ to him: "apropos of nothing, or rather
+with what to me at the time was curious irrelevance, Oscar, while
+tossing off glass after glass of liquor, spoke of Pheme, a goddess
+rare even in mythology, who after appearing twice in Homer, flashed
+through a verse of Hesiod and vanished behind a page of Herodotus. In
+telling of her, suddenly his eyes lifted, his mouth contracted, a
+spasm of pain--or was it dread?--had gripped him. A moment only. His
+face relaxed. It had gone.
+
+"I have since wondered, could he have evoked the goddess then? For
+Pheme typified what modern occultism terms the impact--the premonition
+that surges and warns. It was Wilde's fate to die three times--to die
+in the dock, to die in prison, to die all along the boulevards of
+Paris. Often since I have wondered could the goddess have been
+lifting, however slightly, some fringe of the crimson curtain, behind
+which, in all its horror, his destiny crouched. If so, he braved it.
+
+"I had looked away. I looked again. Before me was a fat pauper, florid
+and over-dressed, who, in the voice of an immortal, was reading the
+fantasies of the damned. In his hand was a manuscript, and we were
+supping on _Salome_."
+
+Edgar Saltus began with Balzac in 1884 and he has reached Oscar Wilde
+in 1917. His other literary essays, on Gautier and Merimee in "Tales
+Before Supper," on Barbey d'Aurevilly in "The Story Without a Name,"
+and on Victor Hugo in "The Forum" (June, 1912,) all display the finest
+qualities of his genius. Pervaded with his rare charm they are
+clairvoyant and illuminating, more than that arresting. They should be
+brought together in one volume, especially as they are at present
+absolutely inaccessible, terrifyingly so, every one of them. And if
+they are to be thus collected may we not hope for one or two new
+essays with, say, for subjects, Flaubert and Huysmans?
+
+It is, you may perceive, as an essayist, a historian, an amateur
+philosopher that Saltus excels, but his fiction should not be
+underrated on that account. His novels indeed are half essays, just as
+his essays are half novels. Even the worst of them contains charming
+pages, delightful and unexpected interruptions. His series of fables
+suggests a vast _Comedie Inhumaine_ but this statement must not be
+regarded as dispraise: it is merely description. You will find
+something of the same quality in the work of Edgar Allan Poe, but
+Saltus has more grace and charm than Poe, if less intensity. After one
+dip into realism ("Mr. Incoul's Misadventure") Saltus became an
+incorrigible romantic. All his characters are the inventions of an
+errant fancy; scarcely one of them suggests a human being, but they
+are none the less creations of art. This, perhaps, was a daring
+procedure in an era devoted to the exploitation in fiction of the
+facts of hearth and home.... After all, however, his way may be the
+better way. Personally I may say that my passion for realism is on the
+wane.
+
+In these strange tales we pass through the familiar haunts of
+metropolitan life, but the creatures are amazingly unfamiliar. They
+have horns and hoofs, halos and wings, or fins and tails. An esoteric
+band of fabulous monsters these: harpies and vampires take tea at
+Sherry's; succubi and incubbi are observed buying opal rings at
+Tiffany's; fairies, angels, dwarfs, and elves, bearing branches of
+asphodel, trip lightly down Waverly Place; peris, amshaspahands, aesir,
+izeds, and goblins sleep at the Brevoort; seraphim and cherubim
+decorate drawing rooms on Irving Place; griffons, chimeras, and
+sphynxes take courses in philosophy at Harvard; willis and sylphs sing
+airs from _Lucia di Lammermoor_ and _Le Nozze di Figaro_; naiads and
+mermaids embark on the Cunard Line; centaurs and amazons drive in the
+Florentine Cascine; kobolds, gnomes, and trolls stab, shoot, and
+poison one another; and a satyr meets the martichoras in Gramercy
+Park. No such pictures of monstrous, diverting, sensuous existence can
+be found elsewhere save in the paintings of Arnold Bocklin, Franz von
+Stuck, and above all those of Gustave Moreau. If he had done nothing
+else Edgar Saltus should be famous for having given New York a
+mythology of its own!
+
+  _January 12, 1918._
+
+
+
+
+The New Art of the Singer
+
+     "_It's the law of life that nothing new can come into the
+     world without pain._"
+
+                        Karen Borneman.
+
+
+
+
+The New Art of the Singer
+
+
+The art of vocalization is retarding the progress of the modern music
+drama. That is the simple fact although, doubtless, you are as
+accustomed as I am to hearing it expressed _a rebours_. How many times
+have we read that the art of singing is in its decadence, that soon
+there would not be one artist left fitted to deliver vocal music in
+public. The Earl of Mount Edgcumbe wrote something of the sort in 1825
+for he found the great Catalani but a sorry travesty of his early
+favourites, Pacchierotti and Banti. I protest against this
+misconception. Any one who asserts that there are laws which govern
+singing, physical, scientific laws, must pay court to other ears than
+mine. I have heard this same man for twenty years shouting in the
+market place that a piece without action was not a play (usually the
+drama he referred to had more real action than that which decorates
+the progress of _Nellie, the Beautiful Cloak Model_), that a
+composition without melody (meaning something by Richard Wagner,
+Robert Franz, or even Edvard Grieg) was not music, that verse without
+rhyme was not poetry. This same type of brilliant mind will go on to
+aver (forgetting the Scot) that men who wear skirts are not men,
+(forgetting the Spaniards) that women who smoke cigars are not women,
+and to settle numberless other matters in so silly a manner that a ten
+year old, half-witted school boy, after three minutes light thinking,
+could be depended upon to do better.
+
+The rules for the art of singing, laid down in the Seventeenth and
+Eighteenth Centuries, have become obsolete. How could it be otherwise?
+They were contrived to fit a certain style of composition. We have but
+the briefest knowledge, indeed, of how people sang before 1700,
+although records exist praising the performances of Archilei and
+others. If a different standard for the criticism of vocalization
+existed before 1600 there is no reason why there should not after
+1917. As a matter of fact, maugre much authoritative opinion to the
+contrary, a different standard does exist. In certain respects the new
+standard is taken for granted. We do not, for example, expect to hear
+male sopranos at the opera. The Earl of Mount Edgcumbe admired this
+artificial form of voice almost to the exclusion of all others. His
+favourite singer, indeed, Pacchierotti, was a male soprano. But other
+breaks have been made with tradition, breaks which are not yet taken
+for granted. When you find that all but one or two of the singers in
+every opera house in the world are ignoring the rules in some respect
+or other you may be certain, in spite of the protests of the
+professors, that the rules are dead. Their excuse has disappeared and
+they remain only as silly commandments made to fit an old religion. A
+singer in Handel's day was accustomed to stand in one spot on the
+stage and sing; nothing else was required of him. He was not asked to
+walk about or to act; even expression in his singing was limited to
+pathos. The singers of this period, Nicolini, Senesino, Cuzzoni,
+Faustina, Caffarelli, Farinelli, Carestini, Gizziello, and
+Pacchierotti, devoted their study years to preparing their voices for
+the display of a certain definite kind of florid music. They had
+nothing else to learn. As a consequence they were expected to be
+particularly efficient. Porpora, Caffarelli's teacher, is said to have
+spent six years on his pupil before he sent him forth to be "the
+greatest singer in the world." Contemporary critics appear to have
+been highly pleased with the result but there is some excuse for H. T.
+Finck's impatience, expressed in "Songs and Song Writers": "The
+favourites of the eighteenth-century Italian audiences were artificial
+male sopranos, like Farinelli, who was frantically applauded for such
+circus tricks as beating a trumpeter in holding on to a note, or
+racing with an orchestra and getting ahead of it; or Caffarelli, who
+entertained his audiences by singing, _in one breath_, a chromatic
+chain of trills up and down two octaves. Caffarelli was a pupil of the
+famous vocal teacher Porpora, who wrote operas consisting chiefly of
+monotonous successions of florid arias resembling the music that is
+now written for flutes and violins." All very well for the day, no
+doubt, but could Cuzzoni sing Isolde? Could Faustina sing Melisande?
+And what modern parts would be allotted to the Julian Eltinges of the
+Eighteenth Century?
+
+When composers began to set dramatic texts to music trouble
+immediately appeared at the door. For example, the contemporaries of
+Sophie Arnould, the "creator" of _Iphigenie en Aulide_, are agreed
+that she was greater as an actress than she was as a singer. David
+Garrick, indeed, pronounced her a finer actress than Clairon. From
+that day to this there has been a continual triangular conflict
+between critic, composer, and singer, which up to date, it must be
+admitted, has been won by the academic pundits, for, although the
+singer has struggled, she has generally bent under the blows of the
+critical knout, thereby holding the lyric drama more or less in the
+state it was in a hundred years ago (every critic and almost every
+composer will tell you that any modern opera can be sung according to
+the laws of _bel canto_ and enough singers exist, unfortunately, to
+justify this assertion) save that the music is not so well sung,
+according to the old standards, as it was then. No singer has had
+quite the courage to entirely defy tradition, to refuse to study with
+a teacher, to embody her own natural ideas in the performance of
+music, to found a new school ... but there have been many rebells.
+
+The operas of Mozart, Bellini, Donizetti, and Rossini, as a whole, do
+not demand great histrionic exertion from their interpreters and for a
+time singers trained in the old Handelian tradition met every
+requirement of these composers and their audiences. If more action was
+demanded than in Handel's day the newer music, in compensation, was
+easier to sing. But even early in the Nineteenth Century we observe
+that those artists who strove to be actors as well as singers lost
+something in vocal facility (really they were pushing on to the new
+technique). I need only speak of Ronconi and Mme. Pasta. The lady was
+admittedly the greatest lyric artist of her day although it is
+recorded that her slips from true intonation were frequent. When she
+could no longer command a steady tone the _beaux restes_ of her art
+and her authoritative style caused Pauline Viardot, who was hearing
+her then for the first time, to burst into tears. Ronconi's voice,
+according to Chorley, barely exceeded an octave; it was weak and
+habitually out of tune. This baritone was not gifted with vocal
+agility and he was monotonous in his use of ornament. Nevertheless
+this same Chorley admits that Ronconi afforded him more pleasure in
+the theatre than almost any other singer he ever heard! If this critic
+did not rise to the occasion here and point the way to the future in
+another place he had a faint glimmering of the coming revolution:
+"There might, there _should_ be yet, a new _Medea_ as an opera.
+Nothing can be grander, more antique, more Greek, than Cherubini's
+setting of the 'grand fiendish part' (to quote the words of Mrs.
+Siddons on Lady Macbeth). But, as music, it becomes simply impossible
+to be executed, so frightful is the strain on the energies of her who
+is to present the heroine. Compared with this character, Beethoven's
+Leonora, Weber's Euryanthe, are only so much child's play." This is
+topsy-turvy reasoning, of course, but at the same time it is
+suggestive.
+
+The modern orchestra dug a deeper breach between the two schools.
+Wagner called upon the singer to express powerful emotion, passionate
+feeling, over a great body of sound, nay, in many instances, _against_
+a great body of sound. (It is significant that Wagner himself admitted
+that it was a singer [Madame Schroeder-Devrient] who revealed to him
+the possibilities of dramatic singing. He boasted that he was the only
+one to learn the lesson. "She was the first artist," writes H. T.
+Finck, "who fully revealed the fact that in a dramatic opera there may
+be situations where _characteristic_ singing is of more importance
+than _beautiful_ singing.") It is small occasion for wonder that
+singers began to bark. Indeed they nearly expired under the strain of
+trying successfully to mingle Porpora and passion. According to W. F.
+Apthorp, Max Alvary once said that, considering the emotional
+intensity of music and situations, the constant co-operation of the
+surging orchestra, and, most of all, the unconquerable feeling of the
+reality of it all, it was a wonder that singing actors did not go
+stark mad, before the very faces of the audience, in parts like
+Tristan or Siegfried.... The critics, however, were inexorable; they
+stood by their guns. There was but one way to sing the new music and
+that was the way of Bernacchi and Pistocchi. In time, by dint of
+persevering, talking night and day, writing day and night, they
+convinced the singer. The music drama developed but the singer was
+held in his place. Some artists, great geniuses, of course, made the
+compromise successfully.... Jean de Reszke, for example, and Lilli
+Lehmann, who said to H. E. Krehbiel ("Chapters of Opera"): "It is
+easier to sing all three Brunnhildes than one Norma. You are so
+carried away by the dramatic emotion, the action, and the scene, that
+you do not have to think how to sing the words. That comes of itself"
+... but they made the further progress of the composer more difficult
+thereby; music remained merely pretty. The successors of these supple
+singers even learned to sing Richard Strauss with broad cantilena
+effects. As for Puccini! At a performance of _Madama Butterfly_ a
+Japanese once asked why the singers were producing those nice round
+tones in moments of passion; why not ugly sounds?
+
+Will any composer arise with the courage to write an opera which
+_cannot_ be sung? Stravinsky almost did this in _The Nightingale_ but
+the break must be more complete. Think of the range of sounds made by
+the Japanese, the gipsy, the Chinese, the Spanish folk-singers. The
+newest composer may ask for shrieks, squeaks, groans, screams, a
+thousand delicate shades of guttural and falsetto vocal tones from his
+interpreters. Why should the gamut of expression on our opera stage be
+so much more limited than it is in our music halls? Why should the
+Hottentots be able to make so many delightful noises that we are
+incapable of producing? Composers up to date have taken into account a
+singer's apparent inability to bridge difficult intervals. It is only
+by ignoring all such limitations that the new music will definitely
+emerge, the new art of the singer be born. What marvellous effects
+might be achieved by skipping from octave to octave in the human
+voice! When will the obfusc pundits stop shouting for what Avery
+Hopwood calls "ascending and descending tetrarchs!"
+
+But, some one will argue, with the passing of _bel canto_ what will
+become of the operas of Mozart, Bellini, Rossini, and Donizetti? Who
+will sing them? Fear not, lover of the golden age of song, _bel canto_
+is not passing as swiftly as that. Singers will continue to be born
+into this world who are able to cope with the floridity of this music,
+for they are born, not made. Amelita Galli-Curci will have her
+successors, just as Adelina Patti had hers. Singers of this kind begin
+to sing naturally in their infancy and they continue to sing, just
+sing.... One touch of drama or emotion and their voices disappear.
+Remember Nellie Melba's sad experience with _Siegfried_. The great
+Mario had scarcely studied singing (one authority says that he had
+taken a few lessons of Meyerbeer!) when he made his debut in _Robert,
+le Diable_ and there is no evidence that he studied very much
+afterwards. Melba, herself, spent less than a year with Mme. Marchesi
+in preparation for her opera career. Mme. Galli-Curci asserts that she
+has had very little to do with professors and I do not think Mme.
+Tetrazzini passed her youth in mastering _vocalizzi_. As a matter of
+fact she studied singing only six months. Adelina Patti told Dr.
+Hanslick that she had sung _Una voce poco fa_ at the age of seven with
+the same embellishments which she used later when she appeared in the
+opera in which the air occurs. No, these singers are freaks of nature
+like tortoise-shell cats and like those rare felines they are usually
+females of late, although such singers as Battistini and Bonci remind
+us that men once sang with as much agility as women. But when this
+type of singer finally becomes extinct naturally the operas which
+depend on it will disappear too for the same reason that the works of
+Monteverde and Handel have dropped out of the repertory, that the
+Greek tragedies and the Elizabethan interludes are no longer current
+on our stage. None of our actors understands the style of Chinese
+plays; consequently it would be impossible to present one of them in
+our theatre. As Deirdre says in Synge's great play, "It's a heartbreak
+to the wise that it's for a short space we have the same things only."
+We cannot, indeed, have everything. No one doubts that the plays of
+AEschylus, Euripides, and Sophocles are great dramas; the operas I have
+just referred to can also be admired in the closet and probably they
+will be. Even today no more than two works of Rossini, the most
+popular composer of the early Nineteenth Century, are to be heard.
+What has become of _Semiramide_, _La Cenerentola_, and the others?
+There are no singers to sing them and so they have been dropped from
+the repertory without being missed. Can any of our young misses hum
+_Di Tanti Palpiti_? You know they cannot. I doubt if you can find two
+girls in New York (and I mean girls with a musical education) who can
+tell you in what opera the air belongs and yet in the early Twenties
+this tune was as popular as _Un Bel Di_ is today.
+
+Coloratura singing has been called heartless, not altogether without
+reason. At one time its exemplars fired composers to their best
+efforts. That day has passed. That day passed seventy years ago. It
+may occur to you that there is something wrong when singers of a
+certain type can only find the proper means to exploit their voices in
+works of the past, operas which are dead. It is to be noted that
+Nellie Melba and Amelita Galli-Curci are absolutely unfitted to sing
+in music dramas even so early as those of Richard Wagner; Dukas,
+Strauss, and Stravinsky are utterly beyond them. Even Adelina Patti
+and Marcella Sembrich appeared in few, if any, new works of
+importance. They had no bearing on the march of musical history. Here
+is an entirely paradoxical situation; a set of interpreters who exist,
+it would seem, only for the purpose of delivering to us the art of the
+past. What would we think of an actor who could make no effect save in
+the tragedies of Corneille? It is such as these who have kept Leo
+Ornstein from writing an opera. Berlioz forewarned us in his
+"Memoirs." He was one of the first to foresee the coming day: "We
+shall always find a fair number of female singers, popular from their
+brilliant singing of brilliant trifles, and odious to the great
+masters because utterly incapable of properly interpreting them. They
+have voices, a certain knowledge of music, and flexible throats: they
+are lacking in soul, brain, and heart. Such women are regular monsters
+and all the more formidable to composers because they are often
+charming monsters. This explains the weakness of certain masters in
+writing falsely sentimental parts, which attract the public by their
+brilliancy. It also explains the number of degenerate works, the
+gradual degradation of style, the destruction of all sense of
+expression, the neglect of dramatic properties, the contempt for the
+true, the grand, and the beautiful, and the cynicism and decrepitude
+of art in certain countries."
+
+So, even if, as the ponderous criticasters are continually pointing
+out, the age of _bel canto_ is really passing there is no actual
+occasion for grief. All fashions in art pass and what is known as _bel
+canto_ is just as much a fashion as the bombastic style of acting that
+prevailed in Victor Hugo's day or the "realistic" style of acting we
+prefer today. All interpretative art is based primarily on the
+material with which it deals and with contemporary public taste. This
+kind of singing is a direct derivative of a certain school of opera
+and as that school of opera is fading more expressive methods of
+singing are coming to the fore. The very first principle of _bel
+canto_, an equalized scale, is a false one. With an equalized scale a
+singer can produce a perfectly ordered series of notes, a charming
+string of matched pearls, but nothing else. It is worthy of note that
+it is impossible to sing Spanish or negro folk-songs with an equalized
+scale. Almost all folk-music, indeed, exacts a vocal method of its
+interpreter quite distinct from that of the art song.
+
+We know now that true beauty lies deeper than in the emission of
+"perfect tone." Beauty is truth and expressiveness. The new art of the
+singer should develop to the highest degree the significance of the
+text. Calve once said that she did not become a real artist until she
+forgot that she had a beautiful voice and thought only of the proper
+expression the music demanded.
+
+Of the old method of singing only one quality will persist in the late
+Twentieth Century (mind you, this is deliberate prophecy but it is
+about as safe as it would be to predict that Sarah Bernhardt will live
+to give several hundred more performances of _La Dame aux Camelias_)
+and that is style. The performance of any work demands a knowledge of
+and a feeling for its style but style is about the last thing a singer
+ever studies. When, however, you find a singer who understands style,
+there you have an artist!
+
+Style is the quality which endures long after the singer has lost the
+power to produce a pure tone or to contrive accurate phrasing and so
+makes it possible for artists to hold their places on the stage long
+after their voices have become partially defective or, indeed, have
+actually departed. It is knowledge of style that accounts for the long
+careers of Marcella Sembrich and Lilli Lehmann or of Yvette Guilbert
+and Maggie Cline for that matter. It is knowledge of style that makes
+De Wolf Hopper a great artist in his interpretation of the music of
+Sullivan and the words of Gilbert. Some artists, indeed, with barely a
+shred of voice, have managed to maintain their positions on the stage
+for many years through a knowledge of style. I might mention Victor
+Maurel, Max Heinrich (not on the opera stage, of course), Antonio
+Scotti, and Maurice Renaud.
+
+A singer may be born with the ability to produce pure tones (I doubt
+if Mme. Melba learned much about tone production from her teachers),
+she may even phrase naturally, although this is more doubtful, but the
+acquirement of style is a long and tedious process and one which
+generally requires specialization. For style is elusive. An auditor, a
+critic, will recognize it at once but very few can tell of what it
+consists. Nevertheless it is fairly obvious to the casual listener
+that Olive Fremstad is more at home in the music dramas of Gluck and
+Wagner than she is in _Carmen_ and _Tosca_, and that Marcella Sembrich
+is happier when she is singing Zerlina (as a Mozart singer she has had
+no equal in the past three decades) than when she is singing _Lakme_.
+Mme. Melba sings _Lucia_ in excellent style but she probably could not
+convince us that she knows how to sing a Brahms song. So far as I know
+she has never tried to do so. A recent example comes to mind in Maria
+Marco, the Spanish soprano, who sings music of her own country in her
+own language with absolutely irresistible effect, but on one occasion
+when she attempted _Vissi d'Arte_ she was transformed immediately into
+a second-rate Italian singer. Even her gestures, ordinarily fully of
+grace and meaning, had become conventionalized.
+
+If this quality of style (which after all means an understanding of
+both the surface manner and underlying purpose of a composition and an
+ability to transmit this understanding across the footlights) is of
+such manifest importance in the field of art music it is doubly so in
+the field of popular or folk-music. A foreigner had best think twice
+before attempting to sing a Swedish song, a Hungarian song, or a
+Polish song, popular or folk. (According to no less an authority than
+Cecil J. Sharp, the peasants themselves differentiate between the two
+and devote to each a _special vocal method_. Here are his words
+["English Folk-Song"]: "But, it must be remembered that the vocal
+method of the folk-singer is inseparable from the folk-song. It is a
+cult which has grown up side by side with the folk-song, and is, no
+doubt, part and parcel of the same tradition. When, for instance, an
+old singing man sings a modern popular song, he will sing it in quite
+another way. The tone of his voice will change and he will slur his
+intervals, after the approved manner of the street-singer. Indeed, it
+is usually quite possible to detect a genuine folk-song simply by
+paying attention to the way in which it is sung.") Strangers as a rule
+do not attempt such matters although we have before us at the present
+time the very interesting case of Ratan Devi. It is a question,
+however, if Ratan Devi would be so much admired if her songs or their
+traditional manner of performance were more familiar to us.
+
+On our music hall stage there are not more than ten singers who
+understand how to sing American popular songs (and these, as I have
+said elsewhere at some length,[33] constitute America's best claim in
+the art of music). It is very difficult to sing them well. Tone and
+phrasing have nothing to do with the matter; it is all a question of
+style (leaving aside for the moment the important matter of
+personality which enters into an accounting for any artist's
+popularity or standing). Elsie Janis, a very clever mimic, a
+delightful dancer, and perhaps the most deservedly popular artist on
+our music hall stage, is not a good interpreter of popular songs. She
+cannot be compared in this respect with Bert Williams, Blanche Ring,
+Stella Mayhew, Al Jolson, May Irwin, Ethel Levey, Nora Bayes, Fannie
+Brice, or Marie Cahill. I have named nearly all the good ones. The
+spirit, the very conscious liberties taken with the text (the
+vaudeville singer must elaborate his own syncopations as the singer of
+early opera embroidered on the score of the composer) are not matters
+that just happen. They require any amount of work and experience with
+audiences. None of the singers I have named is a novice. Nor will you
+find novices who are able to sing Schumann and Franz _lieder_,
+although they may be blessed with well-nigh perfect vocal organs.
+
+Still the music critics with strange persistence continue to adjudge a
+singer by the old formulae and standards: has she an equalized scale?
+Has she taste in ornament? Does she overdo the use of _portamento_,
+_messa di voce_, and such devices? How is her shake? etc., etc. But
+how false, how ridiculous, this is! Fancy the result if new writers
+and composers were criticized by the old laws (so they are, my son,
+but not for long)! Creative artists always smash the old tablets of
+commandments and it does not seem to me that interpretative artists
+need be more unprogressive. Acting changes. Judged by the standards by
+which Edwin Booth was assessed John Drew is not an actor. But we know
+now that it is a different kind of acting. Acting has been flamboyant,
+extravagant, and intensely emotional, something quite different from
+real life. The present craze for counterfeiting the semblance of
+ordinary existence on the stage will also die out for the stage is not
+life and representing life on the stage (except in a conventionalized
+or decorative form) is not art. Our new actors (with our new
+playwrights) will develop a new and fantastic mode of expression
+which will supersede the present fashion.... Rubinstein certainly did
+not play the piano like Chopin. Presently a _virtuoso_ will appear who
+will refuse to play the piano at all and a new instrument without a
+tempered scale will be invented so that he may indulge in all the
+subtleties between half-tones which are denied to the pianist.
+
+It's all very well to cry, "Halt!" and "Who goes there?" but you can't
+stop progress any more than you can stop the passing of time. The old
+technique of the singer breaks down before the new technique of the
+composer and the musician with daring will go still further if the
+singer will but follow. Would that some singer would have the complete
+courage to lead! But do not misunderstand me. The road to Parnassus is
+no shorter because it has been newly paved. Indeed I think it is
+longer. Caffarelli studied six years before he made his debut as "the
+greatest singer in the world" but I imagine that Waslav Nijinsky
+studied ten before he set foot on the stage. The new music drama,
+combining as it does principles from all the arts is all-demanding of
+its interpreters. The new singer must learn how to move gracefully and
+awkwardly, how to make both fantastic and realistic gestures, always
+unconventional gestures, because conventions stamp the imitator. She
+must peer into every period, glance at every nation. Every nerve
+centre must be prepared to express any adumbration of plasticity. Many
+of the new operas, _Carmen_, _La Dolores_, _Salome_, _Elektra_, to
+name a few, call for interpretative dancing of the first order.
+_Madama Butterfly_ and _Lakme_ demand a knowledge of national
+characteristics. _Pelleas et Melisande_ and _Ariane et Barbe-Bleue_
+require of the interpreter absolutely distinct enunciation. In
+Handel's operas the phrases were repeated so many times that the
+singer was excused if he proclaimed the meaning of the line once.
+After that he could alter the vowels and consonants to suit his vocal
+convenience. _Monna Vanna_ and _Tristan und Isolde_ exact of their
+interpreters acting of the highest poetic and imaginative scope....
+
+It is a question whether certain singers of our day have not solved
+these problems with greater success than that for which they are given
+credit.... Yvette Guilbert has announced publicly that she never had a
+teacher, that she would not trust her voice to a teacher. The
+enchanting Yvette practises a sound by herself until she is able to
+make it; she repeats a phrase until she can deliver it without an
+interrupting breath, and is there a singer on the stage more
+expressive than Yvette Guilbert? She sings a little tenor, a little
+baritone, and a little bass. She can succeed almost invariably in
+making the effect she sets out to make. And Yvette Guilbert is the
+answer to the statement often made that unorthodox methods of singing
+ruin the voice. Ruin it for performances of _Linda di Chaminoux_ and
+_La Sonnambula_ very possibly, but if young singers sit about saving
+their voices for performances of these operas they are more than
+likely to die unheard. It is a fact that good singing in the
+old-fashioned sense will help nobody out in _Elektra_, _Ariane et
+Barbe-Bleue_, _Pelleas et Melisande_, or _The Nightingale_. These
+works are written in new styles and they demand a new technique. Put
+Mme. Melba, Mme. Destinn, Mme. Sembrich, or Mme. Galli-Curci to work
+on these scores and you will simply have a sad mess.
+
+We have, I think, but a faint glimmering of what vocal expressiveness
+may become. Such torch-bearers as Mariette Mazarin and Feodor
+Chaliapine have been procaciously excoriated by the critics. Until
+recently Mary Garden, who of all artists on the lyric stage, is the
+most nearly in touch with the singing of the future, has been treated
+as a charlatan and a fraud. W. J. Henderson once called her the "Queen
+of Unsong." Well, perhaps she is, but she is certainly better able to
+cope artistically with the problems of the modern music drama than
+such Queens of Song as Marcella Sembrich and Adelina Patti would be.
+Perhaps Unsong is the name of the new art.
+
+I do not think I have ever been backward in expressing my appreciation
+of this artist. My essay devoted to her in "Interpreters and
+Interpretations" will certainly testify eloquently as to my previous
+attitude in regard to her. But it has not always been so with some of
+my colleagues. Since she has been away from us they have learned
+something; they have watched and listened to others and so when Mary
+Garden came back to New York in _Monna Vanna_ in January, 1918, they
+were ready to sing choruses of praise in her honour. They have been
+encomiastic even in regard to her voice and her manner of singing.
+
+Even my own opinion of this artist's work has undergone a change. I
+have always regarded her as one of the few great interpreters, but in
+the light of recent experience I now feel assured that she is the
+greatest artist on the contemporary lyric stage. It is not, I would
+insist, Mary Garden that has changed so much as we ourselves. She has,
+it is true, polished her interpretations until they seem incredibly
+perfect, but has there ever been a time when she gave anything but
+perfect impersonations of Melisande or Thais? Has she ever been
+careless before the public? I doubt it.
+
+The fact of the matter is that when Mary Garden first came to New York
+only a few of us were ready to receive her at anywhere near her true
+worth. In a field where mediocrity and brainlessness, lack of
+theatrical instinct and vocal insipidity are fairly the rule her
+dominant personality, her unerring search for novelty of expression,
+the very completeness of her dramatic and vocal pictures, annoyed the
+philistines, the professors, and the academicians. They had been
+accustomed to taking their opera quietly with their after-dinner
+coffee and, on the whole, they preferred it that way.
+
+But the main obstacle in the way of her complete success lay in the
+matter of her voice, of her singing. Of the quality of any voice there
+can always exist a thousand different opinions. To me the great beauty
+of the middle register of Mary Garden's voice has always been
+apparent. But what was not so evident at first was the absolute
+fitness of this voice and her method of using it for the dramatic
+style of the artist and for the artistic demands of the works in
+which she appeared. Thoroughly musical, Miss Garden has often puzzled
+her critical hearers by singing _Faust_ in one vocal style and _Thais_
+in another. But she was right and they were wrong. She might, indeed,
+have experimented still further with a new vocal technique if she had
+been given any encouragement but encouragement is seldom offered to
+any innovator. As Edgar Saltus puts it, "The number of people who
+regard a new idea or a fresh theory as a personal insult is curiously
+large; indeed they are more frequent today than when Socrates quaffed
+the hemlock." It must, therefore, be a source of ironic amusement to
+her to find herself now appreciated not alone by her public, which has
+always been loyal and adoring, but also by the professors themselves.
+
+It would do no harm to any singer to study the multitude of vocal
+effects this artist achieves. I can think of nobody who could not
+learn something from her. How, for example, she gives her voice the
+hue and colour of a _jeune fille_ in _Pelleas et Melisande_, for
+although Melisande had been the bride of Barbe-Bleue before Golaud
+discovered her in the forest she had never learned to be anything else
+than innocent and distraught, unhappy and mysterious. Her treatment of
+certain important phrases in this work is so electrifying in its
+effect that the heart of every auditor is pierced. Remember, for
+example, her question to Pelleas at the end of the first act,
+"_Pourquoi partez-vous?_" to which she imparts a kind of dreamy
+intuitive longing; recall the amazement shining through her grief at
+Golaud's command that she ask Pelleas to accompany her on her search
+for the lost ring: "_Pelleas!--Avec Pelleas!--Mais Pelleas ne voudra
+pas_..."; and do not forget the terrified cry which signals the
+discovery of the hidden Golaud in the park, "_Il y a quelqu'un
+derriere nous!_"
+
+In _Monna Vanna_ her most magnificent vocal gesture rested on the
+single word _Si_ in reply to Guido's "_Tu ne reviendras pas?_" Her
+performance of this work, however, offers many examples of just such
+instinctive intonations. One more, I must mention, her answer to
+Guido's insistent, "_Cet homme t'a-t-il prise_?"... "_J'ai dit la
+verite.... Il ne m'a pas touchee_," sung with dignity, with force,
+with womanliness, and yet with growing impatience and a touch of
+sadness.
+
+Let me quote Pitts Sanborn: "It is easy to be flippant about Miss
+Garden's singing. Her faults of voice and technique are patent to a
+child, though he might not name them. One who has become a man can
+ponder the greatness of her singing. I do not mean exclusively in
+Debussy, though we all know that as a singer of Debussy ... she has
+scarce a rival. Take her _mezza voce_ and her phrasing in the second
+act of _Monna Vanna_, take them and bow down before them. Ponder a
+moment her singing in _Thais_. The converted Thais, about to betake
+herself desertward with the insistent monk, has a solo to sing. The
+solo is Massenet, simon-pure Massenet, the idol of the Paris
+_midinette_. Miss Garden, with a defective voice, a defective
+technique, exalts and magnifies that passage till it might be the
+noblest air of Handel or of Mozart. By a sheer and unashamed reliance
+on her command of style, Miss Garden works that miracle, transfigures
+Massenet into something superearthly, overpowering. Will you rise up
+to deny that is singing?"
+
+As for her acting, there can scarcely be two opinions about that! She
+is one of the few possessors of that rare gift of imparting atmosphere
+and mood to a characterization. Some exceptional actors and singers
+accomplish this feat occasionally. Mary Garden has scarcely ever
+failed to do so. The moment Melisande is disclosed to our view, for
+example, she seems to be surrounded by an aura entirely distinct from
+the aura which surrounds Monna Vanna, Jean, Thais, Salome, or Sapho.
+She becomes, indeed, so much a part of the character she assumes that
+the spectator finds great difficulty in dissociating her from that
+character, and I have found those who, having seen Mary Garden in only
+one part, were quite ready to generalize about her own personality
+from the impression they had received.
+
+One of the tests of great acting is whether or not an artist remains
+in the picture when she is not singing or speaking. Mary Garden knows
+how to listen on the stage. She does not need to move or speak to make
+herself a part of the action and she is never guilty of such an
+offence against artistry as that committed by Tamagno, who, according
+to Victor Maurel, allowed a scene in _Otello_ to drop to nothing while
+he prepared himself to emit a high B.
+
+Watching her magnificent performance of Monna Vanna it struck me that
+she would make an incomparable Isolde. At the present moment I cannot
+imagine Mary Garden learning Boche or singing in it even if she knew
+it, but if some one will present us Wagner's (who hated the Germans as
+much as Theodore Roosevelt does) music drama in French or English with
+Mary Garden as Isolde, I think the public will thank me for having
+suggested it.
+
+Or it would be even better if Schoenberg, or Stravinsky, or Leo
+Ornstein, inspired by the new light the example of such a singer has
+cast over our lyric stage, would write a music drama, ignoring the
+technique and the conventions of the past, as Debussy did when he
+wrote _Pelleas et Melisande_ (creating opportunities which any
+opera-goer of the last decade knows how gloriously Miss Garden
+realized). It is thus that the new order will gradually become
+established. And then the new art ... the new art of the singer....
+
+  _April 18, 1918._
+
+
+
+
+Au Bal Musette
+
+    _"Aupres de ma blonde
+      Qu'il fait bon, fait bon, bon, bon...."_
+
+                        Old French Song.
+
+
+
+
+Au Bal Musette
+
+
+It has often been remarked by philosophers and philistines alike that
+the commonest facts of existence escape our attention until they are
+impressed upon it in some unusual way. For example I knew nothing of
+the sovereign powers of citronella as a mosquito dispatcher until a
+plague of the insects drove me to make enquiries of a chemist. For
+years I believed that knocking the necks off bottles, lacking an
+opener, was the only alternative. A friend who caught me in this
+predicament showed me the other use to which the handles of high-boy
+drawers could be put. It was long my habit to quickly dispose of
+trousers which had been disfigured by cigarette burns, but that was
+before I had heard of _stoppage_, a process by which the original
+weave is cleverly counterfeited. And, wishing to dance, in Paris, I
+have been guilty of visits to the great dance halls and to the small
+smart places where champagne is oppressively the only listed beverage.
+But that was before I discovered the _bal musette_.
+
+One July night in Paris I had dinner with a certain lady at the
+Cou-Cou, followed by cognac at the Savoyarde. I find nothing strange
+in this program; it seems to me that I must have dined at the Cou-Cou
+with every one I have known in Paris from time to time, a range of
+acquaintanceship including Fernand, the _apache_, and the Comtesse de
+J----, and cognac at the Savoyarde usually followed the dinner. This
+evening at the Cou-Cou then resembled any other evening. Do you know
+how to go there? You must take a taxi-cab to the foot of the hill of
+Montmartre and then be drawn up in the _finiculaire_ to the top where
+the church of Sacre-Coeur squats proudly, for all the world like a
+mammoth Buddha (of course you may ride all the way up the mountain in
+your taxi if you like). From Sacre-Coeur one turns to the left around
+the board fence which, it would seem, will always hedge in this
+unfinished monument of pious Catholics; still turning to the left,
+through the Place du Tertre, in which one must not be stayed by the
+pleasant sight of the _Montmartroises bourgeoises_ eating _petite
+marmite_ in the open air, one arrives at the Place du Calvaire. The
+tables of the Restaurant Cou-Cou occupy nearly the whole of this tiny
+square, to which there are only two means of approach, one up the
+stairs from the city below, and the other from the Place du Tertre. An
+artist's house disturbs the view on the side towards Paris; opposite
+is the restaurant, flanked on the right by a row of modest apartment
+houses, to which one gains entrance through a high wall by means of a
+small gate. Sundry visitors to these houses, some on bicycles, make
+occasional interruptions in the dinner.... From over this wall, too,
+comes the huge Cheshire cat (much bigger than Alice's, a beautiful
+animal), which lounges about in the hope, frequently realized, that
+some one will give him a chicken bone.... Conterminous to the
+restaurant, on the right, is a tiny cottage, fronted by a still tinier
+garden, fenced in and gated. Many of the visitors to the Cou-Cou hang
+their hats and sticks on this fence and its gate. I have never seen
+the occupants of the cottage in any of my numerous visits to this open
+air restaurant, but once, towards eleven o'clock the crowd in the
+square becoming too noisy, the upper windows were suddenly thrown up
+and a pailful of water descended.... "_Per Baccho!_" quoth the
+inn-keeper for, it must be known, the Restaurant Cou-Cou is Italian by
+nature of its _patron_ and its cooking.
+
+This night, I say, had been as the others. The Cou-Cou is (and in this
+respect it is not exceptional in Paris) safe to return to if you have
+found it to your liking in years gone by. Perhaps some day the small
+boy of the place will be grown up. He is a real _enfant terrible_. It
+is his pleasure to _tutoyer_ the guests, to amuse himself by
+pretending to serve them, only to bring the wrong dishes, or none at
+all. If you call to him he is deaf. Any hope of _revanche_ is
+abandoned in the reflection of the super-retaliations he himself
+conceives. One young man who expresses himself freely on the subject
+of Pietro receives a plate of hot soup down the back of his neck,
+followed immediately by a "_Pardon, Monsieur_," said not without
+respect. But where might Pietro's father be? He is in the kitchen
+cooking and if you find your dinner coming too slowly at the hands of
+the distracted maid servants, who also have to put up with Pietro, go
+into the kitchen, passing under the little vine-clad porch wherein you
+may discover a pair of lovers, and help yourself. And if you find some
+one else's dinner more to your liking than your own take that off the
+stove instead. At the Cou-Cou you pay for what you eat, not for what
+you order. And the Signora, Pietro's mother? That unhappy woman
+usually stands in front of the door, where she interferes with the
+passage of the girls going for food. She wrings her hands and moans,
+"_Mon Dieu, quel monde!_" with the idea that she is helping vastly in
+the manipulation of the machinery of the place.
+
+And the _monde_; who goes there? It is not too _chic_, this _monde_,
+and yet it is surely not _bourgeois_; if one does not recognize M.
+Rodin or M. Georges Feydeau, yet there are compensations.... The girls
+who come attended by bearded companions, are unusually pretty; one
+sees them afterwards at the bars and _bals_ if one does not go to the
+Abbaye or Pages.... It makes a very pleasant picture, the Place du
+Calvaire towards nine o'clock on a summer night when tiny lights with
+pink globes are placed on the tables. The little square twinkles with
+them and the couples at the tables become very gay, and sometimes
+sentimental. And when the pink lights appear a small boy in blue
+trousers comes along to light the street lamp. Then the urchins gather
+on the wall which hedges in the garden on the fourth side of the
+square and chatter, chatter, chatter, about all the things that French
+boys chatter about. Naturally they have a good deal to say about the
+people who are eating.
+
+I have described the Cou-Cou as it was this night and as it has been
+all the nights during the past eight summers that I have been there.
+The dinner too is always the same. It is served _a la carte_, but one
+is not given much choice. There is always a _potage_, always
+_spaghetti_, always chicken and a salad, always a lobster, and
+_zabaglione_ if one wants it. The wine--it is called _chianti_--is
+tolerable. And the _addition_ is made upon a slate with a piece of
+white chalk. "_Qu'est-ce que monsieur a mange?_" Sometimes it is very
+difficult to remember, but it is necessary. Such honesty compels an
+exertion. It is all added up and for the two of us on this evening, or
+any other evening, it may come to nine _francs_, which is not much to
+pay for a good dinner.
+
+Then, on this evening, and every other evening, we went on, back as we
+had come, round past the other side of Sacre-Coeur, past the statue of
+the Chevalier who was martyred for refusing to salute a procession
+(why he refused I have never found out, although I have asked
+everybody who has ever dined with me at the Cou-Cou) to the Cafe
+Savoyarde, the broad windows of which look out over pretty much all
+the Northeast of Paris, over a glittering labyrinth of lights set in
+an obscure sea of darkness. It was not far from here that Louise and
+Julien kept house when they were interrupted by Louise's mother, and
+it was looking down over these lights that they swore those eternal
+vows, ending with Louise's "_C'est une Feerie!_" and Julien's "_Non,
+c'est la vie!_" One always remembers these things and feels them at
+the Savoyarde as keenly as one did sometime in the remote past
+watching Mary Garden and Leon Beyle from the topmost gallery of the
+Opera-Comique after an hour and a half wait in the _queue_ for one
+_franc_ tickets (there were always people turned away from
+performances of _Louise_ and so it was necessary to be there early;
+some other operas did not demand such punctuality). There is a terrace
+outside the Savoyarde, a tiny terrace, with just room for one man, who
+griddles _gaufrettes_, and three or four tiny tables with chairs. At
+one of these we sat that night (just as I had sat so many times
+before) and sipped our cognac.
+
+It is difficult in an adventure to remember just when the departure
+comes, when one leaves the past and strides into the future, but I
+think that moment befell me in this cafe ... for it was the first time
+I had ever seen a cat there. He was a lazy, splendid animal. In New
+York he would have been an oddity, but in Paris there are many such
+beasts. Tawny he was and soft to the touch and of a hugeness. He was
+lying on the bar and as I stroked his coat he purred melifluously....
+I stroked his warm fur and thought how I belonged to the mystic band
+(Gautier, Baudelaire, Merimee, all knew the secrets) of those who are
+acquainted with cats; it is a feeling of pride we have that
+differentiates us from the dog lovers, the pride of the appreciation
+of indifference or of conscious preference. And it was, I think, as I
+was stroking the cat that my past was smote away from me and I was
+projected into the adventure for, as I lifted the animal into my arms,
+the better to feel its warmth and softness, it sprang with strength
+and unsheathed claws out of my embrace, and soon was back on the bar
+again, "just as if nothing had happened." There was blood on my face.
+Madame, behind the bar, was apologetic but not chastening. "_Il avait
+peur_," she said. "_Il n'est pas mechant._" The wound was not deep,
+and as I bent to pet the cat again he again purred. I had interfered
+with his habits and, as I discovered later, he had interfered with
+mine.
+
+We decided to walk down the hill instead of riding down in the
+_finiculaire_, down the stairs which form another of the pictures in
+_Louise_, with the abutting houses, into the rooms of which one looks,
+conscious of prying. And you see the old in these interiors, making
+shoes, or preparing dinner, or the middle-aged going to bed, but the
+young one never sees in the houses in the summer.... It was early and
+we decided to dance; I thought of the Moulin de la Galette, which I
+had visited twice before. The Moulin de la Galette waves its gaunt
+arms in the air half way up the _butte_ of Montmartre; it serves its
+purpose as a dance hall of the quarter. One meets the pretty little
+_Montmartroises_ there and the young artists; the entrance fee is not
+exorbitant and one may drink a bock. And when I have been there,
+sitting at a small table facing the somewhat vivid mural decoration
+which runs the length of one wall, drinking my brown _bock_, I have
+remembered the story which Mary Garden once told me, how Albert Carre
+to celebrate the hundredth--or was it the twenty-fifth?--performance
+of _Louise_, gave a dinner there--so near to the scenes he had
+conceived--to Charpentier and how, surrounded by some of the most
+notable musicians and poets of France, the composer had suddenly
+fallen from the table, face downwards; he had starved himself so long
+to complete his masterpiece that food did not seem to nourish him. It
+was the end of a brilliant dinner. He was carried away ... to the
+Riviera; some said that he had lost his mind; some said that he was
+dying. Mary Garden herself did not know, at the time she first sang
+_Louise_ in America, what had happened to him. But a little later the
+rumour that he was writing a trilogy was spread about and soon it was
+a known fact that at least one other part of the trilogy had been
+written, _Julien_; that lyric drama was produced and everybody knows
+the story of its failure. Charpentier, the natural philosopher and the
+poet of Montmartre, had said everything he had to say in _Louise_. As
+for the third play, one has heard nothing about that yet.
+
+But on this evening the Moulin de la Galette was closed and then I
+remembered that it was open on Thursday and this was Wednesday. Is it
+Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday that the Moulin de la Galette is open?
+I think so. By this time we were determined to dance; but where? We
+had no desire to go to some stupid place, common to tourists, no such
+place as the Bal Tabarin lured us; nor did the Grelot in the Place
+Blanche, for we had been there a night or two before. The Elysee
+Montmartre (celebrated by George Moore) would be closed. Its _patron_
+followed the schedule of days adopted for the Galette.... To chance I
+turn in such dilemmas.... I consulted a small boy, who, with his
+companion, had been good enough to guide us through many winding
+streets to the Moulin. Certainly he knew of a _bal_. Would _monsieur_
+care to visit a _bal musette_? His companion was horrified. I caught
+the phrase "_mal frequente_." Our curiosity was aroused and we gave
+the signal to advance.
+
+There were two grounds for my personal curiosity beyond the more
+obvious ones. I seemed to remember to have read somewhere that the
+ladies of the court of Louis XIV played the _musette_, which is French
+for bag-pipe. It was the fashionable instrument of an epoch and the
+_musettes_ played by the _grandes dames_ were elaborately decorated.
+The word in time slunk into the dictionaries of musical terms as
+descriptive of a drone bass. Many of Gluck's ballet airs bear the
+title, _Musette_. Perhaps the bass was even performed on a
+bag-pipe.... "_Mal frequente_" in Parisian _argot_ has a variety of
+significations; in this particular instance it suggested _apaches_ to
+me. A _bal_, for instance, attended by _cocottes_, _mannequins_, or
+_modeles_, could not be described as _mal frequente_ unless one were
+speaking to a boarding school miss, for all the public _bals_ in Paris
+are so attended. No, the words spoken to me, in this connection, could
+only mean _apaches_. The confusion of epochs began to invite my
+interest and I wondered, in my mind's eye, how a Louis XIV _apache_
+would dress, how he would be represented at a costume ball, and a
+picture of a ragged silk-betrousered person, flaunting a plaid-bellied
+instrument came to mind. An imagination often leads one violently
+astray.
+
+The two urchins were marching us through street after street, one of
+them whistling that pleasing tune, _Le lendemain elle etait
+souriante_. Dark passage ways intervened between us and our
+destination: we threaded them. The cobble stones of the underfoot were
+not easy to walk on for my companion, shod in high-heels from the
+Place Vendome.... The urchins amused each other and us by capers on
+the way. They could have made our speed walking on their hands, and
+they accomplished at least a third of the journey this way. Of course,
+I deluged them with large round five and ten _centimes_ pieces.
+
+We arrived at last before a door in a short street near the Gare du
+Nord. Was it the Rue Jessaint? I do not know, for when, a year later,
+I attempted to re-find this _bal_ it had disappeared.... We could hear
+the hum of the pipes for some paces before we turned the corner into
+the street, and never have pipes sounded in my ears with such a shrill
+significance of being somewhere they ought not to be, never but once,
+and that was when I had heard the piper who accompanies the dinner of
+the Governor of the Bahamas in Nassau. Marching round the porch of the
+Governor's Villa he played _The Blue Bells of Scotland_ and _God Save
+the King_, but, hearing the sound from a distance through the
+interstices of the cocoa-palm fronds in the hot tropical night, I
+could only think of a Hindoo blowing the pipes in India, the charming
+of snakes.... So, as we turned the corner into the Rue Jessaint, I
+seemed to catch a faint glimpse of a scene on the lawn at
+Versailles.... Louis XIV--it was the epoch of Cinderella!
+
+But it wasn't a bag-pipe at all. That we discovered when we entered
+the room, after passing through the bar in the front. The _bal_ was
+conducted in a large hall at the back of the _maison_. In the doorway
+lounged an _agent de service_, always a guest at one of these
+functions, I found out later. There were rows of tables, long tables,
+with long wooden benches placed between them. One corner of the floor
+was cleared--not so large a corner either--for dancing, and on a small
+platform sat the strangest looking youth, like Peter Pan never to grow
+old, like the _Monna Lisa_ a boy of a thousand years, without emotion
+or expression of any sort. He was playing an accordion; the bag-pipe,
+symbol of the _bal_, hung disused on the wall over his head. His
+accordion, manipulated with great skill, was augmented by sleigh-bells
+attached to his ankles in such a manner that a minimum of movement
+produced a maximum of effect; he further added to the complexity of
+sound and rhythm by striking a cymbal occasionally with one of his
+feet. The music was both rhythmic and ordered, now a waltz, now a tune
+in two-four time, but never faster or slower, and never ending ...
+except in the middle of each dance, for a brief few seconds, while the
+_patronne_ collected a _sou_ from each dancer, after which the dance
+proceeded. All the time we remained never did the musician smile,
+except twice, once briefly when I sent word to him by the waiter to
+order a _consommation_ and once, at some length, when we departed. On
+these occasions the effect was almost emotionally illuminating, so
+inexpressive was the ordinary cast of his features. A strange lad; I
+like to think of him always sitting there, passively, playing the
+accordion and shaking his sleigh-bells. He suggested a static picture,
+a thing of always, but I know it is not so, for even the next summer
+he had disappeared along with the _bal_ and now he may have been shot
+in the Battle of the Marne or he may have murdered his _gigolette_ and
+been transported to one of the French penal colonies.... An _apache,
+en musicien!_ ... black cloth around his throat, hair parted in the
+middle, _velours_ trousers; a _vrai apache_ I tell you, a cool,
+cunning creature, shredded with cocaine and absinthe, monotonous in
+his virtuosity, playing the accordion. He had begun before we arrived
+and he continued after we left. I like to think of him as always
+playing, but it is not so....
+
+As for the dancers, they were of various kinds and sorts. The women
+had that air which gave them the stamp of a quarter; they wore loose
+_blouses_, tucked in plaid skirts, or dark blue skirts, or
+multi-coloured calico skirts (if you have seen the lithographs of
+Steinlen you may reconstruct the picture with no difficulty) and they
+danced in that peculiar fashion so much in vogue in the Northern
+outskirts of Paris. The men seized them tightly and they whirled to
+the inexorable music when it was a waltz, whirled and whirled, until
+one thought of the Viennese and how they become as dervishes and
+Japanese mice when one plays Johann Strauss. But in the dances in
+two-four time their way was more our way, something between a
+one-step, a mattchiche, and a tango, with strange fascinating steps of
+their own devising, a folk-dance manner.... Yes, under their feet, the
+dance became a real dance of the people and, when we entered into it,
+our feet seemed heavy and our steps conventional, although we tried
+to do what they did. (How they did laugh at us!) And the strange
+youth emphasized the effect of folk-dancing by playing old _chansons
+de France_ which he mingled with his repertory of _cafe-concert_ airs.
+And there was achieved that wonderful thing (to an artist) a mixture
+of _genres_--intriguing one's curiosity, awakening the most dormant
+interest, and inspiring the dullest imagination.
+
+This was my first night at a _bal musette_ and my last in that year,
+for shortly afterwards I left for Italy and in Italy one does not
+dance. But the next season found me anxious to renew the adventure, to
+again enjoy the pleasures of the _bal musette_. I have said I was
+perhaps wrong in recalling the street as the Rue Jessaint, or perhaps
+the old _maison_ had disappeared. At any rate, when I searched I could
+not find the _bal_, not even the bar. So again I appealed for help,
+this time to a chauffeur, who drove me to the opposite side of the
+city, to the _quartier_ of the _Halles_.... And I was beginning to
+think that the man had misunderstood me, or was stupid. "He will take
+me to a cabaret, l'Ange Gabriel or"--and I rapidly revolved in my mind
+the possibilities of this quarter where the _apaches_ come to the
+surface to feel the purse of the tourist, who buys drinks as he
+listens to stories of murders, some of which have been committed, for
+it is true that some of the real _apaches_ go there (I know because my
+friend Fernand did and it was in l'Ange Gabriel that he knocked all
+the teeth down the throat of Angelique, _sa gigolette_. You may find
+the life of these creatures vividly and amusingly described in that
+amazing book of Charles-Henry Hirsch, "Le Tigre et Coquelicot" It is
+the only book I have read about the _apaches_ of modern Paris that is
+worth its pages). But the idea of l'Ange Gabriel was not amusing to me
+this evening and I leaned forward to ask my chauffeur if he had it in
+mind to substitute another attraction for my desired _bal musette_.
+His reply was reassuring; it took the form of a gesture, the waving of
+a hand towards a small lighted globe depending over the door of a
+little _marchand de vin_. On this globe was painted in black letters
+the single word, _bal_. We were in the narrow Rue des Gravilliers--I
+was there for the first time--and the _bal_ was the Bal des
+Gravilliers.
+
+The bar is so small, when one enters, that there is no intimation of
+the really splendid aspect of the dancing room. For here there are two
+rooms separated by the dancing floor, two halls filled with tables,
+with long wooden benches between them. Benches also line the walls,
+which are white with a grey-blue frieze; the lighting is brilliant.
+The musicians play in a little balcony, and here there are two of
+them, an accordionist and a guitarist. The performer on the accordion
+is a _virtuoso_; he takes delight in winding florid ornament, after
+the manner of some brilliant singer impersonating Rosina in _Il
+Barbiere_, around the melodies he performs. As in the Rue Jessaint a
+_sou_ is demanded in the middle of each dance. But there comparison
+must cease, for the life here is gayer, more of a character. The types
+are of the _Halles_.... There are strange exits....
+
+A short woman enters; "_elle s'avance en se balancant sur ses hanches
+comme une pouliche du haras de Cordoue_"; she suggests an operatic
+Carmen in her swagger. She is slender, with short, dark hair, cropped
+_a la_ Boutet de Monvel, and she flourishes a cigarette, the smoke
+from which wreathes upward and obscures--nay makes more subtle--the
+strange poignancy of her deep blue eyes. Her nose is of a snubness. It
+is the _mome_ Estelle, and as she passes down the narrow aisle,
+between the tables, there is a stir of excitement.... The men raise
+their eyes.... Edouard, _le petit_, flicks a _louis_ carelessly
+between his thumb and fore-finger, with the long dirty nails, and
+then passes it back into his pocket. Do not mistake the gesture; it
+is not made to entice the _mome_, nor is it a sign of affluence; it is
+Edouard's means of demanding another _louis_ before the night is up,
+if it be only a "_louis de dix francs_." Estelle looks at him boldly;
+there is no fear in her eyes; you can see that she would face death
+with Carmen's calm if the Fates cut the thread to that effect.... The
+music begins and Estelle dances with Carmella, _l'Arabe_. Edouard
+glowers and pulls his little grey cap down tower.... It is a waltz....
+Suddenly he is on the floor and Estelle is pressed close to his
+body.... Carmella sits down. She smiles, and presently she is dancing
+with Jean-Baptiste.... Estelle and Edouard are now whirling, whirling,
+and all the while his dark eyes look down piercingly into her blue
+eyes. The music stops. Estelle fumbles in her stocking for two _sous_.
+Edouard lights a _Maryland_.
+
+There is a newcomer tonight. (I am talking to the _agent de service_.)
+She is of a youth and she is certainly from Brittany. I see her
+sitting in a corner, waiting for something, trying to know. "She will
+learn," says my friend, "She will learn to pay like the others." That
+is the _gros_ Pierre who regards her. He twirls his moustache and
+considers, and in the end he lumbers to her and asks her to dance.
+She is willing to do so, but the intensity of Pierre frightens her,
+frightens and intrigues.... There is a sign on the wall that one must
+not stamp one's feet, but no other prohibition.... He twists her
+finger purposely as they whirl ... and whirl. She cowers. _Gros_
+Pierre is very big and strong. "_T'es bath, mome_," I hear him say, as
+they pass me by.... The dance over, he towers above her for a brief
+second before he swaggers out.... Estelle smiles. Her lips move and
+she speaks quickly to Edouard, _le petit_.... He does not listen. Why
+should he listen to his _gigolette_? She is wasting her time here
+anyway. He becomes impatient.... Carmella smiles across the room in a
+brief second of chance and Estelle answers the smile. Carmella holds
+up three fingers (it is now 1.30). Estelle nods her head quickly. The
+musicians are always playing, except in the middle of the dance when
+_madame, la patronne_, gathers in the _sous_.... Only from one she
+takes nothing.... He is twenty and very blonde and he is dancing with
+_Madame_.... Between dances she pays his _consommations_.... Estelle
+rises slowly and walks out while Carmella, _l'Arabe_, follows her with
+his eyes. Edouard, _le petit_, lights a _Maryland_ and poises a
+_louis_ between his thumb and fore-finger, the nails of which are
+long and dirty.... The music is always playing.... The little girl
+from Brittany is again alone in the corner. There is fear in her face.
+She is beginning to know. She summons her courage and walks to the
+door, on through.... The _agent de service_ twirls his moustache and
+points after her. "She soon will know." I follow. She hesitates for a
+second at the street door and then starts towards the corner.... She
+reaches the corner and passes around it.... I hear a scream ... the
+sound of running footsteps ... the beat of a horse's hoofs ... the
+rolling of wheels on the cobble stones....
+
+
+  _November 11, 1915._
+
+
+
+
+Music and Cooking
+
+    _"Give me some music,--music, moody food
+      Of us that trade in love."_
+
+                        Shakespeare's _Cleopatra_.
+
+
+
+
+Music and Cooking
+
+
+It is my firm belief that there is an intimate relationship between
+the stomach and the ear, the saucepan and the crotchet, the mysteries
+of Mrs. Rorer and the mysteries of Mme. Marchesi. It has even occurred
+to me that one of the reasons our American composers are so barren in
+ideas is because as a race we are not interested in cooking and
+eating. Those countries in which music plays the greater part in the
+national life are precisely those which are the most interested in the
+culinary art. The food of Italy, the cooking, is celebrated; every
+peasant in that sunny land sings, and the voices of some Italians have
+reverberated around the world. The very melodies of Verdi and Rossini
+are inextricably twined in our minds around memories of _ravioli_ and
+_zabaglione_. _Vesti la Giubba_ is _spaghetti_. The composers of these
+melodies and their interpreters alike cooked, ate, and drank with joy,
+and so they composed and sang with joy too. Men with indigestion may
+be able to write novels, but they cannot compose great music.... The
+Germans spend more time eating than the people of any other country
+(at least they did once). It is small occasion for wonder, therefore,
+that they produce so many musicians. They are always eating, mammoth
+plates heaped high with Bavarian cabbage, _Koenigsberger Klopps_,
+_Hasenpfeffer_, noodles, sauerkraut, _Wiener Schnitzel_ ... drinking
+seidels of beer. They escort sausages with them to the opera. All the
+women have their skirts honeycombed with capacious pockets, in which
+they carry substantial lunches to eat while Isolde is deceiving King
+Mark. Why, the very principle of German music is based on a theory of
+well-fed auditors. The voluptuous scores of Richard Wagner, Richard
+Strauss, Max Schillings and Co. were not written for skinny,
+ill-nourished wights. Even Beethoven demands flesh and bone of his
+hearers. The music of Bach is directly aimed against the doctrine of
+asceticism. "The German capacity for feeling emotion in music has
+developed to the same extent as the capacity of the German stomach for
+containing food," writes Ernest Newman, "but in neither the one case
+nor the other has there been a corresponding development in refinement
+of perceptions. German sentimental music is not quite as gross as
+German food and German feeding, but it comes very near to it
+sometimes.... 'The Germans do not taste,' said Montaigne, 'they gulp.'
+As with their food, so with the emotions of their music. So long as
+they get them in sufficient mass, of the traditional quality, and with
+the traditional pungent seasoning, they are content to leave piquancy
+and variety of effect to others."... Once in Munich in a second
+storey window of the Bayerischebank I saw a small boy, about ten years
+old, sitting outside on the sill, washing the panes of glass. Opposite
+him on the same sill a dachshund reposed on her paws, regarding her
+master affectionately. Between the two stood a half-filled toby of
+foaming Lowenbrau, which, from time to time, the lad raised to his
+lips, quaffing deep draughts. And when he set the pot down he whistled
+the first subject of Beethoven's _Fifth Symphony_. On Sunday
+afternoons, in the gardens which invariably surround the Munich
+breweries, the happy mothers, who gather to listen to the band play
+while they drink beer, frequently replenish the empty nursing bottles
+of their offspring at the taps from which flows the deep brown
+beverage.... The food of the French is highly artificial, delicately
+prepared and served, and flavoured with infinite art: _vol au vent a
+la reine_ and Massenet, _petits pois a l'etuvee_ and Gounod, _oeuf
+Ste. Clotilde_ and Cesar Franck, all strike the tongue and the ear
+quite pleasantly. Des Esseintes and his liqueur symphony were the
+inventions of a Frenchman.... Hungarian goulash and Hungarian
+rhapsodies are certainly designed to be taken in conjunction....
+Russian music tastes of _kascha_ and _bortsch_ and vodka. The happy,
+hearty eaters of Russia, the drunken, sodden drinkers of Russia are
+reflected in the scores of _Boris Godunow_ and _Petrouchka_.... In
+England we find that the great English meat pasties and puddings
+appeared in the same century with the immortal Purcell.... But in
+America we import our cooks ... and our music. As a race we do not
+like to cook. We scarcely like to eat. We certainly do not enjoy
+eating. We will never have a national music until we have national
+dishes and national drinks and until we like good food. It is
+significant that our national drinks at present are mixed drinks, the
+ingredients of which are foreign. It is doubly significant that that
+section of the country which produces chicken _a la Maryland_, corn
+bread, beaten biscuit, mint juleps, and New Orleans fizzes has
+furnished us with the best of such music as we can boast. Maine has
+offered us no _Suwanee River_; we owe no _Swing Low, Sweet Chariot_ to
+Nebraska. The best of our ragtime composers are Jews, a race which
+regards eating and cooking of sufficient importance to include rules
+for the preparation and disposition of food in its religious tenets.
+
+Most musicians and those who enjoy listening to music, like to eat
+(this does not mean that people who like to eat always desire to
+listen to music at the same time, but nowadays one has little choice
+in the matter); what is more pregnant, most of them like to cook. We
+may include even the music critics, one of whom (Henry T. Finck) has
+written a book about such matters. The others eat ... and expand.
+James Huneker devotes sixteen pages of "The New Cosmopolis" to the
+"maw of the monster." And as H. L. Mencken has pointed out, "The
+Pilsner motive runs through the book from cover to cover." Dinners are
+constantly being given for the musicians and critics to meet and talk
+over thirteen courses with wine. You may read Mr. Krehbiel's glowing
+accounts of the dinner given to Adelina Patti (a dinner referred to in
+Joseph Hergesheimer's lyric novel, "The Three Black Pennys") on the
+occasion of her twenty-fifth anniversary as a singer, of the dinner to
+Marcella Sembrich to mark her retirement from the opera stage, and of
+a dinner to Teresa Carreno when she proposed a toast to her three
+husbands.... Go to the opera house and observe the lady singers, with
+their ample bosoms and their broad hips, the men with their expansive
+paunches ... and use your imagination. Why is it, when a singer is
+interviewed for a newspaper, that she invariably finds herself tired
+of hotel food and wants an apartment of her own, where she can cook to
+her stomach's content? Why are the musical journals and the Sunday
+supplements of the newspapers always publishing pictures of contralti
+with their sleeves rolled back to the elbows, their Poiret gowns
+(cunningly and carefully exhibited nevertheless) covered with aprons,
+baking bread, turning omelettes, or preparing clam broth Uncle Sam?
+You, my reader, have surely seen these pictures, but it has perhaps
+not occurred to you to conjure up a reason for them.
+
+Edgar Saltus says: "A perfect dinner should resemble a concert. As the
+_morceaux_ succeed each other, so, too, should the names of the
+composers." Few dinners in New York may be regarded as concerts and
+still fewer restaurants may be looked upon as concert halls, except,
+unfortunately, in the literal sense. However, if you can find a
+restaurant where opera singers and conductors eat you may be sure it
+is a good one. Huneker describes the old Lienau's, where William
+Steinway, Anton Seidl, Theodore Thomas, Scharwenka, Joseffy, Lilli
+Lehmann, Max Heinrich, and Victor Herbert used to gather. Follow
+Alfred Hertz and you will be in excellent company in a double sense.
+Then watch him consume a plateful of Viennese pastry. If you have ever
+seen Emmy Destinn or Feodor Chaliapine eat you will feel that justice
+has been done to a meal. I once sat with the Russian bass for twelve
+hours, all of which time he was eating or drinking. He began with six
+plates of steaming onion soup (cooked with cheese and toast). The old
+New Year's eve festivities at the Gadski-Tauschers' resembled the
+storied banquets of the middle ages.... Boars' heads, meat pies,
+_salade macedoine_, _coeur de palmier_, _hollandaise_ were washed down
+with magnums and quarts of Irroy brut, 1900, Pol Roger, Chambertin,
+graceful Bohemian crystal goblets of Liebfraumilch and Johannisberger
+Schloss-Auslese. Mary Garden once sent a jewelled gift to the _chef_
+at the Ritz-Carlton in return for a superb fish sauce which he had
+contrived for her. H. E. Krehbiel says that Brignoli "probably ate as
+no tenor ever ate before or since--ravenously as a Prussian dragoon
+after a fast." _Peche Melba_ has become a stable article on many menus
+in many cities in many lands. Agnes G. Murphy, in her biography of
+Mme. Melba, says that one day the singer, Joachim, and a party of
+friends stopped at a peasant's cottage near Bergamo, where they were
+regaled with such delicious macaroni that Melba persuaded her friends
+to return another day and wait while the peasant taught her the exact
+method of preparing the dish. In at least one New York restaurant
+_oeuf Toscanini_ is to be found on the bill. I have heard Olive
+Fremstad complain of the cooking in this hotel in Paris, or that hotel
+in New York, or the other hotel in Munich, and when she found herself
+in an apartment of her own she immediately set about to cook a few
+special dishes for herself.
+
+Two musicians I know not only keep restaurants in New York, but
+actually prepare the dinners themselves. One of them is at the same
+time a singer in the Metropolitan Opera Company. Have you seen Bernard
+Begue standing before his cook stove preparing food for his patrons?
+His huge form, clad in white, viewed through the open doorway
+connecting the dining room with the kitchen, almost conceals the great
+stove, but occasionally you can catch sight of the pots and pans, the
+_casseroles_ of _pot-au-feu_, the roasting chicken, the filets of
+sole, all the ingredients of a dinner, _cuisine bourgeoise_ ... and
+after dining, you can hear Begue sing the Uncle-priest in _Madama
+Butterfly_ at the Opera House.
+
+Or have you seen Giacomo (and have not Meyerbeer and Puccini been
+bearers of this name?) Pogliani turning from the _spaghetti_ theme
+chromatically to that of the _risotto_, the most succulent and
+appetizing _risotto_ to be tasted this side of Bonvecchiati's in
+Venice ... or the _polenta_ with _funghi_.... But, best of all, the
+roasts, and were it not that the Prince Troubetskoy is a vegetarian
+you would fancy that he came to Pogliani's for these viands. And it
+must not be forgotten that this supreme cook is--or was--a bassoon
+player of the first rank, that he is a graduate of the Milan
+Conservatory. The bassoon is a difficult instrument. It is sometimes
+called the "comedian of the orchestra," but there are few who can play
+it at all, still fewer who can play it well. Bassoonists are highly
+paid and they are in demand. Walter Damrosch used to say that when he
+was engaging a bassoon player he would ask him to play a passage from
+the bassoon part in _Scheherazade_. If he could play that, he could
+play anything else written for his instrument. Pogliani gave up the
+bassoon for the fork, spoon, and saucepan. Like Prospero he buried his
+magic wand and in Viafora's cartoon the instrument lies idle in the
+cobwebs.
+
+Charles Santley's "Reminiscences" and "Student and Singer" are full of
+references to food: "ox-hearts, stuffed with onions," "a joint of
+meat, well cooked, with a bright brown crust which prevented the
+juices escaping," "a splendid shoulder of mutton, a picture to behold,
+and a _peas pudding_," and "whaffles" are a few of the dishes referred
+to with enthusiasm. In America a newspaper gravely informed its
+readers that "Santley says squash pie is the best thing to sing on he
+knows!" Santley was a true pantophagist, but he was worsted in his
+first encounter with the American oyster: "I had often heard of the
+celebrated American oyster, which half a dozen people had tried to
+swallow without success, and was anxious to learn if the story were
+founded on fact. Cummings conducted me to a cellar in Broadway, where,
+upon his order, a waiter produced two plates, on which were half a
+dozen objects, about the size and shape of the sole of an ordinary
+lady's shoe, on each of which lay what appeared to me to be a very
+bilious tongue, accompanied by smaller plates containing shredded
+white cabbage raw. I did not admire the look of the repast, but I
+never discard food on account of looks. I took up an oyster and tried
+to get it into my mouth, but it was of no use; I tried to ram it in
+with the butt-end of the fork, but all to no purpose, and I had to
+drop it, and, to the great indignation of the waiter, paid and left
+the oysters for him to dispose of as he might like best. I presume
+those oysters are eaten, but I cannot imagine by whom; I have rarely
+seen a mouth capable of the necessary expansion. I soon found out that
+there were plenty of delicious oysters in the States within the
+compass of ordinary jaws."
+
+J. H. Mapleson says in his "Memoirs" that at the Opera at Lodi, where
+he made his debut as a tenor, refreshments of all kinds were served to
+the audience between the acts and every box was furnished with a
+little kitchen for cooking macaroni and baking or frying pastry. The
+wine of the country was drunk freely, not out of glasses, but "in
+classical fashion--from bowls." Mapleson also tells us that Del Puente
+was a "very tolerable cook." On one trying occasion he prepared
+macaroni for his impressario. Michael Kelly declares that the sight of
+Signor St. Giorgio entering a fruit shop to eat peaches, nectarines,
+and a pineapple, was really what stimulated him to study for a career
+on the stage. "While my mouth watered, I asked myself why, if I
+assiduously studied music, I should not be able to earn money enough
+to lounge about in fruit-shops, and eat peaches and pineapples as
+well as Signor St. Giorgio...."
+
+Lillian Russell is a good cook. I can recommend her recipe for the
+preparation of mushrooms: "Put a lump of butter in a chafing dish (or
+a saucepan) and a slice of Spanish onion and the mushrooms minus the
+stems; let them simmer until they are all deliciously tender and the
+juice has run from them--about twenty minutes should be enough--then
+add a cupful of cream and let this boil. As a last touch squeeze in
+the juice of a lemon." When Luisa Tetrazzini was going mad with a
+flute in our vicinity she varied the monotony of her life by sending
+pages of her favourite recipes to the Sunday yellow press.
+Unfortunately, I neglected to make a collection of this series. A
+passion for cooking caused the death of Naldi, a buffo singer of the
+early Nineteenth Century. Michael Kelly tells the story: "His ill
+stars took him to Paris, where, one day, just before dinner, at his
+friend Garcia's house, in the year 1821, he was showing the method of
+cooking by steam, with a portable apparatus for that purpose;
+unfortunately, in consequence of some derangement of the machinery, an
+explosion took place, by which he was instantaneously killed." Almost
+everybody knows some story or other about a _virtuoso_, trapped into
+dining and asked to perform after dinner by his host. Kelly relates
+one of the first: "Fischer, the great oboe player, whose minuet was
+then all the rage ... being very much pressed by a nobleman to sup
+with him after the opera, declined the invitation, saying that he was
+usually much fatigued, and made it a rule never to go out after the
+evening's performance. The noble lord would, however, take no denial,
+and assured Fischer that he did not ask him professionally, but merely
+for the gratification of his society and conversation. Thus urged and
+encouraged, he went; he had not, however, been many minutes in the
+house of the consistent nobleman, before his lordship approached him,
+and said, 'I hope, Mr. Fischer, you have brought your oboe in your
+pocket.'--'No, my Lord,' said Fischer, 'my oboe never sups.' He turned
+on his heel, and instantly left the house, and no persuasion could
+ever induce him to return to it." You perhaps have heard rumours that
+Giuseppe Campanari prefers _spaghetti_ to Mozart, especially when he
+cooks it himself. When this baritone was a member of the Metropolitan
+Opera Company his paraphernalia for preparing his favourite food went
+everywhere with him on tour. Heinrich Conried (or was it Maurice
+Grau?) once tried to take advantage of this weakness, according to a
+story often related by the late Algernon St. John Brenon. Campanari
+was to appear as Kothner in _Die Meistersinger_, a character with no
+singing to do after the first act, although he appears in the
+procession in the third act. The singer told his impressario that he
+saw no reason why he should remain to the end and explained that he
+would leave his costume for a chorus man to don to represent him in
+the final episode. "What would the Master say?" demanded Conried,
+wringing his hands. "Would he approve of such a proceeding? No. That
+would not be truth! That would not be art!" Campanari was obdurate.
+The Herr Direktor became reflective. He was silent for a moment and
+then he continued: "If you will stay for the last act you will find in
+your room a little supper, a bottle of wine, and a box of cigars,
+which you may consume while you are waiting." In sooth when Campanari
+entered his dressing room after the first act of Wagner's comic opera
+he found that his director had kept his word.... The baritone ate the
+supper, drank the wine, put the cigars in his pocket ... and went
+home!
+
+If some singers are good cooks it does not follow that all good cooks
+are singers. Benjamin Lumley, in his "Reminiscences of the Opera,"
+tells the sad story of the Countess of Cannazaro's cook, which should
+serve as a lesson to housemaids who are desirous of becoming moving
+picture stars. "This worthy man, excellent no doubt as a _chef_, took
+it into his head that he was a vocalist of the highest order, and that
+he only wanted opportunity to earn musical distinction. His strange
+fancy came to the knowledge of Rubini, and it was arranged that a
+performance should take place in the morning, in which the cook's
+talent should be fairly tested. Certainly every chance was afforded
+him. Not only was he encouraged by Rubini and Lablache (whose gravity
+on the occasion was wonderful), but by a few others, Costa included,
+as instrumentalists. The failure was miserable, ridiculous, as
+everybody expected." Frederick Crowest describes a certain Count
+Castel de Maria who had a spit that played tunes, "and so regulated
+and indicated the condition of whatever was hung upon it to roast. By
+a singular mechanical contrivance this wonderful spit would strike up
+an appropriate tune whenever a joint had hung sufficiently long on its
+particular roast. Thus, _Oh! the roast beef of Old England_, when a
+sirloin had turned and hung its appointed time. At another air, a leg
+of mutton, _a l'Anglaise_ would be found excellent; while some other
+tune would indicate that a fowl _a la Flamande_ was cooked to a nicety
+and needed removal from the fowl roast."
+
+To Crowest, too, I am indebted for a list of beverages and eatables
+which certain singers held in superstitious awe as capable of
+refreshing their voices. Formes swore by a pot of good porter and
+Wachtel is said to have trusted to the yolk of an egg beaten up with
+sugar to make sure of his high Cs. The Swedish tenor, Labatt, declared
+that two salted cucumbers gave the voice the true metallic ring.
+Walter drank cold black coffee during a performance; Southeim took
+snuff and cold lemonade; Steger, beer; Niemann, champagne, slightly
+warmed, (Huneker once saw Niemann drinking cocktails from a beer
+glass; he sang Siegmund at the opera the next night); Tichatschek,
+mulled claret; Rubgam drank mead; Nachbaur ate bonbons; Arabanek
+believed in Gampoldskirchner wine. Mlle. Brann-Brini took beer and
+_cafe au lait_, but she also firmly believed in champagne and would
+never dare venture the great duet in the fourth act of _Les Huguenots_
+without a bottle of Moet Cremant Rose. Giardini being asked his
+opinion of Banti, previous to her arrival in England, said: "She is
+the first singer in Italy and drinks a bottle of wine every day."
+Malibran believed in the efficacy of porter. She made her last
+appearances in opera in Balfe's _Maid of Artois_ during the fall of
+1836 in London. On the first night she was in anything but good
+physical condition and the author of "Musical Recollections of the
+Last Half-Century" tells how she pulled herself through: "She
+remembered that an immense trial awaited her in the finale of the
+third act; and finding her strength giving way, she sent for Mr. Balfe
+and Mr. Bunn, and told them that unless they did as they were bid,
+after all the previous success, the end might result in failure; but
+she said, 'Manage to let me have a pot of porter somehow or other
+before I have to sing, and I will get you an encore which will bring
+down the house.' How to manage this was difficult; for the scene was
+so set that it seemed scarcely possible to hand her up 'the pewter'
+without its being witnessed by the audience. After much consultation,
+Malibran having been assured that her wish should be fulfilled, it was
+arranged that the pot of porter should be handed up to her through a
+trap in the stage at the moment when Jules had thrown himself on her
+body, supposing that life had fled; and Mr. Templeton was drilled into
+the manner in which he should so manage to conceal the necessary
+arrangement, that the audience would never suspect what was going on.
+At the right moment a friendly hand put the foaming pewter through the
+stage, to be swallowed at a draught, and success was won!... Malibran,
+however, had not overestimated her own strength. She knew that it
+wanted but this fillip to carry her through. She had resolved to have
+an encore, and she had it, in such a fashion as made the roof of 'Old
+Drury' ring as it had never rung before. On the repetition of the
+opera and afterwards, a different arrangement of the stage was made,
+and a property calabash containing a pot of porter was used; but
+although the same result was constantly won, Malibran always said it
+was not half so 'nice,' nor did her anything like the good it would
+have done if she could only have had it out of the pewter." Clara
+Louise Kellogg in her very lively "Memoirs" publishes a similar tale
+of another singer: "It was told of Grisi that when she was growing old
+and severe exertion told on her she always, after her fall as Lucrezia
+Borgia, drank a glass of beer sent up to her through the floor, lying
+with her back half turned to the audience." Miss Kellogg complains of
+the breaths of the tenors she sang with: "Stigelli usually exhaled an
+aroma of lager beer; while the good Mazzoleni invariably ate from one
+to two pounds of cheese the day he was to sing. He said it
+strengthened his voice. Many of them affected garlic." It is
+necessary, of course, that a singer should know what foods agree with
+him. He must keep himself in excellent physical condition: small
+wonder that many artists are superstitious in this regard.
+
+Charles Santley, who was so fond of eating and drinking himself,
+offers some excellent advice on the subject in "Student and Singer":
+"How the voice is produced or where, except that it is through the
+passage of the throat, is unimportant; it is reasonable to say that
+the passage must be kept clear, otherwise the sound proceeding from it
+will not be clear. I have known many instances of singers undergoing
+very disagreeable operations on their throats for chronic diseases of
+various descriptions; now, my observation and experience assure me
+that, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, the root of the evil is
+chronic inattention to food and raiment. It is a common thing to hear
+a singer say, 'I never touch such-and-such food on the days I sing.'
+My dear young friend, unless you are an absolute idiot, you would not
+partake of anything on the days you sing which might disagree with
+you, or over-tax your digestive powers; it is on the days you do not
+sing you ought more particularly to exercise your judgment and
+self-denial. I do not offer the pinched-up pilgarlic who dines off a
+wizened apple and a crust of bread as a model for imitation; at the
+same time, I warn you seriously against following the example of the
+gobbling glutton who swallows every dish that tempts his palate."
+
+Rossini, after he had composed _Guillaume Tell_, retired. He was
+thirty-seven, a man in perfect health, and he lived thirty-nine years
+longer, to the age of seventy-six, yet he never wrote another opera,
+hardly indeed did he dip his pen in ink at all. These facts have
+seriously disconcerted his biographers, who are at a loss to assign
+reasons for his actions. W. F. Apthorp gives us an ingenious
+explanation in "The Opera Past and Present." He says that after _Tell_
+Rossini's pride would not allow him to return to his earlier Italian
+manner, while the hard work needed to produce more _Tells_ was more
+than his laziness could stomach.... Perhaps, but it must be remembered
+that Rossini did not retire to his library or his music room, but to
+his kitchen. The simple explanation is that he preferred cooking to
+composing, a fact easy to believe (I myself vastly prefer cooking to
+writing). He could cook _risotto_ better than any one else he knew. He
+was dubbed a "hippopotamus in trousers," and for six years before he
+died he could not see his toes, he was so fat. Sir Arthur Sullivan
+relates an anecdote which shows that Rossini was conscious of his
+grossness. Once in Paris Sullivan introduced Chorley to Rossini, when
+the Italian said, "_Je vois, avec plaisir, que monsieur n'a pas de
+ventre_." Chorley indeed was noticeably slender. Rossini could write
+more easily, so his biographers tell us, when he was under the
+influence of champagne or some light wine. His provision merchant once
+begged him for an autographed portrait. The composer gave it to him
+with the inscription, "To my stomach's best friend." The tradesman
+used this souvenir as an advertisement and largely increased his
+business thereby, as such a testimonial from such an acknowledged
+epicure had a very definite value. J. B. Weckerlin asserts that when
+Rossini dined at the Rothschild's he first went to the kitchen to pay
+his respects to the _chef_, to look over the menu, and even to discuss
+the various dishes, after which he ascended to the drawing room to
+greet the family of the rich banker. Mme. Alboni told Weckerlin that
+Rossini had dedicated a piece of music to the Rothschild's _chef_.
+
+Anfossi, we are informed, could compose only when he was surrounded by
+smoking fowls and Bologna sausages; their fumes seemed to inflame his
+imagination, to feed his muse; his brain was stimulated first through
+his nose and then through his stomach. When Gluck wrote music he
+betook himself to the open fields, accompanied by at least two bottles
+of champagne. Salieri told Michael Kelly that a comic opera of Gluck's
+being performed at the Elector Palatine's theatre, at Schwetzingen,
+his Electoral Highness was struck with the music, and inquired who had
+composed it; on being informed that he was an honest German who loved
+_old wine_, his Highness immediately ordered him a tun of Hock.
+Beethoven, on the contrary, seems to have fed on his thoughts
+occasionally, although there is evidence that he was not only a good
+eater but also a good cook (the mothers of both Beethoven and Schubert
+were cooks in domestic service). There is a story related of him that
+about the time he was composing the _Sixth Symphony_ he walked into a
+Viennese restaurant and ordered dinner. While it was being prepared,
+he became involved in thought, and when the waiter returned to serve
+him, he said: "Thank you, I have dined!" laid the price of the dinner
+on the table, and took his departure. Gretry, too, lost his appetite
+when he was composing. There are numerous references to eating and
+drinking in Mendelssohn's letters. His particular preferences,
+according to Sir George Grove, were for rice milk and cherry pie.
+Dussek was a famous eater, and it is said that his ruling passion
+eventually killed him. His patron, the Prince of Benevento, paid the
+composer eight hundred napoleons a year, with a free table for three
+persons, at which, as a matter of fact, one person usually presided. A
+musical historian tells us that in the summer of 1797 he was dining
+with three friends at the Ship Tavern in Greenwich, when the waiter
+came and laid a cloth for one person at the next table, placing
+thereon a dish of boiled eels, one of fried flounders, a bowled fowl,
+a dish of veal cutlets, and a couple of tarts. Then Dussek entered and
+made away with the lot, leaving but the bones! In W. T. Parke's
+"Musical Memoirs" justice is done to the appetite of one C. F.
+Baumgarten, for many years leader of the band and composer at Covent
+Garden Theatre. Once at supper after the play he and a friend ate a
+full-grown hare between them. He would never condescend to drink out
+of anything but a quart pot. On one occasion, at the request of his
+friends, Baumgarten was weighed before and after dinner. There was
+eight pounds difference! William Shield, the composer who wrote many
+operas for Covent Garden Theatre, beginning aptly enough with one
+called _The Flitch of Bacon_, was something of an eater. Parke tells
+how at a dinner one evening there was a brace of partridges. The
+hostess handed Shield one of these to carve and absent-mindedly he set
+to and finished it, while the other guests were forced to make shift
+with the other partridge. Handel was a great eater. He was called the
+"Saxon Giant," as a tribute to his genius, but the phrase might have
+had a satirical reference to his enormous bulk. Intending to dine one
+day at a certain tavern, he ordered beforehand a dinner for three. At
+the hour appointed he sat down to the table and expressed astonishment
+that the dinner was not brought up. The waiter explained that he would
+begin serving when the company arrived. "Den pring up de tinner
+brestissimo," replied Handel, "I am de gombany." Lulli never forsook
+the _casserole_. Paganini was as good a cook as he was a violinist.
+Parke tells a story of Weichsell, not too celebrated a musician, but
+the father of Mrs. Billington and Charles Weichsell, the violinist:
+"He would occasionally supersede the labours of his cook, and pass a
+whole day in preparing his favourite dish, rump-steaks, for the
+stewing pan; and after the delicious viand had been placed on the
+dinner-table, together with early green peas of high price, if it
+happened that the sauce was not to his liking he has been known to
+throw rump-steaks, and green peas, and all, out of the window, whilst
+his wife and children thought themselves fortunate in not being thrown
+after them."
+
+Is there a cooking theme in _Siegfried_ to describe Mime's brewing?
+Lavignac and others, who have listed the _Ring motive_, have neglected
+to catalogue it, but it is mentioned by Old Fogy. Practically a whole
+act is taken up in _Louise_ with the preparation for and consumption
+of a dinner. Scarpia eats in _Tosca_ and the heroine kills him with a
+table knife. There is much talk of food in _Hansel und Gretel_ and
+there is a supper in _The Merry Wives of Windsor_. There are drinking
+songs in _Don Giovanni_, _Lucrezia Borgia_, _Hamlet_, _La Traviata_,
+_Girofle-Girofla_.... The reference to whiskey and soda in _Madama
+Butterfly_ is celebrated. J. E. Cox, the author of "Musical
+Recollections," describes Herr Pischek in the supper scene of _Don
+Giovanni_ as "out-heroding Herod by swallowing glass after glass of
+champagne like a sot, and gnawing the drumstick of a fowl, which he
+held across his mouth with his fingers, just as any of his own
+middle-class countrymen may be seen any day of the week all the year
+round at the _mit-tag_ or _abend-essen_ feeding at one of their
+largely frequented _tables-d'hote_." Eating or drinking on the stage
+is always fraught with danger, as Charles Santley once discovered
+during Papageno's supper scene in _The Magic Flute_: "The supper which
+Tamino commands for the hungry Papageno consisted of pasteboard
+imitations of good things, but the cup contained real wine, a small
+draught of which I found refreshing on a hot night in July, amid the
+dust and heat of the stage. On the occasion in question I was putting
+the cup to lips, when I heard somebody call to me from the wings; I
+felt very angry at the interruption, and was just about to swallow the
+wine when I heard an anxious call not to drink. Suspecting something
+was wrong, I pretended to drink, and deposited the cup on the table.
+Immediately after the scene I made inquiries about the reason for the
+caution I received, and was informed that as each night the
+carpenters, who had no right to it, finished what remained of the wine
+before the property men, whose perquisite it was, could lay hold of
+the cup, the latter, to give their despoilers a lesson, had mingled
+castor-oil with my drink!"
+
+A young husband of my acquaintance once bemoaned to me the fact that
+his wife seemed destined to become a great singer. "She is such a
+remarkable cook!" he explained to account for his despondency. I
+reassured him: "She will cook with renewed energy when she begins to
+sing _Sieglinde_ and _Tosca_.... She will practise _Vissi d'Arte_ over
+the gumbo soup and _Du herstes Wunder_! while the Frankfurters are
+sizzling. Her trills, her chromatic scales, and her _messa di voce_
+will come right in the kitchen; she will equalize her scale and learn
+to breathe correctly bending over the oven. It is even likely that she
+will improve her knowledge of _portamento_ while she is washing
+dishes. When she can prepare a succulent roast suckling pig she will
+be able to sing _Ocean, thou mighty monster_! and she will understand
+_Abscheulicher_ when she understands the mysteries of old-fashioned
+strawberry shortcake. If you hear her shrieking _Suicidio_! invoking
+Agamemnon, or appealing to the _Casta Diva_ among the kettles and pots
+be not alarmed.... For the love you bear of good food, man, do not
+discourage your wife's ambition. The more she loves to sing, the
+better she will cook!"
+
+  _July 17, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+An Interrupted Conversation
+
+    _"We can never depend upon any right adjustment of emotion to
+    circumstance."_
+
+                        Max Beerbohm.
+
+
+
+
+An Interrupted Conversation
+
+
+Ordinarily one does not learn things about oneself from Edmund Gosse,
+but my discovery that I am a Pyrrhonist is due to that literary man. A
+Pyrrhonist, says Mr. Gosse, is "one who doubts whether it is worth
+while to struggle against the trend of things. The man who continues
+to cross the road leisurely, although the cyclists' bells are ringing,
+is a Pyrrhonist--and in a very special sense, for the ancient
+philosopher who gives his name to the class made himself conspicuous
+by refusing to get out of the way of careering chariots." Now the most
+unfamiliar friend I have ever walked with knows my extreme impassivity
+at the corners of streets, remembers the careless attitude with which
+I saunter from kerb to kerb, whether it be across the Grand Boulevard,
+Piccadilly, or Fifth Avenue. Only once has this nonchalant defiance of
+traffic caused me to come to even temporary grief; that was on the
+last night of the year 1913, when, in crossing Broadway, I became
+entangled, God knows how, in the wheels of a swiftly passing vehicle,
+and found myself, top hat and all, in the most ignominious position
+before I was well aware of what had really happened. Then a policeman
+stooped over me, book and pencil in hand, and another held the
+chauffeur of the victorious taxi-cab at bay some yards further up the
+street. But I was not hurt and I waved them all away with a
+magnanimous gesture.... It is owing to this habit of mine that I often
+make interesting _rencontres_ in the middle of streets. It accounts,
+in fact, for my running, quite absent-mindedly, plump into Dickinson
+Sitgreaves, who is more American than his name sounds, one August day
+in Paris.
+
+It was one of those charming days which make August perhaps the most
+delightful month to spend in Paris, although the facts are not known
+to tourists. Many a sly French pair, however, bored with Trouville, or
+the season at Aix, take advantage of the allurements of a Paris August
+to return surreptitiously to the boulevards. On this particular day
+almost all the seduction of an October day was in the air, a splendid
+dull warm-cool crispness, which filtered down through the faded
+chestnut leaves from the sunlight, and left pale splotches of purple
+and orange on the _trottoirs_ ... a really marvellous day, which I was
+spending in that most excellent occupation in Paris of gazing into
+shops and, passing cafes, staring into the faces of those who sat on
+the _terrasses_.... But this is an occupation for one alone; so, when
+I met Sitgreaves, we joined a _terrasse_ ourselves. We were near the
+Napolitain and there he and I sat down and began to talk as only we
+two can talk together after long separation. He explained in the
+beginning how I had interrupted him.... There was a _fille_, some
+little Polish beauty who had captivated his senses a day or so before,
+brought to him quite by accident in an hotel where the _patron_
+furnished his clients with such pleasure as the town and his address
+book afforded.... I knew the _patron_ myself, a fluent, amusing sort
+of person, who had been a _cuirassier_ and who resembled Mayol ... a
+_cafe-concert_ proprietor of an hotel.... It was his boast that he had
+never disappointed a client and it is certain that he would promise
+anything. Some have said that his stock in trade was one pretty girl,
+who assumed costumes, ages, hair, and accents, to please whatever
+demand was made upon her, but this I do not believe. There must have
+been at least two of them. The Grand Duchess Anastasia, it was
+rumoured, had dined with Marcel at one time, in his little hotel, and
+certainly one king had been seen to go there, and one member of the
+English royal family, but Marcel remained simple and obliging.
+
+"When will you look up the little _Polonaise_?" I asked, as we sipped
+_Amer Picon_ and stared with fresh interest at each new boot and ankle
+that passed. Paris in August is like another place in May.
+
+"Why don't you come along?" queried Sitgreaves in reply, "and we could
+go at once.... Oh, I know that you are in no mood for pleasure. You
+see the point is that I shall have to wait. Marcel will have to send
+for the _fille_. It is a bore to wait in a room with red curtains and
+a picture of _Amour et Psyche_ on the walls.... What have you been
+doing?" He paid the _consommation_ and started to leave without
+waiting for a reply, because he knew of my complaisance. I rose with
+him and we walked down the boulevard.
+
+"What is there to do in Paris in August but to enjoy oneself?" I
+asked. "I have made friends with an _apache_ and his _gigolette_. We
+eat bread and cheese and drink bad wine on the fortifications.... In
+the afternoon I walk. Sometimes I go to the Luxembourg gardens to hear
+the band bray sad music, or to watch the little boys play _diavolo_,
+or sail their tiny boats about the fountain pond; sometimes I walk
+quite silently up the Avenue Gabriel, with its _triste_ line of trees,
+and dream that I am a Grand Duke; in the evening there are again the
+_terrasses_ of the cafes, dinner in Montmartre at the Clou, or the
+Cou-Cou, a _revue_ at La Cigale, but it is all governed, my day and my
+night, by what happens and by whom I meet.... Have you seen Jacques
+Blanche's portrait of Nijinsky?"
+
+"I think it is Picasso that interests me now," Sitgreaves was saying.
+"He puts wood and pieces of paper into his composition; architecture,
+that's what it is.... I don't go to Blanche's any more. It's too
+delightfully perfect, the atmosphere there.... The books are by all
+the famous writers, and they are all dedicated to Blanche; the
+pictures are all of the great men of today, and they are all painted
+by Blanche; the music is played by the best musicians.... Do you know,
+I think Blanche is the one man who has made a successful profession of
+being an amateur--unless one excepts Robert de la Condamine.... You
+can scarcely call a man who does so much a dilettante. Yes, I think he
+is an amateur in the best sense."
+
+"I met the Countess of Jena there the other day," I responded. "She
+had scarcely left the room before three people volunteered, _sans
+rancune_, to tell her story. She is a devout Catholic, and her husband
+contrived in some way to substitute a spy for the priest in the
+confessional. He acquired an infinite amount of information, but it
+didn't do him any good. She is so witty that every one invites her
+everywhere in spite of her reputation, and he is left to dine alone at
+the Meurice. Dull men simply are not tolerated in Paris.
+
+"It was at Blanche's last year that I met George Moore," I continued.
+"You know I have just seen him in London. He is at work on _The
+Apostle_, making a novel of it, to be called 'The Brook Kerith.'...
+For a time he thought of finishing it up as a play because a novel
+meant a visit to Palestine and that was distasteful to him, but it
+finally became a novel. He went to Palestine and stayed six weeks,
+just long enough to find a monastery and to study the lay of the
+country. For he says, truly enough, that one cannot imagine
+landscapes; one does not know whether there is a high or low horizon.
+There may be a brook which all the characters must cross. It is
+necessary to see these things. Besides he had to find a monastery....
+He told me of his thrill when he discovered an order of monks living
+on a narrow ledge of cliff, with 500 feet sheer rise and descent above
+and below it ... and when he had found this his work was done and he
+returned to England to write the book, a reaction, for he told me that
+he was getting tired of being personal in literature. The book will
+exhibit a conflict between two types: Christ, the disappointed mystic,
+and Paul; Christ, who sees that there is no good to be served in
+saving the world by his death, and Paul, full of hope, idealism, and
+illusions. It is the drama of the conflict between the nature which is
+affected by externals and that which is not, he told me."
+
+"It's a subject for Anatole France," said Sitgreaves. "Moore, in my
+opinion, is not a novelist. His great achievements are his memoirs. I
+was interested in 'Evelyn Innes' and 'Esther Waters,' but something
+was lacking. There is nothing lacking in the three volumes of 'Hail
+and Farewell.' They grow in interest. Moore has found his _metier_."
+
+"But he insists," I explained, before the door of the little hotel,
+"that 'Hail and Farewell' is a novel. He is infuriated when some one
+suggests that it is a book after the manner of, say, 'The
+Reminiscences of Lady Randolph Churchill.'..."
+
+We entered and walked up the little staircase.
+
+"Do you mean that the incidents are untrue?"
+
+We were at the door of the _concierge_ and there stood Marcel, his
+apron spread neatly over his ample paunch. It was early in the
+afternoon and the room beyond him, sometimes filled with possibilities
+for customers, was empty.
+
+"_Ah, monsieur est revenu!_" he exclaimed in his piping voice. "_C'est
+pour la petite Polonaise sans doute que monsieur revient?_"
+
+"_Oui_," answered Sitgreaves, "_faut-il attendre longtemps?_"
+
+"_Mais non, monsieur, un petit moment. Elle habite en face. Je vais
+envoyer le garcon la chercher tout de suite. Et pour monsieur, votre
+ami?_"
+
+"_Je ne desire rien_," I replied.
+
+Marcel bowed humbly.... "_Comme monsieur voudra._" Then a doubt
+assailed him. "_Peut-etre que la petite Polonaise vous suffira a tous
+les deux?_"
+
+"_Jamais de la vie!_" I shouted, "_Flute, Mercure, allez! Je suis
+puceau!_"
+
+Marcel was equal to this. "_Et ta soeur?_" he demanded as he
+disappeared down the staircase.
+
+He had put us meanwhile in the very chamber with the red curtains and
+the picture of Cupid and Psyche that Sitgreaves had described. Perhaps
+all the rooms were similarly decorated. I lounged on the bed while
+Sitgreaves sat on a chair and smoked....
+
+I answered his last question, "No, they are true, but there is
+selection and form."
+
+"While other memoirs have neither selection nor form and usually are
+not altogether accurate in the bargain...."
+
+"Especially Madame Melba's...."
+
+"Especially," agreed Sitgreaves delightedly, "Madame Melba's."
+
+"Moore is really right," I went on. "He says that some people insist
+that Balzac was greater than Turgeniev, because the Frenchman took his
+characters from imagination, the Russian his from life. You will
+remember, however, that Edgar Saltus says, 'The manufacture of fiction
+from facts was begun by Balzac.' Moore's point is that all great
+writers write from observation. There is no other way. A character may
+have more or less resemblance to the original; it may be derived and
+bear a different name; still there must have been something.... In a
+letter which Moore once wrote me stands the phrase, 'Memory is the
+mother of the Muses.' 'Hail and Farewell' is just as much a work of
+imagination, according to Moore, as 'A Nest of Noblemen' or 'Les
+Illusions Perdues.'"
+
+"Of course," admitted Sitgreaves. "No writer but what has suffered
+from the recognition of his characters. Dickens got into trouble.
+Oscar Wilde is said to have done himself in 'Dorian Gray,' and
+Meredith's models for 'The Tragic Comedians' and 'Diana of the
+Crossways' are well known."
+
+"All Moore has done is to call his characters by their real names and
+he has reported their conversations as he remembered them, but, mind
+you, he has not put into the book all their conversations, or even all
+the people he knew at that period. Arthur Symons, for instance, a
+great friend of Moore's at that time, is scarcely mentioned, and with
+reason: he has no part in the form of the book; its plot is not
+concerned with him.
+
+"All artists create only in the image of the things they have seen,
+reduced to terms of art through their imagination. The paintings of
+Mina Loy seem to the beholder the strange creations of a vagrant
+fancy. I remember one picture of hers in which an Indian girl stands
+poised before an oriental palace, the most fantastic of palaces, it
+would seem. But the artist explained to me that it was simply the
+facade of Hagenbeck's menagerie in Hamburg, seen with an imaginative
+eye. The girl was a model.... One day on the beach at the Lido she saw
+a young man in a bathing suit lying stretched on the sand with his
+head in the lap of a beautiful woman. Other women surrounded the two.
+The group immediately suggested a composition to her. She went home
+and painted. She took the young man's bathing suit off and gave him
+wings; the women she dressed in lovely floating robes, and she called
+the picture, _l'Amour Dorlote par les Belles Dames_.
+
+"And once I asked Frank Harris to explain to me the origin of his
+vivid story, 'Montes the Matador.' 'It's too simple,' he said, 'the
+model for Montes was a little Mexican greaser whom I met in Kansas. He
+was one of many in charge of cattle shipped up from Mexico and down
+from the States. All the white cattle men, the gringos, held him in
+great contempt. But,' continued Harris, speaking deliberately with his
+beautifully modulated voice, and his eyes twinkling with the memory of
+the thing, 'I soon found that the greaser's contempt for the gringos
+was immeasureably greater than their's for him. "Bah," he would say,
+"they know nothing." And it was so. He could go into a cattle car on a
+pitch dark night and make the bulls stand up, a feat that none of the
+white men would have attempted. I asked him how he did this and he
+told me the answer in three words, "I know them." He could go into a
+herd of cattle just let loose together and pick out their leader
+immediately, pick him out before the cattle themselves had! There was
+the origin of "Montes the Matador." He was named, of course, after
+the famous _torero_ described by Gautier in his "Voyage en Espagne."
+When I was in Madrid sometime later I went to a number of bull-fights
+before I put the story together.' 'But,' I asked Harris, 'Is it
+possible for an _espada_ to stand in the bull ring with his back to
+the bull, during a charge, as you have made him do frequently in the
+story?' 'Of course not,' he answered me at once, smiling his frankly
+malevolent smile, 'Of course not. That part was put in to show how
+much the public will stand for in a work of fiction. I believe one of
+the _espadas_ tried it some time after the book appeared and was
+immediately killed.'
+
+"Fiction, history, poetry, criticism, at their best, are all the same
+thing. When they inflame the imagination and stir the pulse they are
+identical: all creative work. It does not matter what a man writes
+about. It matters how he writes it. Subject is nothing. Should we
+regard Velasquez as less important than Murillo because the former
+painted portraits of contemporaries, whom in his fashion he
+criticized, while the Spanish Bouguereau disguised his models as the
+Virgin? Walter Pater's description of the _Monna Lisa_ would live if
+the picture disappeared. Indeed it has created a factitious interest
+in da Vinci's masterwork. Even more might be said for Huysmans's
+description of Moreau's _Salome_, which actually puts the figures in
+the picture in motion! The critic, the historian at their best are
+creative artists as the writers of fiction are creative artists.
+Should we regard, for example, 'Imperial Purple' less a work of
+creative art than 'The Rise of Silas Lapham'?"
+
+"I am getting your meaning more and more," said Sitgreaves. "And it
+occurs to me that perhaps I have been unjust in rating Moore low as a
+novelist. Perhaps I should have said that he is more successful in
+those books which depend more on his memory and less on his
+imaginative instinct. He cannot, after all, have known Jesus and
+Paul...."
+
+"You are quite wrong," I said. "At least from his point of view. He
+says that he knows Paul better than he has ever known any one else. He
+even finds hair on Paul's chest. He can describe Paul, I believe, to
+the last mole. He knows his favourite colours, and whether he prefers
+artichokes to alligator pears. As for Christ, everybody professes to
+know Christ these days. Since the world has become distinctly
+un-Christian it has become comparatively easy to discuss Christ. He
+is regarded as an historical character, and a much more simple one
+than Napoleon. I have heard anarchists in bar-rooms talk about him by
+the hour, sometimes very graphically and always with a certain amount
+of wit. No, it is all the same.... Moore, now that he has been to
+Palestine and read the gospels, feels as well acquainted with Christ
+and Paul as he does with Edward Martyn and Yeats and Lady Gregory."
+
+"I must fall back on the personal then," said Sitgreaves, now really
+at bay, "and say that I am less moved and interested when Moore is
+describing Evelyn Innes, than when he tells of his affair with Doris
+at Orelay."
+
+"I am glad that you mentioned 'Evelyn Innes' again," I said, "because
+it is in this very book that he is said to have painted so many of his
+friends. Ulick Dean is undoubtedly Yeats. It has been suggested that
+Arnold Dolmetsch posed for the portrait of Evelyn's father.
+Dolmetsch's testimony on this point goes farther. He says that he
+dictated certain passages in the book...."
+
+"What is it, then? What is the difference? There is some difference,
+of that I am sure...."
+
+"The difference is--" I began when the door opened and Marcel entered,
+the most amazingly comprehensive smile on his countenance.
+"_Mademoiselle vous attend_," he said, and he looked the question.
+"Shall I bring her in here?"
+
+Sitgreaves answered it immediately, "_Je viens_." And then to me,
+"Wait," as he vanished through the doorway.... I walked to the window,
+drew aside the red curtains, and looked out into the fountain-splashed
+court below....
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"What is the difference?"
+
+"I suppose it is that you prefer the new Moore to the old Moore, the
+author of the later and better written books to the author of the
+earlier ones. 'Evelyn Innes' was many times rewritten. Moore has said
+that he could never get it to suit him, but he has also said,
+recently, that he would never rewrite another book (a resolution he
+has not kept). 'Memoirs of My Dead Life' and 'Hail and Farewell' do
+not need rewriting. They are written to stand. 'The Brook Kerith,'
+perhaps, you will find equally to your taste. It will be the newest
+Moore...."
+
+"You have explained to me," said Sitgreaves, "the difference: it is
+one of development. Now that I think of it I don't believe that
+Anatole France could write 'The Brook Kerith.'... It would be too
+symbolical, too cynical, in his hands. Moore will perhaps make it
+more human, by knowing the characters. I wonder," he continued
+musingly, as we left the room, and descended the stairs, "if he told
+you whether that hair on Paul's chest was red or black...."
+
+  _February 1, 1915._
+
+
+
+
+The Authoritative Work on
+American Music
+
+
+
+
+The Authoritative Work on American Music
+
+
+H. L. Mencken pointed out to me recently, in his most earnest and
+persuasive manner, that it was my duty to write a book about the
+American composers, exposing their futile pretensions and describing
+their flaccid _opera_, stave by stave. It was in vain that I urged
+that this would be but a sleeveless errand, arguing that I could not
+fight men of straw, that these our composers had no real standing in
+the concert halls, and that pushing them over would be an easy
+exercise for a child of ten. On the contrary, he retorted, they
+belonged to the academies; certain people believed that they were
+important; it was necessary to dislodge this belief. I suggested, with
+a not too heavily assumed humility, that I had already done something
+of the sort in an essay entitled "The Great American Composer." "A
+good beginning," asserted Col. Mencken, "but not long enough. I won't
+be satisfied with anything less than a book." "But if I wrote a book
+about Professors Parker, Chadwick, Hadley, and the others I could find
+nothing different to say about them; they are all alike. Neither
+their lives nor their music offer opportunities for variations." "An
+excellent idea!" cried Major Mencken, enthusiastically, "Write one
+chapter and then repeat it verbatim throughout the book, changing only
+the name of the principal character. Then clap on a preface,
+explaining your reason for this procedure." My last protest was the
+feeblest of all: "I can't spend a year or a month or a week poring
+over the scores of these fellows; I can't go to concerts to hear their
+music. I might as well go to work in a coal mine." "I'll do it for
+you!" triumphantly checkmated General Mencken. "I'll read the scores
+and you shall write the book!" And so he left me, as on a similar
+occasion the fiend, having exhibited his prospectus, vanished from the
+eyes of our Lord. And I returned to my home sorely troubled, finding
+that the words of the man were running about in my head like so many
+little Japanese waltzing mice.
+
+And, after much cogitation, I went to such and such a book case and
+took down a certain volume written by Louis Charles Elson (a very
+large red tome) and another by Rupert Hughes, to see if their words of
+praise for our weak musical brothers would stir me to action. I found
+that they did not. My heart action remained normal; no film covered
+my eyes; foam did not issue from my mouth. Indeed I read, quite
+calmly, in Mr. Hughes's "American Composers" that A. J. Goodrich is
+"recognized among scholars abroad as one of the leading spirits of our
+time"; that "(Henry Holden) Huss has ransacked the piano and pillaged
+almost every imaginable fabric of high colour.... The result is
+gorgeous and purple"; that "The thing we are all waiting for is that
+American grand opera, _The Woman of Marblehead_ (by Louis Adolphe
+Coerne). It is predicted that it will not receive the marble heart";
+that "I know of no modern composer who has come nearer to relighting
+the fires that burn in the old gavottes and fugues and preludes (than
+Arthur Foote). His two gavottes are to me away the best since Bach";
+that "the song (_Israfel_ by Edgar Stillman-Kelley) is in my fervent
+belief, a masterwork of absolute genius, one of the very greatest
+lyrics in the world's music"; and in "The History of American Music"
+by Louis C. Elson that "Music has made even more rapid strides than
+literature among us," and that "he (George W. Chadwick) has reconciled
+the symmetrical (sonata) form with modern passion." But it was in the
+fourth volume of "The Art of Music," published by the National Society
+of Music, that I found the supreme examples of this kind of writing.
+The volume was edited by Arthur Farwell and W. Dermot Darby. Therein I
+read with a sort of awed astonishment that one of the songs of
+Frederick Ayres "reveals a poignancy of imagination and a perception
+and apprehension of beauty seldom attained by any composer." I learned
+that T. Carl Whitmer has a "spiritual kinship" with Arthur Shepherd,
+Hans Pfitzner, and Vincent d'Indy. His music is "psychologically
+subtle and spiritually rarefied: in colour it corresponds to the
+violet end of the spectrum." I turned the pages until I came to the
+name of Miss Gena Branscombe: "Inexhaustible buoyancy, a superlative
+emotional wealth, and wholly singular gift of musical intuition are
+the qualities which have shaped the composer's musical personality
+(without much effort of the imagination we might say that they are the
+qualities that shaped Beethoven's musical personality).... Her
+impatient melodies leap and dash with youthful life, while her
+accompaniments abound in harmonic hairbreadth escapes." Before he
+became acquainted with the later French idiom Harvey W. Loomis
+"spontaneously breathed forth the quality of spirit which we now
+recognize in a Debussy or a Ravel."
+
+Curiously enough, however, these statements did not annoy me. I found
+no desire arising in me to deny them and doubtless, though mayhap with
+a guilty conscience, I should have ditched the undertaking, consigned
+it to that heap of undone duties, where already lie notes on a
+comparison of Andalusian mules with the mules of Liane de Pougy, a few
+scribbled memoranda for a treatise on the love habits of the mole, and
+a half-finished biography of the talented gentleman who signed his
+works, "Nick Carter," if my by this time quite roving eye had not
+alighted, entirely fortuitously, on one of the forgotten glories of my
+library, a slender volume entitled "Popular American Composers."
+
+I recalled how I had bought this book. Happening into a modest
+second-hand bookshop on lower Third Avenue, maintained chiefly for the
+laudable purpose of redistributing paper novels of the Seaside and
+kindred libraries, of which, alas, we hear very little nowadays, I
+asked the proprietor if by chance he possessed any literature relating
+to the art of music. By way of answer, he retired to the very back of
+his little room, searched for a space in a litter on the floor, and
+then returned with a pile of nine volumes or so in his arms. The
+titles, such as "Great Violinists," "Harmony in Thirteen Lessons,"
+and "How to Sing," did not intrigue me, but in idly turning the pages
+of this "Popular American Composers" I came across a half-tone
+reproduction of a photograph of Paul Dresser, the only less celebrated
+brother of Theodore Dreiser, with a short biography of the composer of
+_On the Banks of the Wabash_. As Sir George Grove in his excellent
+dictionary neglected to mention this portentous name in American Art
+and Letters (although he devoted sixty-seven pages, printed in double
+columns, to Mendelssohn) I saw the advantage of adding the little book
+to my collection. The bookseller, when questioned, offered to
+relinquish the volume for a total of fifteen cents, and I carried it
+away with me. Once I had become more thoroughly acquainted with its
+pages I realized that I would willingly have paid fifteen dollars for
+it.
+
+This book, indeed, cannot fail to delight General Mencken. There is no
+reference in its pages to Edgar Stillman-Kelley, Miss Gena Branscombe,
+Louis Adolphe Coerne, Henry Holden Huss, T. Carl Whitmer, Arthur
+Farwell, Arthur Foote, or A. J. Goodrich. In fact, if we overlook
+brief notices of John Philip Sousa, Harry von Tilzer, Paul Dresser,
+Charles K. Harris, and Hattie Starr (whom you will immediately recall
+as the composer of _Little Alabama Coon_), the author, Frank L.
+Boyden, has not hesitated to go to the roots of his subject, pushing
+aside the college professors and their dictums, and has turned his
+attention to figures in the art life of America, from whom, Mencken
+himself, I feel sure, would not take a single paragraph of praise, so
+richly is it deserved. I am unfamiliar with the causes contributing to
+this book's comparative obscurity; perhaps, indeed, they are similar
+to those responsible for the early failure of "Sister Carrie." May not
+we even suspect that the odium cast by the Doubledays on the author of
+that romance might have been actively transferred in some degree to a
+work which contained a biographical notice and a picture of his
+brother? At any rate, "Popular American Composers," published in 1902,
+fell into undeserved oblivion and so I make no apology for inviting my
+readers to peruse its pages with me.
+
+Opening the book, then, at random, I discover on page 96 a biography
+of Lottie A. Kellow (her photograph graces the reverse of this page).
+In a few well-chosen words (almost indeed in "gipsy phrases") Mr.
+Boyden gives us the salient details of her career. Mrs. Kellow is a
+resident of Cresco, Iowa, a church singer of note, and the possessor
+of a contralto voice of great volume. As a composer she has to her
+credit "marches, cakewalks, schottisches, and other styles of
+instrumental music." We are given a picture of Mrs. Kellow at work:
+"Mrs. Kellow's best efforts are made in the evening, and in darkness,
+save the light of the moonbeams on the keys of her piano." We are also
+told that "she is happy in her inspirations and a sincere lover of
+music. All of her compositions show a decided talent and possess
+musical elements which are only to be found in the works of an artist.
+Mrs. Kellow's musical friends are confident of her success as a
+composer and predict for her a brilliant future."
+
+Let us turn to the somewhat more extensive biography of W. T. Mullin
+on Page 4 (his photograph faces this page). Almost in the first line
+the author rewards our attention: "To him may be applied the simplest
+and grandest eulogy Shakespeare ever pronounced: 'He was a man.'" We
+are also informed that he was born of a cultured family, that his
+inherited nobility of character has been carefully fostered by a
+thorough education, and told that one finds in him the unusual
+combination of genius wedded to sound common sense and practical
+business capacity. His family moved to Colorado, Texas, while he was
+still a lad and here his musical talent began to display itself. "The
+inventive faculties of the small boy, and the innate harmony of the
+musician, combined to improvise a crude instrument which emitted the
+notes of the scale. Successful at drawing forth a concord of sweet
+sounds, he continued to experiment upon everything which would emit
+musical vibrations. (Even the pigs, I take it, did not escape.) He
+consequently discovered the laws of vibrating chords before he had
+mastered the intricacies of the multiplication table. Yet strange as
+it may seem, his musical education was neglected. A four months'
+course in piano instruction was interrupted and then resumed for two
+months more. Upon this meagre foundation rested his subsequent
+phenomenal progress." I pause to point out to the astonished and
+breathless reader that even Mozart and Schubert, infant prodigies that
+they were, received more training than this.
+
+I continue to quote: "At the age of thirteen he joined The Colorado
+(Texas) Cornet Band as a charter member. The youngest member of the
+band, he soon outstripped his comrades by virtue of his superior
+natural ability. His position was that of second tenor. Wearying of
+the monotony of playing, he determined to venture on solo work. The
+boy felt the impetus of restless power and the following incident
+illustrates his remarkable originality. Taking the piano score of a
+favourite melody he transposed it within the compass of the second
+tenor. This feat evoked admiring applause because of his extreme youth
+and untrained abilities. The band-master remarked that elderly and
+experienced heads could hardly have accomplished this.
+
+"From boyhood to manhood he has remained with the Colorado (Texas)
+band as one of its most efficient members, composing in his leisure
+moments, marches, ragtimes, waltzes, song and dance schottisches, etc.
+Of his many meritorious compositions only one has so far been given to
+the public:--_The West Texas Fair March_, composed for and dedicated
+to the management of the West Texas Fair and Round-up. This
+institution holds its annual meetings at Abilene, Texas. There the
+march was played for the first time at their October, 1899, meet with
+great success, and again at their September, 1900, meet by the
+Stockman band of Colorado, Texas, which has furnished music for the
+West Texas Fair during their 1899 and 1900 meetings. Mr. Mullin's
+position in the Stockman band is that of euphonium soloist. He is a
+proficient performer upon all band instruments from cornet to tuba,
+including slide trombone, his favourites being the baritone and the
+trombone.
+
+"He plays many stringed instruments, as well as the piano and organ.
+He is the proud possessor of a genuine Stradivarius violin--a family
+heirloom--which he naturally prizes beyond the intrinsic value. The
+feat of playing on several instruments at once presents no difficulty
+to him.
+
+"This briefly sketches Mr. Mullin's life, character and ability as a
+musician. His accompanying photograph reveals his superb physique.
+Personally he possesses charming, agreeable manners and Chesterfieldan
+courteousness, which vastly contributes to his popularity. Sincere
+devotion to his art has been rewarded by that elevating nobility of
+soul, which alone can penetrate the blue expanse of space and revel in
+the music of the spheres."
+
+What more is there to say? I can only assure the reader that Mullin
+stands unique among all musicians, creative and interpretative, in
+being able to play the organ, many stringed instruments, and all the
+instruments in a brass band (several of them simultaneously; it would
+be interesting to know which and how) after studying the piano for six
+months. I sincerely hope that the mistake he made in withholding all
+his compositions, save one, from the public, has been rectified.
+
+Helen Kelsey Fox, like so many of our talented men and women, has a
+European strain in her blood. She is a lineal descendant on her
+mother's side of a French nobleman and a German princess. Nevertheless
+she continues to reside in Vermilion, Ohio. She is of a "decided
+poetic nature and lives in an atmosphere of her own. She dwells in a
+world of thought peopled by the creations of an active and lyric
+mentality." She is so imbued with the poetic spark that, as she
+expresses it, she "speaks in rhyme half the time."
+
+John Z. Macdonald, strictly speaking, is not an American composer. He
+was born in Scotland and came to America in 1881 at the age of 21, but
+as he is one of the very few composers since Nero to enter public
+political life he well deserves a place in this collection. In 1890 he
+was elected city clerk of Brazil, Indiana, a position which he held
+for seven years. In 1898 he was elected treasurer of Clay County,
+Indiana. This county is democratic "by between five and six hundred"
+but Mr. Macdonald was elected on the republican ticket by a majority
+of 133. He was the only republican elected. Among the best known of
+Mr. Macdonald's compositions is his famous "expansion" song, in which
+he predicted the fate of Aguinaldo. He has autograph letters, praising
+this song, from the late President McKinley, Col. Roosevelt, General
+Harrison, Admiral Schley, John Philip Sousa and other "eminent
+gentlemen."
+
+Edward Dyer, born in Washington, was the son of a marble cutter who
+"helped to erect the U. S. Treasury, Patent Office, and Capitol.... In
+the majority of his compositions there is a tinge of sadness which
+appeals to his auditors.... Mr. Dyer never descends to coarseness or
+vulgarity in his productions; he writes pure, clean words, something
+that can be sung in the home, school and on the stage to refined
+respectable people."
+
+We learn much of the study years of Mrs. Lucy L. Taggart: "From
+earliest childhood she received valuable musical instruction from her
+father (Mr. Longsdon) who, coming from England in 1835, purchased the
+first piano that came to Chicago, an elegant hand-carved instrument
+that is still treasured in the old home." Later "she studied under
+Prof. C. E. Brown, of Owego, N. Y., Prof. Heimburger, of San Francisco
+and Herr Chas. Goffrie. Mrs. Taggart was also for five years a pupil
+of Senor Arevalo, the famous guitar soloist of Los Angeles.... Mrs.
+Taggart has in preparation (1902) _Methought He Touched the Strings_,
+an idyl for piano in memory of the late Senor M. S. Arevalo."
+
+David Weidley, born in Philadelphia, is the composer of the following
+songs, _Old Spooney Spooppalay_, _Jennie Ree_, _Autumn Leaves_,
+_Hannah Glue_, and _Uncle Reuben and Aunt Lucinda_. "He has done much
+to create and elevate a taste for music in the community where he
+resides and where he is known as 'Dave.' Even the little children call
+him 'Dave' as freely and innocently as those who have known him for
+years, and there can be no greater compliment for any man than that he
+is known and loved by the children. Mr. Weidley is by profession a
+sheet metal worker. He is a P. G. of the I. O. O. F., and a P. C. in
+the Knights of Pythias. He is not identified with any church, but
+loves and serves his fellow-men."
+
+In the biography of Delmer G. Palmer we are assured that "Versatility
+is a trait with which musical composers are not excessively burdened.
+There are few performers who can include _The Moonlight Sonata_ and
+Schubert's _Serenade_ with selections from _The Merry-go-round_, and
+do justice to the expression of each, much less would such
+adaptability be looked for among composers. As most rules have
+exceptions, in this there is one who stands in a class occupied by no
+one else, Mr. Delmer G. Palmer, the 'Green Mountain Composer,' who at
+present resides in Kansas City.
+
+"As recently as 1899 Mr. Palmer wrote a song in the popular 'ragtime,'
+_My Sweetheart is a Midnight Coon_ and almost in the same breath also
+wrote the heavy sacred solo, _Christ in Gethsemane_. The first is of
+the usual light order characteristic of this class of music. The
+latter is as far removed to the contrary as is comedy from tragedy.
+The 'coon' song entered the bubbling effervescing cauldron of what is
+termed 'ragtime' music among the multitudinous others, and soon was
+seen peeping through at the surface among the lightest and most
+catchy.... The sacred solo found its level among the heavier in its
+class, and if the term may be here applied, it was also a hit."
+
+S. Duncan Baker, born August 25, 1855, still lives (1902) in the old
+family residence at Natchez, Miss. "In this house is located the den
+where he has spent many hours with his collection of banjos and
+pictures and in writing for and playing on the instrument which he
+adopted as a favourite during its dark days (about 1871)." We are told
+that he composed an "artistic banjo solo," entitled, _Memories of
+Farland_. "Had this production or its companion piece, _Thoughts of
+the Cadenza_, been written by an old master for some other instrument
+and later have been adapted by a modern composer to the banjo, either
+or both of them would have been pronounced classic, barring some
+slight defects in form."
+
+I cannot stop to quote from the delightful accounts offered us of the
+lives and works of Albert Matson, George D. Tufts, D. O. Loy, Lavinia
+Pascoe Oblad, and forty or fifty other American singers, but it seems
+to me that I have done enough, Mencken, to prove to you that the great
+book on American music has been written. Without one single mention of
+the names of Horatio Parker, George W. Chadwick, Frederick Converse,
+or Henry Hadley, by a transference of the emphasis to the place where
+it belongs, the author of this undying book has answered your prayer.
+
+  _December 11, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+Old Days and New
+
+
+
+
+Old Days and New
+
+
+Some toothless old sentimentalist or other periodically sets up a
+melancholy howl for "the good old days of comic opera," whatever or
+whenever they were. Perhaps none of us, once past forty, is guiltless
+in this respect. Nothing, not even the smell of an apple-blossom from
+the old homestead, the sight of a daguerreotype of a miss one kissed
+at the age of ten, or a taste of a piece of the kind of pie that
+"mother used to make" so arouses the sensibility of a man of middle
+age as the memory of some musical show which he saw in his budding
+manhood. That is why revivals of these venerable institutions are
+frequently projected and, some of them, very successfully
+accomplished. When a manager revives an old drama he must appeal to
+the interest of his audience; it may not be the identical interest
+which held the original spectators of the piece spell-bound, but, none
+the less, it must be an interest. When a manager revives an old
+musical comedy he appeals directly to sentiment.
+
+Of course, the exact date of the good old days is a variable quantity.
+I have known a vain regretter to turn no further back than to the
+nights of _The Merry Widow_, _The Waltz Dream_, _The Chocolate
+Soldier_, _The Girl in the Train_, and _The Dollar Princess_, in other
+words to the Viennese renaissance; another, in using the phrase, is
+subconsciously conjuring up pictures of _La Belle Helene_, _Orphee aux
+Enfers_, or _La Fille de Madame Angot_, good fodder for memory to feed
+on here; a third will instinctively revert to the Johann Strauss
+operetta period, the era of _The Queen's Lace Handkerchief_ and _Die
+Fledermaus_; a fourth cries, "Give us Gilbert and Sullivan!" A fifth,
+when his ideas are chased to their lair, will rhapsodize endlessly
+over the charms of the London Gaiety when _The Geisha_, _The Country
+Girl_, and _The Circus Girl_ were in favour; a sixth, it seems, finds
+his pleasure in Americana, _Robin Hood_, _Wang_, _The Babes in
+Toyland_, and _El Capitan_; a seventh becomes maudlin to the most
+utter degree when you mention _Les Cloches de Corneville_, or _La
+Mascotte_, products of a decadent stage in the history of French
+opera-bouffe. Not long ago I heard a man speak of the cadet operas in
+Boston (did a man named Barnet write them?) as the last of the great
+musical pieces; and every one of you who reads this essay will have a
+brother, or a son, or a friend who went to see _Sybil_ forty-three
+times and _The Girl from Utah_ seventy-six. Twenty years from now, as
+he sits before the open fire, the mere mention of _They Wouldn't
+Believe Me_ will cause the tears to course down his cheeks as he pats
+the pate of his infant son or daughter and weepingly describes the
+never-to-be-forgotten fascination of Julia Sanderson, the (in the then
+days) unattainable agility of Donald Brian.
+
+In no other form of theatrical entertainment is the appeal to softness
+so direct. The man who attends a performance of a musical farce goes
+in a good mood, usually with a couple of friends, or possibly with
+_the_ girl. If he has dined well and his digestion is in working order
+and he is young enough, the spell of the lights and the music is
+irresistible to his receptive and impressionable nature. There are
+those young men, of course, who are constant attendants because of the
+altogether too wonderful hair of the third girl from the right in the
+front row. Others succumb to the dental perfection of the prima donna
+or to the shapely legs of the soubrette. All of us, I am almost proud
+to admit, at some time or other, are subject to the contagion. I well
+remember the year in which I considered myself as a possible suitor
+for the hand of Della Fox. Photographs and posters of this deity
+adorned my walls. I was an assiduous collector of newspaper clippings
+referring to her profoundly interesting activities, although my
+sophistication had not reached the stage where I might appeal to
+Romeike for assistance. The mere mention of Miss Fox's name was
+sufficient cause to make me blush profusely. Eventually my father was
+forced to take steps in the matter when I began, in a valiant effort
+to summon up the spirit of the lady's presence, to disturb the early
+morning air with vocal assaults on _She Was a Daisy_, which, you will
+surely remember, was the musical gem of _The Little Trooper_. Here are
+the words of the refrain:
+
+    "She was a daisy, daisy, daisy!
+    Driving me crazy, crazy, crazy!
+    Helen of Troy and Venus were to her cross-eyed crones!
+    She was dimpled and rosy, rosy, rosy!
+    Sweet as a posy, posy, posy!
+    How I doted upon her, my Ann Jane Jones!"
+
+You will admit, I think, at first glance, the superior literary
+quality of these lines; you will perceive at once to what immeasurably
+higher class of art they belong than the lyrics that librettists forge
+for us today.
+
+Wall Street broker, poet, green grocer, soldier, banker, lawyer,
+whatever you are, confess the facts to yourself: you were once as I.
+You have suffered the same feelings that I suffered. Perhaps with you
+it was not Della Fox.... Who then? Did saucy Marie Jansen awaken your
+admiration? Was pert Lulu Glaser the object of your secret but
+persistent attention? How many times did you go to see Marie Tempest
+in _The Fencing Master_, or Alice Nielsen in _The Serenade_? Was
+Virginia Earle in _The Circus Girl_ the idol of your youth or was it
+Mabel Barrison in _The Babes in Toyland_? Theresa Vaughn in _1492_,
+May Yohe in _The Lady Slavey_, Hilda Hollins in _The Magic Kiss_, or
+Nancy McIntosh in _His Excellency_? Madge Lessing in _Jack and the
+Beanstalk_, Edna May in _The Belle of New York_, Phyllis Rankin in
+_The Rounders_, or Gertrude Quinlan in _King Dodo_?
+
+What do you whistle in your bathtub when you are in a reminiscent
+mood? Is it _The Typical Tune of Zanzibar_, or _Baby, Baby, Dance My
+Darling Baby_, or _Starlight, Starbright_, or _Tell Me, Pretty
+Maiden_, or _A Simple Little String_, or _J'aime les Militaires_ (if
+you whistle this, ten to one your next door neighbour thinks you have
+been to an orchestra concert and heard Beethoven's _Seventh
+Symphony_), or _Sister Mary Jane's Top Note_, or _A Wandering
+Minstrel I_, or _See How It Sparkles_, or the _Lullaby_ from
+_Erminie_, which Pauline Hall used to sing as if she herself were
+asleep, and which Emma Abbott interpolated in _The Mikado_, or _A
+Pretty Girl, A Summer Night_, or the _Policeman's Chorus_ from _The
+Pirates of Penzance_, or _The Soldiers in the Park_, or _My Angeline_,
+or the _Letter Song_ from _The Chocolate Soldier_, or _I'm Little
+Buttercup_, or the _Gobble Song_ from _The Mascot_, or the _Anna Song_
+from _Nanon_, or the march from _Fatinitza_, or _I'm All the Way from
+Gay Paree_, or _Love Comes Like a Summer Sigh_, or _In the North Sea
+Lived a Whale_, or _Jusqu'la_, or _The Harmless Little Girlie With the
+Downcast Eyes_, or _They All Follow Me_, or _The Amorous Goldfish_, or
+_Don't Be Cross_, or _Slumber On, My Little Gypsy Sweetheart_, or
+_Good-bye Flo_, or _La Legende de la Mere Angot_, or _My Alamo Love_?
+
+There is a very subtle and fragrant charm about these old
+recollections which the sight or sound of a score, a view of an old
+photograph of Lillian Russell or Judic, or a dip in the _Theatre
+Complet_ of Meilhac and Halevy will reawaken. But it is only at a
+revival of one of our old favourites that we can really bathe in
+sentimentality, drink in draughts of joy from the past, allow memory
+full away. You whose hair is turning white will be in Row A, Seat No.
+1 for the first performance of a revival of _Robin Hood_. You will not
+hear Edwin Hoff in his original role; Jessie Bartlett Davis is dead
+and, alas, Henry Clay Barnabee is no longer on the boards, but the
+newcomers, possibly, are respectable substitutes and the airs and
+lines remain. You can walk about in the lobby and say proudly that you
+attended the _first_ performance of the opera ever so long ago when
+operettas had tune and reason. "Yes sir, there were plots in those
+days, and composers, and the singers could _act_. Times have certainly
+changed, sir. Come to the corner and have a Manhattan.... There were
+no cocktails in those days.... There is no singer like Mrs. Davis
+today!"
+
+Well the poor souls who cannot feel tenderly about a past they have
+not yet experienced have their recompenses. For one thing I am certain
+that the revivals of the Gilbert and Sullivan operettas to which De
+Wolf Hopper devoted his best talents were better, in many respects,
+than the original London productions; just as I am equally certain
+that the representations of _Aida_ at the Metropolitan Opera House are
+way ahead of the original performance of that work given at Cairo
+before the Khedive of Egypt.
+
+Then there is the musical revue, a form which we have borrowed from
+the French, but which we have vastly improved upon and into which we
+have poured some of our most national feeling and expression. The
+interpretation of these frivolities is a new art. Gaby Deslys may be
+only half a loaf compared to Marie Jansen, but I am sure that Elsie
+Janis is more than three-quarters. Frank Tinney and Al Jolson can, in
+their humble way, efface memories of Digby Bell and Dan Daly. Adele
+Rowland and Marie Dressler have their points (and curves). Irving
+Berlin, Louis A. Hirsch, and Jerome Kern are not to be sniffed at.
+Neither is P. G. Wodehouse. Harry B. Smith we have always with us: he
+is the Sarah Bernhardt of librettists.
+
+Joseph Urban has wrought a revolution in stage settings for this form
+of entertainment. Louis Sherwin has offered us convincing evidence to
+support his theory that the new staging in America is coming to us by
+way of the revue and not through the serious drama. Melville Ellis,
+Lady Duff-Gordon, and Paul Poiret have done their bit for the dresses.
+In fact, my dear young man--who are reading this article--you will
+feel just as tenderly in twenty years about the _Follies of 1917_ as
+your father does now about _Wang_. Only, and this is a very big ONLY,
+the _Follies of 1917_, depending as it does entirely on topical
+subjects and dimpled knees, cannot be revived. Fervid and enlivening
+as its immediate impression may be it cannot be lasting. You can never
+recapture the thrills of this summer by sitting in Row A, Seat No. 1
+at any 1937 _reprise_. There can never be anything of the sort. The
+revue, like the firefly, is for a night only. We take it in with the
+daily papers ... and the next season, already old-fashioned, it goes
+forth to show Grinnell and Davenport how Mlle. Manhattan deported
+herself the year before.
+
+So if the youth of these days chooses to be sentimental in the years
+to come over the good old days of Urban scenery and Olive Thomas, the
+Balloon Girls of the Midnight Frolic and the chorus of the Winter
+Garden, he will be obliged to give way to the mood at home in front of
+the fire, see the pictures in the smoke, and hear the tunes in the
+dropping of the coals. Which is perhaps as it should be. For in 1937
+the youth of that epoch can sit in Row A, Seat No. 1 himself and not
+be ousted from his place by a sentimental gentleman of middle age who
+longs to hear _Poor Butterfly_ again.
+
+  _April 25, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+Two Young American Playwrights
+
+     _"Gautier had a theory to the effect that to be a member of
+     the Academy was simply and solely a matter of
+     predestination. 'There is no need to do anything,' he would
+     say, 'and so far as the writing of books is concerned that
+     is entirely useless. A man is born an Academician as he is
+     born a bishop or a cook. He can abuse the Academy in a dozen
+     pamphlets if it amuses him, and be elected all the same; but
+     if he is not predestined, three hundred volumes and ten
+     masterpieces, recognized as such by the genuflections of an
+     adoring universe, will not aid him to open its doors.'
+     Evidently Balzac was not predestined but then neither was
+     Moliere, and there must have been some consolation for him
+     in that."_
+
+                        Edgar Saltus.
+
+
+
+
+Two Young American Playwrights
+
+
+In the newspaper reports relating to the death of Auguste Rodin I read
+with some astonishment that if the venerable sculptor, who lacked
+three years of being eighty when he died, had lived two weeks longer
+he would have been admitted to the French Academy! In other words, the
+greatest stone-poet since Michael Angelo, internationally famous and
+powerful, the most striking artist figure, indeed, of the last half
+century, was to be permitted, in the extremity of old age, to inscribe
+his name on a scroll, which bore the signatures of many inoffensive
+nobodies. I could not have been more amused if the newspapers, in
+publishing the obituary notices of John Jacob Astor, had announced
+that if the millionaire had not perished in the sinking of the
+_Titanic_, his chances of being invited to join the Elks were good; or
+if "Variety" or some other tradespaper of the music halls, had
+proclaimed, just before Sarah Bernhardt's debut at the Palace Theatre,
+that if her appearances there were successful she might expect an
+invitation to membership in the White Rats.... These hypothetical
+instances would seem ridiculous ... but they are not. The Rodin case
+puts a by no means seldom-recurring phenomenon in the centre of the
+stage under a calcium light. The ironclad dreadnaughts of the academic
+world, the reactionary artists, the dry-as-dust lecturers are
+constantly ignoring the most vital, the most real, the most important
+artists while they sing polyphonic, antiphonal, Palestrinian motets in
+praise of men who have learned to imitate comfortably and efficiently
+the work of their predecessors.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+If there are other contemporary French sculptors than Rodin their
+names elude me at the moment; yet I have no doubt that some ten or
+fifteen of these hackmen have their names emblazoned in the books of
+all the so-called "honour" societies in Paris. It is a comfort, on the
+whole, to realize that America is not the only country in which such
+things happen. As a matter of fact, they happen nowhere more often
+than in France.
+
+If some one should ask you suddenly for a list of the important
+playwrights of France today, what names would you let roll off your
+tongue, primed by the best punditic and docile French critics? Henry
+Bataille, Paul Hervieu, and Henry Bernstein. Possibly Rostand. Don't
+deny this; you know it is true, unless it happens you have been doing
+some thinking for yourself. For even in the works of Remy de Gourmont
+(to be sure this very clairvoyant mind did not often occupy itself
+with dramatic literature) you will find little or nothing relating to
+Octave Mirbeau and Georges Feydeau. True, Mirbeau did not do his best
+work in the theatre. That stinging, cynical attack on the courts of
+Justice (?) of France (nay, the world!), "Le Jardin de Supplice" is
+not a play and it is probably Mirbeau's masterpiece and the best piece
+of critical fiction written in France (or anywhere else) in the last
+fifty years. However Mirbeau shook the pillars of society even in the
+playhouse. _Le Foyer_ was hissed repeatedly at the Theatre Francais.
+Night after night the proceedings ended in the ejection and arrest of
+forty or fifty spectators. Even to a mere outsider, an idle bystander
+of the boulevards, this complete exposure of the social, moral, and
+political hypocricies of a nation seemed exceptionally brutal. _Le
+Foyer_ and "Le Jardin" could only have been written by a man
+passionately devoted to the human ideal ("each as she may," as
+Gertrude Stein so beautifully puts it). _Les Affaires sont les
+Affaires_ is pure theatre, perhaps, but it might be considered the
+best play produced in France between Becque's _La Parisienne_ and
+Brieux's _Les Hannetons_.
+
+It is not surprising, on the whole, to find the critical tribe turning
+for relief from this somewhat unpleasant display of Gallic closet
+skeletons to the discreet exhibition of a few carefully chosen bones
+in the plays of Bernstein and Bataille, direct descendants of Scribe,
+Sardou, _et Cie_, but I may be permitted to indulge in a slight
+snicker of polite amazement when I discover these gentlemen applying
+their fingers to their noses in no very pretty-meaning gesture,
+directed at a grandson of Moliere. For such is Georges Feydeau. His
+method is not that of the Seventeenth Century master, nor yet that of
+Mirbeau; nevertheless, aside from these two figures, Beaumarchais,
+Marivaux, Becque, Brieux at his best, and Maurice Donnay occasionally,
+there has not been a single writer in the history of the French
+theatre so inevitably _au courant_ with human nature. His form is
+frankly farcical and his plays are so funny, so enjoyable merely as
+_good shows_ that it seems a pity to raise an obelisk in the
+playwright's honour, and yet the fact remains that he understands the
+political, social, domestic, amorous, even cloacal conditions of the
+French better than any of his contemporaries, always excepting the
+aforementioned Mirbeau. In _On Purge Bebe_ he has written saucy
+variations on a theme which Rabelais, Boccaccio, George Moore, and
+Moliere in collaboration would have found difficult to handle. It is
+as successful an experiment in bravado and bravura as Mr. Henry
+James's "The Turn of the Screw." And he has accomplished this feat
+with nimbleness, variety, authority, even (granting the subject)
+delicacy. Seeing it for the first time you will be so submerged in
+gales of uncontrollable laughter that you will perhaps not recognize
+at once how every line reveals character, how every situation springs
+from the foibles of human nature. Indeed in this one-act farce
+Feydeau, with about as much trouble as Zeus took in transforming his
+godship into the semblance of a swan, has given you a well-rounded
+picture of middle-class life in France with its external and internal
+implications.... And how he understands the buoyant French _grue_,
+unselfconscious and undismayed in any situation. I sometimes think
+that _Occupe-toi d'Amelie_ is the most satisfactory play I have ever
+seen; it is certainly the most delightful. I do not think you can see
+it in Paris again. The Nouveautes, where it was presented for over a
+year, has been torn down; an English translation would be an insult
+to Feydeau; nor will you find essays about it in the yellow volumes in
+which the French critics tenderly embalm their _feuilletons_; nor do I
+think Arthur Symons or George Moore, those indefatigable diggers in
+Parisian graveyards, have discovered it for their English readers.
+Reading the play is to miss half its pleasure; so you must take my
+word in the matter unless you have been lucky enough to see it
+yourself, in which case ten to one you will agree with me that one
+such play is worth a kettleful of boiled-over drama like _Le Voleur_,
+_Le Secret_, _Samson_, _La Vierge Folle_, _et cetera_, _et cetera_. In
+the pieces I have mentioned Feydeau, in representation, had the
+priceless assistance of a great comic artist, Armande Cassive. If we
+are to take Mr. Symons's assurance in regard to de Pachmann that he is
+the world's greatest pianist because he does one thing more perfectly
+than any one else, by a train of similar reasoning we might
+confidently assert that Mlle. Cassive is the world's greatest actress.
+
+When you ask a Frenchman to explain why he does not like Mirbeau (and
+you will find that Frenchmen invariably do not like him) he will shrug
+his shoulders and begin to tell you that Mirbeau was not good to his
+mother, or that he drank to excess, or that he did not wear a red,
+white, and blue coat on the Fourteenth of July, or that he did not
+stand for the French spirit as exemplified in the eating of snails on
+Christmas. In other words, he will immediately place himself in a
+position in which you may be excused for regarding him as a person
+whose opinion is worth nothing, whereas his ratiocinatory powers on
+subjects with which he is more in sympathy may be excellent. I know
+why he does not like Mirbeau. Mirbeau is the reason. In his life he
+was not accustomed to making compromises nor was he accustomed to
+making friends (which comes after all to the same thing). He did what
+he pleased, said what he pleased, wrote what he pleased. His armorial
+bearings might have been a cat upsetting a cream jug with the motto,
+"_Je m'en fous_." The author of "Le Jardin de Supplice" would not be
+in high favour anywhere; nevertheless I would willingly relinquish any
+claims I might have to future popularity for the privilege of having
+been permitted to sign this book.
+
+Feydeau is distinctly another story; his plays are more successful
+than any others given in Paris. They are so amusing that even while he
+is pointing the finger at your own particular method of living you are
+laughing so hard that you haven't time to see the application.... So
+the French critics have set him down as another popular figure, only a
+nobody born to entertain the boulevards, just as the American critics
+regard the performances of Irving Berlin with a steely supercilious
+impervious eye. The Viennese scorned Mozart because he entertained
+them. "A gay population," wrote the late John F. Runciman, "always a
+heartless master, holds none in such contempt as the servants who
+provide it with amusement."
+
+The same condition has prevailed in England until recently. A few
+seasons ago you might have found the critics pouring out their glad
+songs about Arthur Wing Pinero and Henry Arthur Jones. Bernard Shaw
+has, in a measure, restored the balance to the British theatre. He is
+not only a brilliant playwright; he is a brilliant critic as well.
+Foreseeing the fate of the under man in such a struggle he became his
+own literary huckster and by outcriticizing the other critics he
+easily established himself as the first English (or Irish) playwright.
+When he thus rose to the top, by dint of his own exertions, he had
+strength enough to carry along with him a number of other important
+authors. As a consequence we may regard the Pinero incident closed and
+in ten years his theatre will be considered as old-fashioned and as
+inadept as that of Robertson or Bulwer-Lytton.
+
+Having no Shaw in America, no man who can write brilliant prefaces and
+essays about his own plays until the man in the street is obliged
+perforce to regard them as literature, we find ourselves in the
+condition of benighted France. Dulness is mistaken for literary
+flavour; the injection of a little learning, of a little poetry
+(so-called) into a theatrical hackpiece, is the signal for a good deal
+of enthusiasm on the part of the journalists (there are two brilliant
+exceptions). Which of our playwrights are taken seriously by the
+pundits? Augustus Thomas and Percy MacKaye: Thomas the dean, and
+MacKaye the poet laureate. I have no intention of wrenching the laurel
+wreathes from these august brows. Let them remain. Each of these
+gentlemen has a long and honourable career in the theatre behind him,
+from which he should be allowed to reap what financial and honourary
+rewards he may be able. But I would not add one leaf to these
+wreathes, nor one crotchet to the songs of praise which vibrate around
+them. I turn aside from their plays in the theatre and in the library
+as I turn aside from the fictions of Pierre de Coulevain and Arnold
+Bennett.
+
+I love to fashion wreathes of my own and if two young men will now
+step forward to the lecturer's bench I will take delight in crowning
+them with my own hands. Will the young man at the back of the hall
+please page Avery Hopwood and Philip Moeller?... No response! They
+seem to have retreated modestly into the night. Nevertheless they
+shall not escape me!
+
+I speak of Mr. Hopwood first because he has been writing for our
+theatre for a longer period than has Mr. Moeller, and because his
+position, such as it is, is assured. Like Feydeau in France he has a
+large popular following; he has probably made more money in a few
+years than Mr. Thomas has made during his whole lifetime and the
+managers are always after him to furnish them with more plays with
+which to fill their theatres. For his plays do fill the theatres.
+_Fair and Warmer_, _Nobody's Widow_, _Clothes_, and _Seven Days_,
+would be included in any list of the successful pieces produced in New
+York within the past ten years. Two of these pieces would be near the
+very top of such a list. An utterly absurd allotment of actors is
+sufficient to explain the failures of _Sadie Love_ and _Our Little
+Wife_ and it might be well if some one should attempt a revival of one
+of his three serious plays, _This Woman and This Man_, in which
+Carlotta Nillson appeared for a brief space.
+
+This author, mainly through the beneficent offices of a gift of
+supernal charm, contrives to do in English very much what Feydeau does
+in French. It is his contention that you can smite the Puritans, even
+in the American theatre, squarely on the cheek, provided you are
+sagacious in your choice of weapon. In _Fair and Warmer_ he provokes
+the most boisterous and at the same time the most innocent laughter
+with a scene which might have been made insupportably vulgar. A
+perfectly respectable young married woman gets very drunk with the
+equally respectable husband of one of her friends. The scene is the
+mainstay, the _raison d'etre_, of the play, and it furnishes the
+material for the better part of one act; yet young and old, rich and
+poor, philistine and superman alike, delight in it. To make such a
+situation irresistible and universal in its appeal is, it seems to me,
+undoubtedly the work of genius. What might, indeed should, have been
+disgusting, was not only in intention but in performance very funny.
+Let those who do not appreciate the virtuosity of this undertaking
+attempt to write as successful a scene in a similar vein. Even if they
+are able to do so, and I do not for a moment believe that there is
+another dramatic author in America who can, they will be the first to
+grant the difficulty of the achievement. With an apparently
+inexhaustible fund of fantasy and wit Mr. Hopwood passes his wand over
+certain phases of so-called smart life, almost always with the
+happiest results. With a complete realization of the independence of
+his medium he often ignores the realistic conventions and the
+traditional technique of the stage, but his touch is so light and
+joyous, his wit so free from pose, that he rarely fails to establish
+his effect. His pen has seldom faltered. Occasionally, however, the
+heavy hand of an uncomprehending stage director or of an aggressive
+actor has played havoc with the delicate texture of his fabric. There
+is no need here for the use of hammer or trowel; if an actress must
+seek aid in implements, let her rather rely on a soft brush, a lacy
+handkerchief, or a sparkling spangled fan.
+
+Philip Moeller has achieved distinction in another field, that of
+elegant burlesque, of sublimated caricature. His stage men and women
+are as adroitly distorted (the better to expose their comic
+possibilities) as the drawings of Max Beerbohm. Beginning with the
+Bible and the Odyssey (_Helena's Husband_ and _Sisters of Susannah_
+for the Washington Square Players) he has at length, by way of
+Shakespeare and Bacon (_The Roadhouse in Arden_) arrived at the
+Romantic Period in French literature and in _Madame Sand_, his first
+three-act play, he has established himself at once as a dangerous
+rival of the authors of _Caesar and Cleopatra_ and _The Importance of
+Being Earnest_, both plays in the same _genre_ as Mr. Moeller's latest
+contribution to the stage. The author has thrown a very high light on
+the sentimental adventures of the writing lady of the early Nineteenth
+Century, has indeed advised us and convinced us that they were
+somewhat ridiculous. So they must have appeared even to her
+contemporaries, however seriously George took herself, her romances,
+her passions, her petty tragedies. A less adult, a less seriously
+trained mind might have fallen into the error of making a sentimental
+play out of George's affairs with Alfred de Musset, Dr. Pagello, and
+Chopin (Mr. Moeller contents himself with these three passions,
+selected from the somewhat more extensive list offered to us by
+history). Such an author would doubtless have written _Great
+Catherine_ in the style of _Disraeli_ and _Androcles and the Lion_
+after the manner of _Ben Hur_! Whether love itself is always a comic
+subject, as Bernard Shaw would have us believe, is a matter for
+dispute, but there can be no alternative opinion about the loves of
+George Sand. A rehearsal of them offers only laughter to any one but a
+sentimental school girl.
+
+The piece is conceived on a true literary level; it abounds in wit, in
+fantasy, in delightful situations, but there is nothing precious about
+its progress. Mr. Moeller has carefully avoided the traps expressly
+laid for writers of such plays. For example, the enjoyment of _Madame
+Sand_ is in no way dependent upon a knowledge of the books of that
+authoress, De Musset, and Heine, nor yet upon an acquaintance with the
+music of Liszt and Chopin. Such matters are pleasantly and lightly
+referred to when they seem pertinent, but no insistence is laid upon
+them. Occasionally our author has appropriated some phrase originally
+spoken or written by one of the real characters, but for that he can
+scarcely be blamed. Indeed, when one takes into consideration the
+wealth of such material which lay in books waiting for him, it is
+surprising that he did not take more advantage of it. In the main he
+has relied on his own cleverness to delight our ears for two hours
+with brilliant conversation.
+
+There is, it should be noted, in conclusion, nothing essentially
+American about either of these young authors. Both Mr. Hopwood and
+Mr. Moeller might have written for the foreign stage. Several of Mr.
+Hopwood's pieces, indeed, have already been transported to foreign
+climes and there seems every reason for belief that Mr. Moeller's
+comedy will meet a similarly happy fate.
+
+  _November 29, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+De Senectute Cantorum
+
+    _"All'eta di settanta
+      Non si ama, ne si canta."_
+
+                        Italian proverb.
+
+
+
+
+De Senectute Cantorum
+
+
+"I am not sure," writes Arthur Symons in his admirable essay on Sarah
+Bernhardt, "that the best moment to study an artist is not the moment
+of what is called decadence. The first energy of inspiration is gone;
+what remains is the method, the mechanism, and it is that which alone
+one can study, as one can study the mechanism of the body, not the
+principle of life itself. What is done mechanically, after the heat of
+the blood has cooled, and the divine accidents have ceased to happen,
+is precisely all that was consciously skilful in the performance of an
+art. To see all this mechanism left bare, as the form of a skeleton is
+left bare when age thins the flesh upon it is to learn more easily all
+that is to be learnt of structure, the art which not art but nature
+has hitherto concealed with its merciful covering."
+
+Mr. Symons, of course, had an actress in mind, but his argument can be
+applied to singers as well, although it is safest to remember that
+much of the true beauty of the human voice inevitably departs with the
+youth of its owner. Still style in singing is not noticeably affected
+by age and an artist who possesses or who has acquired this quality
+very often can afford to make lewd gestures at Father Time. If good
+singing depended upon a full and sensuous tone, such artists as
+Ronconi, Victor Maurel, Max Heinrich, Ludwig Wullner, and Maurice
+Renaud would never have had any careers at all. It is obvious that any
+true estimate of their contribution to the lyric stage would put the
+chief emphasis on style, and this is usually the explanation for
+extended success on the opera or concert stage, although occasionally
+an extraordinary and exceptional singer may continue to give pleasure
+to her auditors, despite the fact that she has left middle age behind
+her, by the mere lovely quality of the tone she produces.
+
+In the history of opera there may be found the names of many singers
+who have maintained their popularity and, indeed, a good deal of their
+art, long past fifty, and there is recorded at least one instance in
+which a singer, after a long absence from the theatre, returned to the
+scene of her earlier triumphs with her powers unimpaired, even
+augmented. I refer, of course, to Henrietta Sontag, born in 1805, who
+retired from the stage of the King's Theatre in London in 1830 in her
+twenty-fifth year and who returned twenty years later in 1849. She
+had, in the meantime, become the Countess Rossi, but although she had
+abandoned the stage her reappearance proved that she had not remained
+idle during her period of retirement. For she was one of those artists
+in whom early "inspiration" counted for little and "method" for much.
+She was, indeed, a mistress of style. She came back to the public in
+_Linda di Chaminoux_ and H. F. Chorley ("Thirty Years' Musical
+Recollections") tells us that "all went wondrously well. No magic
+could restore to her voice an upper note or two which Time had taken;
+but the skill, grace, and precision with which she turned to account
+every atom of power she still possessed,--the incomparable steadiness
+with which she wrought out her composer's intentions--she carried
+through the part, from first to last, without the slightest failure,
+or sign of weariness--seemed a triumph. She was greeted--as she
+deserved to be--as a beloved old friend come home again in the late
+sunnier days.
+
+"But it was not at the moment of Madame Sontag's reappearance that we
+could advert to all the difficulty which added to the honour of its
+success.--She came back under musical conditions entirely changed
+since she left the stage--to an orchestra far stronger than that which
+had supported her voice when it was younger; and to a new world of
+operas.--Into this she ventured with an intrepid industry not to be
+overpraised--with every new part enhancing the respect of every real
+lover of music.--During the short period of these new performances at
+Her Majesty's Theatre, which was not equivalent to two complete Opera
+seasons, not merely did Madame Sontag go through the range of her old
+characters--Susanna, Rosina, Desdemona, Donna Anna, and the like--but
+she presented herself in seven or eight operas which had not existed
+when she left the stage--Bellini's _Sonnambula_, Donizetti's _Linda_,
+_La Figlia del Reggimento_, _Don Pasquale_; _Le Tre Nozze_, of Signor
+Alary, _La Tempesta_, by M. Halevy--the last two works involving what
+the French call 'creation,' otherwise the production of a part never
+before represented.--In one of the favourite characters of her
+predecessor, the elder artist beat the younger one hollow.--This was
+as Maria, in Donizetti's _La Figlia_, which Mdlle. Lind may be said to
+have brought to England, and considered as her special property....
+With myself, the real value of Madame Sontag grew, night after
+night--as her variety, her conscientious steadiness, and her adroit
+use of diminished powers were thus mercilessly tested. In one respect,
+compared with every one who had been in my time, she was alone, in
+right, perhaps of the studies of her early days--as a singer of
+Mozart's music."
+
+It was after these last London seasons that Mme. Sontag undertook an
+American tour. She died in Mexico.
+
+The great Mme. Pasta's ill-advised return to the stage in 1850 (when
+she made two belated appearances in London) is matter for sadder
+comment. Chorley, indeed, is at his best when he writes of it, his pen
+dipped in tears, for none had admired this artist in her prime more
+passionately than he. Here was a particularly good opportunity to
+study the bare skeleton of interpretative art; the result is one of
+the most striking passages in all literature:
+
+"Her voice, which at its best, had required ceaseless watching and
+practice, had been long ago given up by her. Its state of utter ruin
+on the night in question passes description.--She had been neglected
+by those who, at least, should have presented her person to the best
+advantage admitted by Time.--Her queenly robes (she was to sing some
+scenes from _Anna Bolena_) in nowise suited or disguised her figure.
+Her hair-dresser had done some tremendous thing or other with her
+head--or rather had left everything undone. A more painful and
+disastrous spectacle could hardly be looked on.--There were artists
+present, who had then, for the first time, to derive some impression
+of a renowned artist--perhaps, with the natural feeling that her
+reputation had been exaggerated.--Among these was Rachel--whose bitter
+ridicule of the entire sad show made itself heard throughout the whole
+theatre, and drew attention to the place where she sat--one might even
+say, sarcastically enjoying the scene. Among the audience, however,
+was another gifted woman, who might far more legitimately have been
+shocked at the utter wreck of every musical means of expression in the
+singer--who might have been more naturally forgiven, if some humour of
+self-glorification had made her severely just--not worse--to an old
+_prima donna_;--I mean Madame Viardot.--Then, and not till then, she
+was hearing Madame Pasta.--But Truth will always answer to the appeal
+of Truth. Dismal as was the spectacle--broken, hoarse, and destroyed
+as was the voice--the great style of the singer spoke to the great
+singer. The first scene was Ann Boleyn's duet with Jane Seymour. The
+old spirit was heard and seen in Madame Pasta's _Sorgi!_ and the
+gesture with which she signed to her penitent rival to rise. Later,
+she attempted the final mad scene of the opera--that most complicated
+and brilliant among the mad scenes on the modern musical stage--with
+its two _cantabile_ movements, its snatches of recitative, and its
+_bravura_ of despair, which may be appealed to as an example of vocal
+display, till then unparagoned, when turned to the account of frenzy,
+not frivolity--perhaps as such commissioned by the superb creative
+artist.--By that time, tired, unprepared, in ruin as she was, she had
+rallied a little. When--on Ann Boleyn's hearing the coronation music
+of her rival, the heroine searches for her own crown on her
+brow--Madame Pasta turned in the direction of the festive sounds, the
+old irresistible charm broke out;--nay, even in the final song, with
+its _roulades_, and its scales of shakes, ascending by a semi-tone,
+the consummate vocalist and tragedian, able to combine form with
+meaning--the moment of the situation, with such personal and musical
+display as form an integral part of operatic art--was indicated: at
+least to the apprehension of a younger artist.--'You are right!' was
+Madame Viardot's quick and heartfelt response (her eyes were full of
+tears) to a friend beside her--'You are right! It is like the
+_Cenacolo_ of Da Vinci at Milan--a wreck of a picture, but the
+picture is the greatest picture in the world!'"
+
+The great Mme. Viardot herself, whose intractable voice and noble
+stage presence inevitably remind one of Mme. Pasta, took no chances
+with fate. The friend of Alfred de Musset, the model for George Sand's
+"Consuelo," the "creator" of Fides in _Le Prophete_, and the singer
+who, in the revival of _Orphee_ at the Theatre Lyrique in 1859,
+resuscitated Gluck's popularity in Paris, retired from the opera stage
+in 1863 at the age of 43, shortly after she had appeared in _Alceste!_
+(She sang in concert occasionally until 1870 or later.) Thereafter she
+divided her time principally between Baden and Paris and became the
+great friend of Turgeniev. His very delightful letters to her have
+been published. Idleness was abhorrent to this fine woman and in her
+middle and old age she gave lessons, while singers, composers, and
+conductors alike came to her for help and advice. She died in 1910 at
+the age of 89. Her less celebrated brother, Manuel Garcia (less
+celebrated as a singer; as a teacher he is given the credit for having
+restored Jenny Lind's voice. Among his other pupils Mathilde Marchesi
+and Marie Tempest may be mentioned), had died in 1906 at the age of
+101. Her sister, Mme. Malibran, died very young, in the early
+Nineteenth Century, before, in fact, Mme. Viardot had made her debut.
+
+Few singers have had the wisdom to follow Mme. Viardot's excellent
+example. The great Jenny Lind, long after her voice had lost its
+quality, continued to sing in oratorio and concert. So did Adelina
+Patti. Muriel Starr once told me of a parrot she encountered in
+Australia. The poor bird had arrived at the noble age of 117 and was
+entirely bereft of feathers. Flapping his stumpy wings he cried
+incessantly, "I'll fly, by God, I'll fly!" So, many singers, having
+lost their voices, continue to croak, "I'll sing, by God, I'll sing!"
+The Earl of Mount Edgcumbe, himself a man of considerable years when
+he published his highly diverting "Musical Reminiscences," gives us
+some extraordinary pictures of senility on the stage at the close of
+the Eighteenth Century. There was, for example, the case of Cecilia
+Davis, the first Englishwoman to sustain the part of prima donna and
+in that situation was second only to Gabrielli, whom she even rivalled
+in neatness of execution. Mount Edgcumbe found Miss Davies in
+Florence, unengaged and poor. A concert was arranged at which she
+appeared with her sister. Later she returned to England ... too old to
+secure an engagement. "This unfortunate woman is now (in 1834) living
+in London, in the extreme of old age, disease, and poverty," writes
+the Earl. He also speaks of a Signora Galli, of large and masculine
+figure and contralto voice, who frequently filled the part of second
+man at the Opera. She had been a principal singer in Handel's
+oratorios when conducted by himself. She afterwards fell into extreme
+poverty, and at the age of about seventy (!!!!), was induced to come
+forward to sing again at the oratorios. "I had the curiosity to go,
+and heard her sing _He was despised and rejected of men_ in _The
+Messiah_. Of course her voice was cracked and trembling, but it was
+easy to see her school was good; and it was a pleasure to observe the
+kindness with which she was received and listened to; and to mark the
+animation and delight with which she seemed to hear again the music in
+which she had formerly been a distinguished performer. The poor old
+woman had been in the habit of coming to me annually for a trifling
+present; and she told me on that occasion that nothing but the
+severest distress should have compelled her so to expose herself,
+which after all, did not answer to its end, as she was not paid
+according to her agreement. She died shortly after." In 1783 the Earl
+heard a singer named Allegranti in Dresden, then at the height of her
+powers. Later she returned to England and reappeared in Cimarosa's
+_Matrimonio Segreto_. "Never was there a more pitiable attempt: she
+had scarcely a thread of voice remaining, nor the power to sing a note
+in tune: her figure and acting were equally altered for the worse, and
+after a few nights she was obliged to retire and quit the stage
+altogether." The celebrated Madame Mara, after a long sojourn in
+Russia, suddenly returned to England and was announced for a benefit
+performance at the King's Theatre after everybody had forgotten her
+existence. "She must have been at least seventy; but it was said that
+her voice had miraculously returned, and was as good as ever. But when
+she displayed those wonderfully revived powers, they proved, as might
+have been expected, lamentably deficient, and the tones she produced
+were compared to those of a _penny trumpet_. Curiosity was so little
+excited that the concert was ill attended ... and Madame Mara was
+heard no more. I was not so lucky (or so unlucky) as to hear these her
+last notes, as it was early in the winter, and I was not in town. She
+returned to Russia, and was a great sufferer by the burning of Moscow.
+After that she lived at Mitlau, or some other town near the Baltic,
+where she died at a great age, not many years ago."
+
+Here is Michael Kelly's account of the same event: "With all her great
+skill and knowledge of the world, Madame Mara was induced, by the
+advice of some of her mistaken friends, to give a public concert at
+the King's Theatre, in her seventy-second year, when, in the course of
+nature her powers had failed her. It was truly grievous to see such
+transcendent talents as she once possessed, so sunk--so fallen. I used
+every effort in my power to prevent her committing herself, but in
+vain. Among other arguments to draw her from her purpose, I told her
+what happened to Monbelli, one of the first tenors of his day, who
+lost all his well-earned reputation and fame, by rashly performing the
+part of a lover, at the Pergola Theatre, at Florence, in his
+seventieth year, having totally lost his voice. On the stage, he was
+hissed; and the following lines, lampooning his attempt, were chalked
+on his house-door, as well as upon the walls of the city:--
+
+    _'All' eta di settanta
+      Non si ama, ne si canta.'"_
+
+W. T. Parke, forty years principal oboe player at Covent Garden
+Theatre, is kinder to Madame Mara in his "Musical Memoirs," but it
+must be taken into account that he is kinder to every one else, too.
+There is little of the acrimonious or the fault-finding note in his
+pages. This is his version of the affair: "That extraordinary singer
+of former days, Madame Mara, who had passed the last eighteen years in
+Russia, and who had lately arrived in England, gave a concert at the
+King's Theatre on the 6th of March (1820), which highly excited the
+curiosity of the musical public. On that occasion she sang some of her
+best airs; and though her powers were greatly inferior to what they
+were in her zenith, yet the same pure taste pervaded her performance.
+Whether vanity or interest stimulated Mara at her time of life to that
+undertaking, it would be difficult to determine; but whichsoever had
+the ascendency, her reign was short; for by singing one night
+afterwards at the vocal concert, the veil which had obscured her
+judgment was removed, and she retired to enjoy in private life those
+comforts which her rare talent had procured for her."
+
+Parke also speaks of a Mrs. Pinto, "the once celebrated Miss Brent,
+the original Mandane in Arne's _Artaxerxes_," who appeared in 1785 at
+the age of nearly seventy in Milton's _Mask of Comus_ at a benefit for
+a Mr. Hull, "the respectable stage-manager of Covent Garden Theatre."
+She was to sing the song of Sweet Echo and as Parke was to play the
+responses to her voice on the oboe he repaired to her house for
+rehearsal. "Although nearly seventy years old, her voice possessed the
+remains of those qualities for which it had been so much
+celebrated,--power, flexibility, and sweetness. On the night _Comus_
+was performed she sung with an unexpected degree of excellence, and
+was loudly applauded. This old lady, as a singer, gave me the idea of
+a fine piece of ruins, which though considerably dilapidated, still
+displayed some of its original beauties."
+
+The celebrated Faustina, whose quarrel with Cuzzoni is as famous in
+the history of music as the war between Gluck and Piccinni, was less
+daring. Dr. Burney visited her when she was seventy-two years old and
+asked her to sing. "Alas, I cannot," she replied, "I have lost all my
+faculties."
+
+La Camargo, the favourite dancer of Paris in the early Eighteenth
+Century, the inventor, indeed of the short ballet skirt, and the
+possessor of many lovers, retired from the stage in 1751 with a large
+fortune, besides a pension of fifteen hundred francs. Thenceforth she
+led a secluded life. She was an assiduous visitor to the poor of her
+parish and she kept a dozen dogs and an angora cat which she
+overwhelmed with affection. In that quaint book, "The Powder Puff," by
+Franz Blei, you may find a most charming description of a call paid to
+the lady in 1768 in her little old house in the Rue St. Thomas du
+Louvre, by Duclos, Grimm, and Helvetius, who had come in bantering
+mood to ask her whom, in her past life, she had loved best. Her reply
+touched these men, who took their leave. "Helvetius told Camargo's
+story to his wife; Grimm made a note of it for his Court Journal; and
+as for Duclos, it suggested some moral reflections to him, for when,
+two years later, Mlle. Marianne Camargo was carried to her grave, he
+remarked: 'It is quite fitting to give her a white pall like a
+virgin.'"
+
+Sophie Arnould, one of the most celebrated actresses and singers of
+the Eighteenth Century, died in poverty at the age of 63 and there is
+no record of her burial place. She had been the friend of Voltaire,
+Rousseau, d'Alembert, Diderot, Helvetius, and the Baron d'Holbach. She
+had "created" Gluck's _Iphigenie en Aulide_ and the composer had said
+of her, "If it had not been for the voice and elocution of Mlle.
+Arnould, my _Iphigenie_ would never have been performed in France." In
+her youth she had interested not only Marie Antoinette but also the
+King, and she had been the object of Mme. de Pompadour's suspicion
+and Mme. du Barry's rage. Garrick declared her a better actress than
+Clairon. She was as famous for her wit as for her singing and acting.
+When Mme. Laguerre appeared drunk in _Iphigenie en Tauride_ she
+exclaimed, "Why this is _Iphigenie en Champagne_!" Indeed, she made so
+many remarks worthy of preservation that shortly after her death in
+1802, a book called "Arnoldiana," devoted to her epigrams, was
+issued.... Nevertheless, this lady was hissed at the age of 36, when,
+after a short absence from the stage she reappeared as Iphigenie in
+1776. She was neither old nor ugly and if her voice may have lost
+something her nineteen years of stage life in Paris might have weighed
+against that. On one occasion, according to La Harpe, when she had the
+line to sing, "You long for me to be gone," the audience applauded
+vociferously. To protect Sophie, Marie Antoinette sat in a box on
+several nights and stemmed the storm of disapproval, but in the end
+even the presence of the queen herself was insufficient to quell the
+hissing. One sad story completes the picture. In 1785, when her
+financial troubles were beginning, her two sons, who bore her no love,
+called for money. She had none to give them. "There are two horses
+left in the stable," she said. "Take those." They rode away on the
+horses.
+
+Latin audiences are notoriously unfaithful to their stage favourites.
+In "The Innocents Abroad" Mark Twain tells us of the bad manners of an
+Italian audience. The singer he mentions is Erminia Frezzolini, born
+at Orvieto in 1818. She sang both in England and America. Chorley said
+of her: "She was an elegant, tall woman, born with a lovely voice, and
+bred with great vocal skill (of a certain order); but she was the
+first who arrived of the 'young Italians'--of those who fancy that
+driving the voice to its extremities can stand in the stead of
+passion. But she was, nevertheless, a real singer, and her art stood
+her in stead for some years after nature broke down. When she had left
+her scarce a note of her rich and real soprano voice to scream with,
+Madame Frezzolini was still charming." She died in Paris, November 5,
+1884. Now for Mark Twain:
+
+"I said I knew nothing against the upper classes from personal
+observation. I must recall it. I had forgotten. What I saw their
+bravest and their fairest do last night, the lowest multitude that
+could be scraped out of the purlieus of Christendom would blush to do,
+I think. They assembled by hundreds, and even thousands, in the great
+Theatre of San Carlo to do--what? Why simply to make fun of an old
+woman--to deride, to hiss, to jeer at an actress they once worshipped,
+but whose beauty is faded now, and whose voice has lost its former
+richness. Everybody spoke of the rare sport there was to be. They said
+the theatre would be crammed because Frezzolini was going to sing. It
+was said she could not sing well now, but then the people liked to see
+her, anyhow. And so we went. And every time the woman sang they hissed
+and laughed--the whole magnificent house--and as soon as she left the
+stage they called her on again with applause. Once or twice she was
+encored five and six times in succession, and received with hisses
+when she appeared, and discharged with hisses and laughter when she
+had finished--then instantly encored and insulted again! And how the
+high-born knaves enjoyed it! White-kidded gentlemen and ladies laughed
+till the tears came, and clapped their hands in very ecstasy when that
+unhappy old woman would come meekly out for the sixth time, with
+uncomplaining patience, to meet a storm of hisses! It was the
+cruellest exhibition--the most wanton, the most unfeeling. The singer
+would have conquered an audience of American rowdies by her brave,
+unflinching tranquillity (for she answered encore after encore, and
+smiled and bowed pleasantly, and sang the best she possibly could, and
+went bowing off, through all the jeers and hisses, without ever losing
+countenance or temper); and surely in any other land than Italy her
+sex and her helplessness must have been an ample protection for
+her--she could have needed no other. Think what a multitude of small
+souls were crowded into that theatre last night!"
+
+English audiences, on the other hand, are notoriously friendly to
+their old favourites. When Dr. Hanslick, the Viennese critic, visited
+England and heard Sims Reeves singing before crowded houses as he had
+been doing for forty or fifty years, he remarked, "It is not easy to
+win the favour of the English public; to lose it is quite impossible."
+
+Mme. Grisi made her last appearance in London in 1866 at the theatre
+she had left twenty years previously, Her Majesty's. The opera was
+_Lucrezia Borgia_. At the end of the first act she miscalculated the
+depth of the apron and the descending curtain left her outside on her
+knees. She had stiffness in her joints and was unable to rise without
+assistance.... This situation must have been very embarassing to a
+singer who previously had been an idol of the public. In the
+passionate duet with the tenor she made an unsuccessful attempt to
+reach the A natural. Notwithstanding the fact that she was well
+received and that she got through with the greater part of the opera
+with credit, her impressario, J. H. Mapleson, relates in his "Memoirs"
+that after the final curtain had fallen she rushed to tell him that it
+was all over and that she would never appear again. In "Student and
+Singer" Charles Santley writes of the occasion: "I had been singing at
+the Crystal Palace concert in the afternoon, and after dining there I
+went up to the theatre to see a little of the performance. I felt very
+sorry for Grisi that she had been induced to appear again; it was a
+sad sight for any one who had known her in her prime, and even long
+past it."
+
+However, even English audiences can be cold. John E. Cox, in his
+"Musical Recollections," recalls an earlier occasion when Grisi sang
+at the Crystal Palace without much success (July 31, 1861): "On
+retiring from the orchestra, after a peculiarly cold reception--as
+unkind as it was inconsiderate, seeing what the career of this
+remarkable woman had been--there was not a single person at the foot
+of the orchestra to receive or to accompany her to her retiring room!
+I could imagine what her feelings at that moment must have been--she
+who had in former years been accustomed to be thronged, wherever she
+appeared, and to be the recipient of adulation--often as exaggerated
+as it was fulsome--but who was now literally deserted. With
+Grisi--although I had been once or twice introduced to her--I never
+had any personal acquaintance. I could not, however, resist the
+impulse of preceding her, without obtruding myself on her notice, and
+opening the door of the retiring room for her, which was situated at
+some considerable distance from the orchestra. Her look as I did this,
+and she passed out of sight, is amongst the most painful of my
+'Recollections.'"
+
+German audiences are usually kind to their favourites. In America we
+adopt neither the attitude of the English and Germans, nor yet that of
+the Italians and French. We simply stay away from the theatre. Mark
+Twain has put it succinctly, "When a singer has lost his voice and a
+jumper his legs, those parties fail to draw."
+
+Benjamin Lumley in his "Reminiscences of the Opera," quoting an
+anonymous friend, relates a touching story regarding Catalani, who was
+born in 1779 and who retired from the stage in 1831. When Jenny Lind
+visited Paris in the spring of 1849 she learned to her astonishment
+that Catalani was in the French capital. The old singer, who resided
+habitually in Florence, had come to Paris with her daughter who, as
+the widow of a Frenchman, was obliged to go through certain legal
+forms before taking possession of her share of her husband's property.
+Through a friend of both ladies it was arranged that the two should
+meet at a dinner at the home of the Marquis of Normansby, the English
+ambassador to the Tuscan court, but the Swedish singer could not
+restrain her impatience and before that event she set out one forenoon
+for Mme. Catalani's apartment in the Rue de la Paix and sent in her
+name by a servant. The old singer hastened out to greet her
+distinguished visitor with obvious delight. She had known nothing of
+Mlle. Lind's presence in Paris and had feared that such a chance would
+never befall her, much as she had longed to see the celebrated singer
+who had excited the English public in a way which recalled her own
+past triumphs and who rivalled her in her purity and her charity. They
+talked together for an hour.... At the dinner the Marchioness of
+Normansby considerately refrained from asking Jenny Lind to sing,
+because no one is allowed to refuse such an invitation made by a
+representative of royalty. Catalani, however, had no such scruples.
+She went up to the Nightingale and begged her to sing, adding,
+"_C'est la vieille Catalini qui desire vous entendre chanter, avant de
+mourir!_" This appeal was irresistible. Jenny Lind sat down to the
+piano and sang _Non credea mirarti_ and one or two other airs,
+including _Ah! non giunge_. Catalani is described as sitting on an
+ottoman in the centre of the room, rocking her body to and fro with
+delight and sympathy, murmuring, "_Ah la bella cosa che la musica,
+quando si fa di quella maniera!_" and again "_Ah! la carissima! quanto
+bellissima!_" A dinner at Catalani's apartment followed, but a few
+days later it became known that the old singer was ill, an illness
+which proved fatal. She had, however, heard the Swedish Nightingale
+sing "_avant de mourir_."
+
+William Gardiner visited Madame Catalani in 1846. "I was surprised at
+the vigour of Madame Catalani," he says, "and how little she has
+altered since I saw her in Derby in 1828. I paid her a compliment on
+her good looks. 'Ah,' said she, 'I'm sixty-six!' She has lost none of
+that commanding expression which gave her such dignity on the stage.
+She is without a wrinkle, and appears to be no more than forty. Her
+breadth of chest is still remarkable: it is this which endowed her
+with the finest voice that ever sang. Her speaking voice and dramatic
+air are still charming, and not in the least impaired."
+
+Is Christine Nilsson still alive? I think so. She was born August 20,
+1843. In Clara Louise Kellogg's very entertaining, but not always
+trustworthy, "Memoirs" there is an interesting reference to this
+singer in her later career. Dates, unfortunately, are not furnished.
+"I was present," declares Mme. Kellogg, "on the night ... when she
+practically murdered the high register of her voice. She had five
+upper notes the quality of which was unlike any other I ever heard and
+that possessed a peculiar charm. The tragedy happened during a
+performance of _The Magic Flute_ in London.... Nilsson was the Queen
+of the Night, one of her most successful early roles. The second aria
+in _The Magic Flute_ is more famous and less difficult than the first
+aria, and also, more effective. Nilsson knew well the ineffectiveness
+of the ending of the first aria in the two weakest notes of a
+soprano's voice, A natural and B flat. I never could understand why a
+master like Mozart should have chosen to use them as he did. There is
+no climax to the song. One has to climb up hard and fast and then stop
+short in the middle. It is an appalling thing to do and that night
+Nilsson took those two notes at the last in _chest tones_. 'Great
+heavens!' I gasped, 'what is she doing? What is the woman thinking
+of!' Of course I knew she was doing it to get volume and vibration and
+to give that trying climax some character. But to say that it was a
+fatal attempt is to put it mildly. She absolutely killed a certain
+quality in her voice there and then and she _never recovered it_. Even
+that night she had to cut out the second great aria. Her beautiful
+high notes were gone forever." As I have said, the date of this
+incident, which, so far as I know, is not recorded elsewhere, is not
+mentioned, but Christine Nilsson sang in New York in the early
+Eighties and continued to sing until 1891, the year of her final
+appearance in London.
+
+Adelina Patti, born the same year as Nilsson but six months before
+(February 10, 1843; according to some records, which by no means go
+undisputed, a quartet of famous singers came into the world this year.
+The other two were Ilma de Murska and Pauline Lucca) made many
+farewell tours of this country ... one too many in 1903-4, when she
+displayed the _beaux restes_ of her voice. She is living at present in
+retirement at Craig-y-Nos in Wales. Her greatest rival, Etelka
+Gerster, too, is alive, I believe.
+
+Lilli Lehmann, one of the oldest of the living great singers, was
+born May 13, 1848. She was a member of the famous casts which
+introduced many of the Wagner works to New York. Her last appearances
+in opera here were made, I think, in the late Nineties, but she has
+sung here since in concert and in Germany she has frequently assisted
+at the performances of the Mozart festivals at Salzburg and has even
+sung in _Norma_ and _Gotterdammerung_ within recent years! Her head is
+now crowned with white hair and her noble appearance and magnificent
+style in singing have doubtless stood her in good stead at these
+belated performances, which probably were disappointing, judged as
+vocal exhibitions.
+
+Lillian Nordica had a long career. She was born May 12, 1859, and made
+her operatic debut in Brescia in _La Traviata_ in 1879. She continued
+to sing up to the time of her death in Batavia, Java, May 10, 1914.
+Indeed she was then undertaking a concert tour of the world at the age
+of 55! But the artist, who in the Nineties had held the Metropolitan
+Opera House stage with honour in the great dramatic roles, had very
+little to offer in her last years. Never a great musician, defects in
+style began to make themselves evident as her vocal powers decreased.
+Her season at the Manhattan Opera House in 1907-8 was quickly and
+unpleasantly terminated. A subsequent single appearance as Isolde at
+the Metropolitan in the winter of 1909-10 was even less successful.
+The voice had lost its resonance, the singer her appeal. Her
+magnificent courage and indomitable ambition urged her on to the end.
+
+Two singers whose voices have been miraculously preserved, who have
+indeed suffered little from the ravages of time, are Marcella Sembrich
+and Nellie Melba. Both of these singers, however, have consistently
+refrained from misusing their voices (if one may except the one
+occasion on which Mme. Melba attempted to sing Brunnhilde in
+_Siegfried_ with disastrous results). Mme. Melba (according to Grove's
+Dictionary, which, like all other books devoted to the subject of
+music, is frequently inaccurate) was born in Australia, May 19, 1859.
+Therefore she was 28 years old when she made her debut in Brussels as
+Gilda on October 12, 1887. She has used her voice carefully and well
+and still sings in concert and opera at the age of 59. With the
+advance of age, indeed, her voice began to take on colour. When she
+sang here in opera at the Manhattan Opera House in 1906-7 she was in
+her best vocal estate. Her voice, originally rather pale, had become
+mellow and rich, although it is possible it had lost some of its old
+remarkable agility. When last I listened to her in concert, a few
+years ago at the Hippodrome, it seemed to me that I had never before
+heard so beautiful a voice, and yet Mme. Melba sang in the first
+performance of opera I ever attended (Chicago Auditorium; _Faust_,
+February 22, 1899).
+
+According to H. T. Finck, Caruso once said, "When you hear that an
+artist is going to retire, don't you believe it, for as long as he
+keeps his voice he will sing. You may depend upon that." Sometimes,
+indeed, longer. Mme. Melba made a belated and unfortunate attempt to
+sing Marguerite in _Faust_ with the Chicago Opera Company, Monday
+evening, February 4, 1918, at the Lexington Theatre, New York. She
+sang with some art and style; her tone was still pure and her
+wonderful enunciation still remained a feature of her performance but
+scarcely a shadow of the beautiful voice I can remember so well was
+left. As if to atone for vocal deficiencies the singer made histrionic
+efforts such as she had never deemed necessary during the height of
+her career. Her meeting with Faust in the Kermesse scene was
+accomplished with modesty that almost became fright. She nearly danced
+the jewel song and embraced the tenor with passion in the love duet.
+In the church scene, overcome with terror at the sight of
+Mephistopheles, she flung her prayer book across the stage.... Her
+appearance was almost shocking and the first lines of the part of
+Marguerite, "_Non monsieur, je ne suis demoiselle, ni belle_" had a
+merciless application. However, the audience received her with
+kindness, more with a certain sort of enthusiasm. She reappeared again
+in the same opera on Thursday evening, February 14, 1918, but on this
+occasion I did not hear her.
+
+Marcella Sembrich was born February 15, 1858. She made her debut in
+Athens in _I Puritani_, June 8, 1877, and she made her New York debut
+in _Lucia_ October 24, 1883, at the beginning of the first season of
+the Metropolitan Opera House. After a long absence she returned to New
+York in 1898 as Rosina in _Il Barbiere_. After that year she sang
+pretty steadily at the Metropolitan until February 6, 1909, when, at
+the age of 51 (or lacking nine days of it), she bid farewell to the
+New York opera stage in acts from several of her favourite operas. She
+subsequently sang in a few performances of opera in Europe and was
+heard in song recital in America. When she left the opera house she
+had no rival in vocal artistry; and she had so satisfactorily solved
+the problems of style in singing certain kinds of songs that she also
+surveyed the field of song recital from a mountain top.... But such a
+singer as Mme. Sembrich, who made her appeal through the expression of
+the milder emotions, who never, indeed, attempted to touch dramatic
+depths, even style, in the end, will not assist. Magnificent Lilli
+Lehmann might make a certain effect in _Gotterdammerung_ so long as
+she had a leg to stand on or a note to croak, but an adequate delivery
+of _Der Nussbaum_ or _Wie Melodien_ demands a vocal control which a
+singer past middle age is not always sure of possessing.... After a
+long retirement, Mme. Sembrich gave a concert at Carnegie Hall,
+November 21, 1915. The house was crowded and the applause at the
+beginning must almost have unnerved the singer, who walked slowly
+towards the front of the platform as the storm burst and then bowed
+her head again and again. Her program on this occasion was not one of
+her best. She had not chosen familiar songs in which to return to her
+public. This may in a measure account for her lack of success in
+always calling forth steady tones. However, on the whole, her voice
+sounded amazingly fresh. Her high notes especially rang true and
+resonant as ever. Her middle voice showed wear. Her style remained
+impeccable, unrivalled.... She announced, following this concert, a
+series of four recitals in a small hall and actually appeared at one
+of them. This time I did not hear her, but I am told that her voice
+refused to respond to her wishes. Nor was the hall filled. The
+remaining concerts were abandoned. "Mme. Sembrich has never been a
+failure and she is too old to begin now!" she is reported to have said
+to a friend.
+
+Emma Calve's date of birth is recorded as 1864 in some of the musical
+dictionaries. This would make her 53 years old. Her singing of the
+_Marseillaise_ a year ago at the Allies Bazaar at the Grand Central
+Palace proved to me that her retirement from the Opera was premature.
+Her performances at the Manhattan Opera House in 1906-7 were
+memorable, vocally superb. Her Carmen was out of drawing dramatically,
+but her Anita and her Santuzza remained triumphs of stage craft.
+
+Emma Eames, born August 13, 1867, is three years younger than Mme.
+Calve. She made her debut as Juliette, March 13, 1889. She retired
+from the opera stage in 1907-8, although she has sung since then a few
+times in concert. Her last appearances at the Opera were made in
+dramatic roles, Donna Anna, Leonora (in _Trovatore_), and Tosca, in
+contradistinction to the lyric parts in which she gained her early
+fame. That she was entirely successful in compassing the breach cannot
+be said in all justice. Yet there was a certain distinction in her
+manner, a certain acid quality in her voice, that gave force to these
+characterizations. Certainly, however, no one would ever have compared
+her Donna Anna favourably with her Countess in _Figaro_. Her
+performance of _Or sai chi l'onore_ was deficient in breadth of style
+and her lack of breath control at this period gave uncertainty to her
+execution.
+
+Life teaches us, through experience, that no rule is infallible, but
+insofar as I am able to give a meaning to these rambling biographical
+notes, collected, I may as well admit, more to interest my reader than
+to prove anything, it is the meaning, sounded with a high note of
+truth, by Arthur Symons, in the paragraph quoted at the beginning of
+this essay. Style is a rare quality in a singer. With it in his
+possession an artist may dare much for a long time. Without it he
+exists as long as those qualities which are perfectly natural to him
+exist. A voice fades, but a manner of applying that voice (even when
+there is practically no voice to apply) to an artistic problem has an
+indefinite term of life.
+
+Yvette Guilbert once told me that crossing the Atlantic with Duse on
+one occasion she had asked the Italian actress if she were going to
+include _La Dame aux Camelias_ in her American repertory. "I am too
+old to play Marguerite ..." was the sad response. "She was right,"
+said Guilbert, in relating the incident, "she was too old; she was
+born too old ... in spirit. Now when I am sixty-three I shall begin to
+impersonate children. I grow younger every year!"
+
+  _September 12, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+Impressions in the Theatre
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+The Land of Joy
+
+     _"Dancing is something more than an amusement in Spain. It
+     is part of that solemn ritual which enters into the whole
+     life of the people. It expresses their very spirit."_
+
+                        Havelock Ellis.
+
+
+An idle observer of theatrical conditions might derive a certain
+ironic pleasure from remarking the contradiction implied in the
+professed admiration of the constables of the playhouse for the
+unconventional and their almost passionate adoration for the
+conventional. We constantly hear it said that the public cries for
+novelty, and just as constantly we see the same kind of acting, the
+same gestures, the same Julian Mitchellisms and George Marionisms and
+Ned Wayburnisms repeated in and out of season, summer and winter.
+Indeed, certain conventions (which bore us even now) are so deeply
+rooted in the soil of our theatre that I see no hope of their being
+eradicated before the year 1999, at which date other conventions will
+have supplanted them and will likewise have become tiresome.
+
+In this respect our theatre does not differ materially from the
+theatres of other countries except in one particular. In Europe the
+juxtaposition of nations makes an interchange of conventions possible,
+which brings about slow change or rapid revolution. Paris, for
+example, has received visits from the Russian Ballet which almost
+assumed the proportions of Tartar invasions. London, too, has been
+invaded by the Russians and by the Irish. The Irish playwrights,
+indeed, are continually pounding away at British middle-class
+complacency. Germany, in turn, has been invaded by England (we regret
+that this sentence has only an artistic and figurative significance),
+and we find Max Reinhardt well on his way toward giving a complete
+cycle of the plays of Shakespeare; a few years ago we might have
+observed Deutschland groveling hysterically before Oscar Wilde's
+_Salome_, a play which, at least without its musical dress, has not, I
+believe, even yet been performed publicly in London. In Italy, of
+course, there are no artistic invasions (nobody cares to pay for them)
+and even the conventions of the Italian theatre themselves, such as
+the _Commedia del' Arte_, are quite dead; so the country remains as
+dormant, artistically speaking, as a rag rug, until an enthusiast like
+Marinetti arises to take it between his teeth and shake it back into
+rags again.
+
+Very often whisperings of art life in the foreign theatre (such as
+accounts of Stanislavski's accomplishments in Moscow) cross the
+Atlantic. Very often the husks of the realities (as was the case with
+the Russian Ballet) are imported. But whispers and husks have about as
+much influence as the "New York Times" in a mayoralty campaign, and as
+a result we find the American theatre as little aware of world
+activities in the drama as a deaf mute living on a pole in the desert
+of Sahara would be. Indeed any intrepid foreign investigator who
+wishes to study the American drama, American acting, and American
+stage decoration will find them in almost as virgin a condition as
+they were in the time of Lincoln.
+
+A few rude assaults have been made on this smug eupepsy. I might
+mention the coming of Paul Orleneff, who left Alla Nazimova with us to
+be eventually swallowed up in the conventional American theatre. Four
+or five years ago a company of Negro players at the Lafayette Theatre
+gave a performance of a musical revue that boomed like the big bell in
+the Kremlin at Moscow. Nobody could be deaf to the sounds. Florenz
+Ziegfeld took over as many of the tunes and gestures as he could buy
+for his _Follies_ of that season, but he neglected to import the one
+essential quality of the entertainment, its style, for the
+exploitation of which Negro players were indispensable. For the past
+two months Mimi Aguglia, one of the greatest actresses of the world,
+has been performing in a succession of classic and modern plays (a
+repertory comprising dramas by Shakespeare, d'Annunzio, and Giacosa)
+at the Garibaldi Theatre, on East Fourth Street, before very large and
+very enthusiastic audiences, but uptown culture and managerial acumen
+will not awaken to the importance of this gesture until they read
+about it in some book published in 1950....
+
+All of which is merely by way of prelude to what I feel must be
+something in the nature of lyric outburst and verbal explosion. A few
+nights ago a Spanish company, unheralded, unsung, indeed almost
+unwelcomed by such reviewers as had to trudge to the out-of-the-way
+Park Theatre, came to New York, in a musical revue entitled _The Land
+of Joy_. The score was written by Joaquin Valverde, _fils_, whose
+music is not unknown to us, and the company included La Argentina, a
+Spanish dancer who had given matinees here in a past season without
+arousing more than mild enthusiasm. The theatrical impressarii, the
+song publishers, and the Broadway rabble stayed away on the first
+night. It was all very well, they might have reasoned, to read about
+the goings on in Spain, but they would never do in America. Spanish
+dancers had been imported in the past without awakening undue
+excitement. Did not the great Carmencita herself visit America twenty
+or more years ago? These impressarii had ignored the existence of a
+great psychological (or more properly physiological) truth: you cannot
+mix Burgundy and Beer! One Spanish dancer surrounded by Americans is
+just as much lost as the great Nijinsky himself was in an English
+music hall, where he made a complete and dismal failure. And so they
+would have been very much astonished (had they been present) on the
+opening night to have witnessed all the scenes of uncontrollable
+enthusiasm--just as they are described by Havelock Ellis, Richard
+Ford, and Chabrier--repeated. The audience, indeed, became hysterical,
+and broke into wild cries of _Ole! Ole!_ Hats were thrown on the
+stage. The audience became as abandoned as the players, became a part
+of the action.
+
+You will find all this described in "The Soul of Spain," in
+"Gatherings from Spain," in Chabrier's letters, and it had all been
+transplanted to New York almost without a whisper of preparation,
+which is fortunate, for if it had been expected, doubtless we would
+have found the way to spoil it. Fancy the average New York first-night
+audience, stiff and unbending, sceptical and sardonic, welcoming this
+exhibition! Havelock Ellis gives an ingenious explanation for the fact
+that Spanish dancing has seldom if ever successfully crossed the
+border of the Iberian peninsula: "The finest Spanish dancing is at
+once killed or degraded by the presence of an indifferent or
+unsympathetic public, and that is probably why it cannot be
+transplanted, but remains local." Fortunately the Spaniards in the
+first-night audience gave the cue, unlocked the lips and loosened the
+hands of us cold Americans. For my part, I was soon yelling _Ole!_
+louder than anybody else.
+
+The dancer, Doloretes, is indeed extraordinary. The gipsy fascination,
+the abandoned, perverse bewitchery of this female devil of the dance
+is not to be described by mouth, typewriter, or quilled pen. Heine
+would have put her at the head of his dancing temptresses in his
+ballet of _Mephistophela_ (found by Lumley too indecent for
+representation at Her Majesty's Theatre, for which it was written; in
+spite of which the scenario was published in the respectable "Revue de
+Deux Mondes"). In this ballet a series of dancing celebrities are
+exhibited by the female Mephistopheles for the entertainment of her
+victim. After Salome had twisted her flanks and exploited the prowess
+of her abdominal muscles to perfunctory applause, Doloretes would have
+heated the blood, not only of Faust, but of the ladies and gentlemen
+in the orchestra stalls, with the clicking of her heels, the clacking
+of her castanets, now held high over head, now held low behind her
+back, the flashing of her ivory teeth, the shrill screaming, electric
+magenta of her smile, the wile of her wriggle, the passion of her
+performance. And close beside her the sinuous Mazantinita would flaunt
+a garish tambourine and wave a shrieking fan. All inanimate objects,
+shawls, mantillas, combs, and cymbals, become inflamed with life, once
+they are pressed into the service of these senoritas, languorous and
+forbidding, indifferent and sensuous. Against these rude gipsies the
+refined grace and Goyaesque elegance of La Argentina stand forth in
+high relief, La Argentina, in whose hands the castanets become as
+potent an instrument for our pleasure as the violin does in the
+fingers of Jascha Heifetz. Bilbao, too, with his thundering heels and
+his tauromachian gestures, bewilders our highly magnetized senses.
+When, in the dance, he pursues, without catching, the elusive
+Doloretes, it would seem that the limit of dynamic effects in the
+theatre had been reached.
+
+Here are singers! The limpid and lovely soprano of the comparatively
+placid Maria Marco, who introduces figurations into the brilliant
+music she sings at every turn. One indecent (there is no other word
+for it) chromatic oriental phrase is so strange that none of us can
+ever recall it or forget it! And the frantically nervous Luisita
+Puchol, whose eyelids spring open like the cover of a Jack-in-the-box,
+and whose hands flutter like saucy butterflies, sings suggestive
+popular ditties just a shade better than any one else I know of.
+
+But _The Land of Joy_ does not rely on one or two principals for its
+effect. The organization as a whole is as full of fire and purpose as
+the original Russian Ballet; the costumes themselves, in their
+blazing, heated colours, constitute the ingredients of an orgy; the
+music, now sentimental (the adaptability of Valverde, who has lived in
+Paris, is little short of amazing; there is a vocal waltz in the style
+of Arditi that Mme. Patti might have introduced into the lesson scene
+of _Il Barbiere_; there is another song in the style of George M.
+Cohan--these by way of contrast to the Iberian music), now pulsing
+with rhythmic life, is the best Spanish music we have yet heard in
+this country. The whole entertainment, music, colours, costumes,
+songs, dances, and all, is as nicely arranged in its crescendos and
+decrescendos, its prestos and adagios as a Mozart finale. The close of
+the first act, in which the ladies sweep the stage with long ruffled
+trains, suggestive of all the Manet pictures you have ever seen, would
+seem to be unapproachable, but the most striking costumes and the
+wildest dancing are reserved for the very last scene of all. There
+these bewildering senoritas come forth in the splendourous envelope of
+embroidered Manila shawls, and such shawls! Prehistoric African roses
+of unbelievable measure decorate a texture of turquoise, from which
+depends nearly a yard of silken fringe. In others mingle royal purple
+and buff, orange and white, black and the kaleidoscope! The revue, a
+sublimated form of zarzuela, is calculated, indeed, to hold you in a
+dangerous state of nervous excitement during the entire evening, to
+keep you awake for the rest of the night, and to entice you to the
+theatre the next night and the next. It is as intoxicating as vodka,
+as insidious as cocaine, and it is likely to become a habit, like
+these stimulants. I have found, indeed, that it appeals to all classes
+of taste, from that of a telephone operator, whose usual artistic
+debauch is the latest antipyretic novel of Robert W. Chambers, to that
+of the frequenter of the concert halls.
+
+I cannot resist further cataloguing; details shake their fists at my
+memory; for instance, the intricate rhythms of Valverde's elaborately
+syncopated music (not at all like ragtime syncopation), the thrilling
+orchestration (I remember one dance which is accompanied by drum taps
+and oboe, nothing else!), the utter absence of tangos (which are
+Argentine), and habaneras (which are Cuban), most of the music being
+written in two-four and three-four time, and the interesting use of
+folk-tunes; the casual and very suggestive indifference of the
+dancers, while they are not dancing, seemingly models for a dozen
+Zuloaga paintings, the apparently inexhaustible skill and variety of
+these dancers in action, winding ornaments around the melodies with
+their feet and bodies and arms and heads and castanets as coloratura
+sopranos do with their voices. Sometimes castanets are not used;
+cymbals supplant them, or tambourines, or even fingers. Once, by some
+esoteric witchcraft, the dancers seemed to tap upon their arms. The
+effect was so stupendous and terrifying that I could not project
+myself into that aloof state of mind necessary for a calm dissection
+of its technique.
+
+What we have been thinking of all these years in accepting the
+imitation and ignoring the actuality I don't know; it has all been
+down in black and white. What Richard Ford saw and wrote down in 1846
+I am seeing and writing down in 1917. How these devilish Spaniards
+have been able to keep it up all this time I can't imagine. Here we
+have our paradox. Spain has changed so little that Ford's book is
+still the best to be procured on the subject (you may spend many a
+delightful half-hour with the charming irony of its pages for
+company). Spanish dancing is apparently what it was a hundred years
+ago; no wind from the north has disturbed it. Stranger still, it
+depends for its effect on the acquirement of a brilliant technique.
+Merely to play the castanets requires a severe tutelage. And yet it is
+all as spontaneous, as fresh, as unstudied, as vehement in its appeal,
+even to Spaniards, as it was in the beginning. Let us hope that Spain
+will have no artistic reawakening.
+
+Aristotle and Havelock Ellis and Louis Sherwin have taught us that the
+theatre should be an outlet for suppressed desires. So, indeed, the
+ideal theatre should. As a matter of fact, in most playhouses (I will
+generously refrain from naming the one I visited yesterday) I am
+continually suppressing a desire to strangle somebody or other, but
+after a visit to the Spaniards I walk out into Columbus Circle
+completely purged of pity and fear, love, hate, and all the rest. It
+is an experience.
+
+  _November 3, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+A Note on Mimi Aguglia
+
+     _"Art has to do only with the creation of beauty, whether it
+     be in words, or sounds, or colour, or outline, or rhythmical
+     movement; and the man who writes music is no more truly an
+     artist than the man who plays that music, the poet who
+     composes rhythms in words no more truly an artist than the
+     dancer who composes rhythms with the body, and the one is no
+     more to be preferred to the other, than the painter is to be
+     preferred to the sculptor, or the musician to the poet, in
+     those forms of art which we have agreed to recognize as of
+     equal value."_
+
+                        Arthur Symons.
+
+
+The only George Jean, "witty, wise, and cruel," and the "amaranthine"
+Louis Sherwin, who understands better than anybody else how to plunge
+the rapier into the vulnerable spot and twist it in the wound, making
+the victim writhe, have been having some fun with the art of acting
+lately, or to be exact, with the art of actors. Now actor-baiting is
+no new game; as a winter sport it is as popular as making jokes about
+mothers-in-law, decrying the art of Bouguereau or Howard Chandler
+Christy, or discussing the methods of Mr. Belasco. Ever so long ago
+(and George Henry Lewes preceded him) George Moore wrote an article
+called "Mummer Worship," holding the players up to ridicule, but
+George really adores the theatre and even acting, goes to the
+playhouse constantly, and writes a bad play himself every few years.
+None of these has achieved success on the stage. The list includes
+_Martin Luther_, written with a collaborator, _The Strike at
+Arlingford_, _The Bending of the Bough_ (Moore's version of a play by
+Edwin Martyn), a dramatization of "Esther Waters," _Elizabeth Cooper_,
+and the fragment, _The Apostle_, on which "The Brook Kerith," was
+based. Now he is at work turning the novel back into another play....
+When the Sunday editor of a newspaper is at his wit's end he
+invariably sends a competent reporter to collect data for a symposium
+on one of two topics, Is the author or the player more important? or
+Does the stage director make the actor? The amount of amusement this
+reporter can derive in gathering indignant replies from mountebanks
+and scribblers is only limited by his own sense of humour. Even the
+late Sir Henry Irving felt compelled on more than one occasion to
+defend his "noble calling."
+
+The actor, when he slaps back, usually overlooks the point at issue,
+but sometimes he has something to say over which we may well ponder.
+Witness, for example, the following passage, quoted from that justly
+celebrated compendium of personal opinions and broad-shaft wit called
+"Nat Goodwin's Book": "The average author and manager of today are
+prone to advertise themselves as conspicuously as the play (as if the
+public cared a snap who wrote the play or who 'presents'). I doubt if
+five per cent of the public know who wrote 'The Second Mrs.
+Tanqueray,' 'In Mizzoura,' or 'Richelieu,' but they know their stage
+favourites. I wonder how many mantels are adorned with pictures of the
+successful dramatist and those who 'present' and how many there are on
+which appear Maude Adams, Dave Warfield, Billie Burke, John Drew,
+Bernhardt, Duse, and hundreds of other distinguished players."
+
+It is principally urged against the claims of acting as an art that a
+young person without previous experience or training can make an
+immediate (and sometimes lasting) effect upon the stage, whereas in
+the preparation for any other art (even the interpretative arts) years
+of training are necessary. This premise is full of holes; nevertheless
+George Moore, and Messrs. Nathan and Sherwin all cling to it. It is
+true that almost any young girl, moderately gifted with charm or
+comeliness, may make an instantaneous impression on our stage,
+especially in the namby-pamby roles which our playwrights usually give
+her to play. But she is soon found out. She may still attract
+audiences (as George Barr McCutcheon and Alma Tadema still attract
+audiences) but the discerning part of the public will take no joy in
+seeing her. Charles Frohman said (and he ought to know) that the
+average life of a female star on the American stage was ten years; in
+other words, her career continued as long as her youth and physical
+charms remained potent.
+
+We have easily accounted for the unimportant actors, the rank and
+file, but what about those who immediately claim positions which they
+hold in spite of their lack of previous training? These are rarer. At
+the moment, indeed, I cannot think of any. For while genius often
+manifests itself early in a career, the great actors, as a rule, have
+struggled for many years to learn the rudiments of their art before
+they have given indisputable proof of their greatness, or before they
+have been recognized. "Real acting," according to Percy Fitzgerald,
+"is a science, to be studied and mastered, as other sciences are
+studied and mastered, by long years of training." They may not have
+had the strenuous Conservatoire and Theatre Francais training of Sarah
+Bernhardt. As a matter of fact, indeed, the actor may far better learn
+to handle his tools by manipulating them before an audience, than by
+practicing with them for too long a time in the closet. The technique
+of violin playing can best be acquired before the _virtuoso_ appears
+in public, although no amount of training in itself will make a great
+violinist, but the basic elements of acting, grace, diction, etc., can
+just as well be acquired behind the footlights and so many great
+actors have acquired them, as many of the greatest have ignored them.
+There can be no hard and fast rules laid down for this sort of thing.
+Can we thank nine months with Mme. Marchesi for the instantaneous
+success and subsequent brilliant career of Mme. Melba? Against this
+training offset the years and years of road playing and the more years
+of study at home in retirement to account for the career of Mrs.
+Fiske. The Australian soprano was born with a naturally-placed and
+flexible voice. Her shake is said to have been perfection when she was
+a child; her scale was even; her intonation impeccable. She had very
+little to learn except the roles in the operas she was to sing and her
+future was very clearly marked from the night she made her debut as
+Gilda in _Rigoletto_. Mme. Patti was equally gifted. Mme. Pasta and
+Mme. Fremstad, on the other hand, toiled very slowly towards fame. The
+former singer was an absolute failure when she first appeared in
+London and it took several years of hard work to make her the greatest
+lyric artist of her day. The great Jenny Lind retired from the stage
+completely defeated, only to return as the most popular singer of her
+time. Mischa Elman has told me he never practices; Leo Ornstein, on
+the other hand, spends hours every day at the piano. Mozart sprang,
+full-armed with genius, into the world. He began composing at the age
+of four. No training was necessary for him, but Beethoven and Wagner
+developed slowly. In the field of writers there are even more happy
+examples. Hundreds of boys have spent years in theme and literature
+courses in college preparing in vain for a future which was never to
+be theirs, while other youths with no educations have taken to writing
+as a cat takes to cat-nip. Should we assume that the annual output of
+Professor Baker's class at Harvard produces better playwrights than
+Moliere or Shakespeare, neither of whom enjoyed Professor Baker's
+lectures, nor, I think I am safe in conjecturing, anything like them?
+
+What, after all, constitutes training? For a creative or
+interpretative genius mere existence seems to be sufficient. Joseph
+Conrad, Nicholas Rimsky-Korsakov, and Patrick MacGill all were sailors
+for many years before they began to write. We owe "Youth" and the
+first section of _Scheherazade_ to this accident. MacGill also had the
+privilege of digging potatoes; he writes about it in "The Rat-pit."
+Mrs. Patrick Campbell learned enough about how to move about and how
+to speak in the country houses she frequented before she began her
+professional career to enable her immediately to take a position of
+importance on the stage. It does not seem necessary, indeed, that the
+training for any career should be prescribed or systematic. Some men
+get their training one way and some another. A school of acting may be
+of the greatest benefit to A, while B will not profit by it. Some
+actors are ruined by stock companies; others are improved by them. The
+geniuses in this interpretative art as in all the other interpretative
+and creative arts, seem to rise above obstructions, and to make
+themselves felt, whatever difficulties are put in their way.
+
+Some great actors, like some great musicians and authors, create out
+of their fulness. They cannot explain; they do not need to study;
+they create by instinct. Others, like Beethoven and Olive Fremstad,
+work and rework their material in the closet until it approaches
+perfection, when they expose it. To say that there are bad actors
+following in the footsteps of both these types of geniuses is to be
+axiomatic and trite. It would be a foregone conclusion. Just as there
+are musicians who write as easily as Mozart but who have nothing to
+say, so there are other musicians who write and rewrite, work and
+rework, study and restudy, and yet what they finally offer the public
+has not the quality or the force or the inspiration of a common
+gutter-ballad.
+
+It has also been urged in print that as naturalness is the goal of the
+actor he should never have to strive for it. The names of Frank
+Reicher and John Drew are often mentioned as those of men who "play
+themselves" on the stage. A most difficult thing to do! Also an
+unfortunate choice of names. Each of these artists has undergone a
+long and arduous apprenticeship in order to achieve the natural method
+which has given him eminence in his career. Indeed, of all the
+qualities of the actor this is the least easy to acquire.
+
+Actors are often condemned because they are not versatile. Versatility
+is undoubtedly an admirable quality in an actor, valuable, especially
+to his manager, but hardly an essential one. An artist is not
+required to do more than one thing well. Vladimir de Pachmann
+specializes in Chopin playing, but Arthur Symons once wrote that "he
+is the greatest living pianist, because he can play certain things
+better than any other pianist can play anything." Should we not allot
+similar approval to the actor or actress who makes a fine effect in
+one part or in one kind of part? I should not call Ellen Terry a
+versatile actress, but I should call her a great artist. Marie Tempest
+is not versatile, unless she should be so designated for having made
+equal successes on the lyric and dramatic stages, but she is one of
+the most satisfying artists at present appearing before our public.
+Mallarme was not versatile; Cezanne was not versatile; nor was Thomas
+Love Peacock. Mascagni, assuredly, is not versatile. The da Vincis and
+Wagners are rare figures in the history of creative art just as the
+Nijinskys and Rachels are rare in the history of interpretative art.
+
+Someone may say that the great actor dies while the play goes
+thundering on through the ages on the stage and in everyman's library.
+This very point, indeed, is made by Mr. Lewes. But this, alas, is the
+reverse of the truth. We have competent and immensely absorbing
+records of the lives and art of David Garrick, Mrs. Siddons, Ristori,
+Clairon, Rachel, Charlotte Cushman, Edwin Booth, and other prominent
+players, while most of the plays in which they appeared are not only
+no longer actable, but also no longer readable. The brothers de
+Goncourt, for example, wrote an account of Clairon which is a book of
+the first interest, while I defy any one to get through two pages of
+most of the fustian she was compelled to act! The reason for this is
+very easily formulated. Great acting is human and universal. It is
+eternal in its appeal and its memory is easily kept alive while
+playwrighting is largely a matter of fashion, and appeals to the mob
+of men and women who never read and who are more interested in police
+news than they are in poetry. George Broadhurst or Henry Bernstein or
+Arthur Wing Pinero, or others like them, have always been the popular
+playwrights; a few names like Sophocles, Terence, Moliere,
+Shakespeare, and Ibsen come rolling down to us, but they are precious
+and few.
+
+A great actor, indeed, can put life into perfectly wooden material. In
+the case of Sarah Bernhardt, who was the creator, the actress or
+Sardou? In the case of Henry Irving, who was the creator, the actor or
+the authors of _The Bells_ and _Faust_ (not, in this instance,
+Goethe)? Is Langdon Mitchell's version of "Vanity Fair" sufficiently
+a work of art to exist without the co-operation of Mrs. Fiske? When
+Duse electrified her audiences in such plays as _The Second Mrs.
+Tanqueray_ and _Fedora_, were the dramatists responsible for the
+effect? Arthur Symons says of her in the latter play, "A great
+actress, who is also a great intelligence, is seen accepting it, for
+its purpose, with contempt, as a thing to exercise her technical skill
+upon." One reads of Mrs. Siddone that she could move a roomful of
+people to tears merely by repeating the word "hippopotamus" with
+varying stress. Should we thank the behemoth for this miracle?
+
+Any one who understands, great acting knows that it is illumination.
+There are those who are born to throw light on the creations of the
+poets, just as there are others born to be poets. These interpreters
+give a new life to the works of the masters, AEschylus, Congreve,
+Tchekhov. When, as more frequently happens, they are called upon to
+play mediocre parts it is with their own personal force, their
+atmospheric aura that they create something more than the author
+himself ever intended or dreamed of. How could Joseph Jefferson play
+_Rip Van Winkle_ for thirty years (or longer) with scenery in tatters
+and a company of mummers which Corse Payton would have scorned? Was
+it because of the greatness of the play? If that were true, why is not
+some one else performing this drama today to large audiences? Has any
+one read the Joseph Jefferson acting version of _Rip Van Winkle_? Who
+wrote it? Don't you think it rather extraordinary that a play which
+apparently has given so much pleasure, and in which Jefferson was
+hailed as a great actor by every contemporary critic of note, as is in
+itself so little known? It is not extraordinary. It was Jefferson's
+performance of the title role which gave vitality to the play.
+
+Of course, there are few actors who have this power, few great actors.
+What else could you expect? A critic might prove that playwriting was
+not an art on the majority of the evidence. Almost all the music
+composed in America could be piled up to prove that music was not an
+art. Should we say that there is no art of painting because the
+Germans have no great painters?
+
+At present, however, it is quite possible for any one in New York with
+car or taxi-cab fare to see one of the greatest of living actresses.
+She is not playing on Broadway. This actress has never been to
+dramatic school; she has not had the advantages of Alla Nazimova, who
+has worked with at least one fine stage director. She was simply born
+a genius, that is all; she has perfected her art by appearing in a
+great variety of parts, the method of Edwin Booth. Most of these parts
+happen to be in masterpieces of the drama. She is not unaccustomed to
+playing _Zaza_ one evening and d'Annunzio's _Francesca da Rimini_ the
+next. Her repertory further includes _La Dame aux Camelias_, _Hamlet_,
+_Romeo and Juliet_, _La Figlia di Iorio_, Giuseppe Giacosa's _Come le
+Foglie_, Sicilian folk-plays, and plays by Arturo Giovannitti. When I
+first saw Mimi Aguglia she was little more than a crude force, a great
+struggling light, that sometimes illuminated, nay often blinded, but
+which shone in unequal flashes. Experience has made of her an actress
+who is almost unfailing in her effect. If you asked her about the
+technique of her art she would probably smile (as Mozart and Schubert
+might have done before her); if you asked her about her method she
+would not understand you ... but she understands the art of acting.
+
+Watch her, for instance, in the second act of _Zaza_, in the scene in
+which the music hall singer discovers that her lover has a wife and
+child. No heroics, no shrieks, no conventional posturings and
+shruggings and sobbing ... something far worse she exposes to us, a
+nameless terror. She stands with her back against a table, nonchalant
+and smilingly defiant, unwilling to return to the music hall with her
+former partner, but pleasantly jocular in her refusal. Stung into
+anger, he hurls his last bomb. Zaza is smoking. As she listens to the
+cruel words the corner of her mouth twitches, the cigarette almost
+falls. That is all. There is a moment's silence unbroken save by the
+heartbeats of her spectators. Even the babies which mothers bring in
+abundance to the Italian theatre are quiet. With that esoteric
+magnetism with which great artists are possessed she holds the
+audience captive by this simple gesture. I could continue to point out
+other astounding details in this impersonation, but not one of them,
+perhaps, would illustrate Aguglia's art as does this one. If no
+training is necessary to produce effects of this kind, I would
+pronounce acting the most holy of the arts, for then, surely, it is a
+direct gift from God.
+
+  _September 5, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+The New Isadora
+
+    _"We shift and bedeck and bedrape us,
+      Thou art noble and nude and antique;"_
+
+                        Swinburne's "Dolores."
+
+
+I have a fine memory of a chance description flung off by some one at
+a dinner in Paris; a picture of the youthful Isadora Duncan in her
+studio in New York developing her ideals through sheer will and
+preserving the contour of her feet by wearing carpet slippers. The
+latter detail stuck in my memory. It may or may not be true, but it
+could have been, _should_ have been true. The incipient dancer keeping
+her feet pure for her coming marriage with her art is a subject for
+philosophic dissertation or for poetry. There are many poets who would
+have seized on this idea for an ode or even a sonnet, had it occurred
+to them. Oscar Wilde would have liked this excuse for a poem ... even
+Robert Browning, who would have woven many moral strophes from this
+text.... It would have furnished Mr. George Moore with material for
+another story for the volume called "Celibates." Walter Pater might
+have dived into some very beautiful, but very conscious, prose with
+this theme as a spring-board. Huysmans would have found this
+suggestion sufficient inspiration for a romance the length of
+"Clarissa Harlowe." You will remember that the author of "En Route"
+meditated writing a novel about a man who left his house to go to his
+office. Perceiving that his shoes have not been polished he stops at a
+boot-black's and during the operation he reviews his affairs. The
+problem was to make 300 pages of this!... Lombroso would have added
+the detail to his long catalogue in "The Man of Genius" as another
+proof of the insanity of artists. Georges Feydeau would have found
+therein enough matter for a three-act farce and d'Annunzio for a
+poetic drama which he might have dedicated to "Isadora of the
+beautiful feet." Sermons might be preached from the text and many
+painters would touch the subject with reverence. Manet might have
+painted Isadora with one of the carpet slippers half depending from a
+bare, rosy-white foot.
+
+There are many fables concerning the beginning of Isadora's career.
+One has it that the original dance in bare feet was an accident....
+Isadora was laving her feet in an upper chamber when her hostess
+begged her to dance for her other guests. Just as she was she
+descended and met with such approval that thenceforth her feet
+remained bare. This is a pretty tale, but it has not the fine ring of
+truth of the story of the carpet slippers. There had been bare-foot
+dancers before Isadora; there had been, I venture to say, discinct
+"Greek dancers." Isadora's contribution to her art is spiritual; it is
+her feeling for the idea of the dance which isolates her from her
+contemporaries. Many have overlooked this essential fact in attempting
+to account for her obvious importance. Her imitators (and has any
+other interpretative artist ever had so many?) have purloined her
+costumes, her gestures, her steps; they have put the music of
+Beethoven and Schubert to new uses as she had done before them; they
+have unbound their hair and freed their feet; but the essence of her
+art, the _spirit_, they have left in her keeping; they could not well
+do otherwise.
+
+Inspired perhaps by Greek phrases, by the superb collection of Greek
+vases in the old Pinakotheck in Munich, Isadora cast the knowledge she
+had gleaned of the dancer's training from her. At least she forced it
+to be subservient to her new wishes. She flung aside her memory of the
+entrechat and the pirouette, the studied technique of the ballet; but
+in so doing she unveiled her own soul. She called her art the
+renaissance of the Greek ideal but there was something modern about
+it, pagan though it might be in quality. Always it was pure and
+sexless ... always abstract emotion has guided her interpretations.
+
+In the beginning she danced to the piano music of Chopin and Schubert.
+Eleven years ago I saw her in Munich in a program of Schubert
+_impromptus_ and Chopin _preludes_ and _mazurkas_. A year or two later
+she was dancing in Paris to the accompaniment of the Colonne
+Orchestra, a good deal of the music of Gluck's _Orfeo_ and the very
+lovely dances from _Iphigenie en Aulide_. In these she remained
+faithful to her original ideal, the beauty of abstract movement, the
+rhythm of exquisite gesture. This was not sense echoing sound but
+rather a very delightful confusion of her own mood with that of the
+music.
+
+So a new grace, a new freedom were added to the dance; in her later
+representations she has added a third quality, strength. Too, her
+immediate interpretations often suggest concrete images.... A
+passionate patriotism for one of her adopted countries is at the root
+of her fiery miming of the _Marseillaise_, a patriotism apparently as
+deep-rooted, certainly as inflaming, as that which inspired Rachel in
+her recitation of this hymn during the Paris revolution of 1848. In
+times of civil or international conflagration the dancer, the actress
+often play important roles in world politics. Malvina Cavalazzi, the
+Italian _ballerina_ who appeared at the Academy of Music during the
+Eighties and who married Charles Mapleson, son of the impressario,
+once told me of a part she had played in the making of United Italy.
+During the Austrian invasion the Italian flag was _verboten_. One
+night, however, during a representation of opera in a town the name of
+which I have forgotten, Mme. Cavalazzi wore a costume of green and
+white, while her male companion wore red, so that in the _pas de deux_
+which concluded the ballet they formed automatically a semblance of
+the Italian banner. The audience was raised to a hysterical pitch of
+enthusiasm and rushed from the theatre in a violent mood, which
+resulted in an immediate encounter with the Austrians and their
+eventual expulsion from the city.
+
+Isadora's pantomimic interpretation of the _Marseillaise_, given in
+New York before the United States had entered the world war, aroused
+as vehement and excited an expression of enthusiasm as it would be
+possible for an artist to awaken in our theatre today. The audiences
+stood up and scarcely restrained their impatience to cheer. At the
+previous performances in Paris, I am told, the effect approached the
+incredible.... In a robe the colour of blood she stands enfolded; she
+sees the enemy advance; she feels the enemy as it grasps her by the
+throat; she kisses her flag; she tastes blood; she is all but crushed
+under the weight of the attack; and then she rises, triumphant, with
+the terrible cry, _Aux armes, citoyens!_ Part of her effect is gained
+by gesture, part by the massing of her body, but the greater part by
+facial expression. In the anguished appeal she does not make a sound,
+beyond that made by the orchestra, but the hideous din of a hundred
+raucous voices seems to ring in our ears. We see Felicien Rops's
+_Vengeance_ come to life; we see the _sans-culottes_ following the
+carts of the aristocrats on the way to execution ... and finally we
+see the superb calm, the majestic flowing strength of the Victory of
+Samothrace.... At times, legs, arms, a leg or an arm, the throat, or
+the exposed breast assume an importance above that of the rest of the
+mass, suggesting the unfinished sculpture of Michael Angelo, an
+aposiopesis which, of course, served as Rodin's inspiration.
+
+In the _Marche Slav_ of Tschaikovsky Isadora symbolizes her conception
+of the Russian moujik rising from slavery to freedom. With her hands
+bound behind her back, groping, stumbling, head-bowed, knees bent, she
+struggles forward, clad only in a short red garment that barely covers
+her thighs. With furtive glances of extreme despair she peers above
+and ahead. When the strains of _God Save the Czar_ are first heard in
+the orchestra she falls to her knees and you see the peasant
+shuddering under the blows of the knout. The picture is a tragic one,
+cumulative in its horrific details. Finally comes the moment of
+release and here Isadora makes one of her great effects. She does not
+spread her arms apart with a wide gesture. She brings them forward
+slowly and we observe with horror that they have practically forgotten
+how to move at all! They are crushed, these hands, crushed and
+bleeding after their long serfdom; they are not hands at all but
+claws, broken, twisted piteous claws! The expression of frightened,
+almost uncomprehending, joy with which Isadora concludes the march is
+another stroke of her vivid imaginative genius.
+
+In her third number inspired by the Great War, the _Marche Lorraine_
+of Louis Ganne, in which is incorporated the celebrated _Chanson
+Lorraine_, Isadora with her pupils, symbolizes the gaiety of the
+martial spirit. It is the spirit of the cavalry riding gaily with
+banners waving in the wind; the infantry marching to an inspired
+tune. There is nothing of the horror of war or revolution in this
+picture ... only the brilliancy and dash of war ... the power and the
+glory!
+
+Of late years Isadora has danced (in the conventional meaning of the
+word) less and less. Since her performance at Carnegie Hall several
+years ago of the _Liebestod_ from _Tristan_, which Walter Damrosch
+hailed as an extremely interesting experiment, she has attempted to
+express something more than the joy of melody and rhythm. Indeed on at
+least three occasions she has danced a Requiem at the Metropolitan
+Opera House.... If the new art at its best is not dancing, neither is
+it wholly allied to the art of pantomime. It would seem, indeed, that
+Isadora is attempting to express something of the spirit of sculpture,
+perhaps what Vachell Lindsay describes as "moving sculpture." Her
+medium, of necessity, is still rhythmic gesture, but its development
+seems almost dream-like. More than the dance this new art partakes of
+the fluid and unending quality of music. Like any other new art it is
+not to be understood at first and I confess in the beginning it said
+nothing to me but eventually I began to take pleasure in watching it.
+Now Isadora's poetic and imaginative interpretation of the symphonic
+interlude from Cesar Franck's _Redemption_ is full of beauty and
+meaning to me and during the whole course of its performance the
+interpreter scarcely rises from her knees. The neck, the throat, the
+shoulders, the head and arms are her means of expression. I thought of
+Barbey d'Aurevilly's phrase, "_Elle avait l'air de monter vers Dieu
+les mains toutes pleines de bonnes oeuvres._"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Isadora's teaching has had its results but her influence has been
+wider in other directions. Fokine thanks her for the new Russian
+Ballet. She did indeed free the Russians from the conventions of the
+classic ballet and but for her it is doubtful if we should have seen
+_Scheherazade_ and _Cleopatre_. _Daphnis et Chloe_, _Narcisse_, and
+_L'Apresmidi d'un Faune_ bear her direct stamp. This then, aside from
+her own appearances, has been her great work. Of her celebrated school
+of dancing I cannot speak with so much enthusiasm. The defect in her
+method of teaching is her insistence (consciously or unconsciously) on
+herself as a model. The seven remaining girls of her school dance
+delightfully. They are, in addition, young and beautiful, but they are
+miniature Isadoras. They add nothing to her style; they make the same
+gestures; they take the same steps; they have almost, if not quite,
+acquired a semblance of her spirit. They vibrate with intention; they
+have force; but constantly they suggest just what they are ...
+imitations. When they dance alone they often make a very charming but
+scarcely overpowering effect. When they dance with Isadora they are
+but a moving row of shadow shapes of Isadora that come and go. Her own
+presence suffices to make the effect they all make together.... I have
+been told that when Isadora watches her girls dance she often weeps,
+for then and then only she can behold herself. One of the griefs of an
+actor or a dancer is that he can never see himself. This oversight of
+nature Isadora has to some extent overcome.
+
+Those who like to see pretty dancing, pretty girls, pretty things in
+general will not find much pleasure in contemplating the art of
+Isadora. She is not pretty; her dancing is not pretty. She has been
+cast in nobler mould and it is her pleasure to climb higher mountains.
+Her gesture is titanic; her mood generally one of imperious grandeur.
+She has grown larger with the years--and by this I mean something more
+than the physical meaning of the word, for she is indeed heroic in
+build. But this is the secret of her power and force. There is no
+suggestion of flabbiness about her and so she can impart to us the
+soul of the struggling moujik, the spirit of a nation, the figure on
+the prow of a Greek bark.... And when she interprets the
+_Marseillaise_ she seems indeed to feel the mighty moment.
+
+  _July 14, 1917._
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+Margaret Anglin Produces
+_As You Like It_
+
+
+Of all the comedies of Shakespeare _As You Like It_ is the one which
+has attracted to itself the most attention from actresses. No feminine
+star but what at one time or another has a desire to play Rosalind.
+Bernard Shaw says, "Who ever failed or could fail as Rosalind?" and I
+am inclined to think him right, though opinions differ. It would seem,
+however, that Rosalind is to the dramatic stage what Mimi in _La
+Boheme_ is to the lyric, a role in which a maximum of effect can be
+gotten with a minimum of effort.
+
+Opinions differ however. Stung to fury by Mrs. Kendal's playing of the
+part, George Moore says somewhere, "Mrs. Kendal nurses children all
+day and strives to play Rosalind at night. What infatuation, what
+ridiculous endeavour! To realize the beautiful woodland passion and
+the idea of the transformation a woman must have sinned, for only
+through sin may we learn the charm of innocence. To play Rosalind a
+woman must have had more than one lover, and if she has been made to
+wait in the rain and has been beaten she will have done a great deal
+to qualify herself for the part." Still another critic considers the
+role a difficult one. He says: "With the exception of Lady Macbeth no
+woman in Shakespeare is so much in controversy as Rosalind. The
+character is thought to be almost unattainable. An ideal that is lofty
+but at the same time vague seems to possess the Shakespeare scholar,
+accompanied by the profound conviction that it never can be fulfilled.
+Only a few actresses have obtained recognition as Rosalind, chief
+among them being Mrs. Pritchard, Peg Woffington, Mrs. Dancer, Dora
+Jordan, Louisa Nesbitt, Helen Faucit, Ellen Tree, Adelaide Neilson,
+Mrs. Scott-Siddons and Miss Mary Anderson."
+
+Of those who have recently played Rosalind perhaps Mary Anderson, Ada
+Rehan, Henrietta Crosman and Julia Marlowe will remain longest in the
+memory, although Marie Wainwright, Mary Shaw, Mrs. Langtry and Julia
+Neilson are among a long list of those who have tried the part. Miss
+Rehan appeared in the role when Augustin Daly revived the comedy at
+Daly's Theatre, December 17, 1889. We are told that an effort was made
+in this production to emphasize the buoyant gaiety of the piece. The
+scenery displayed the woods embellished in a springtime green, and
+the acting did away as much as possible with any of the underlying
+melancholy which flows through the comedy.
+
+William Winter frankly asserts--perhaps not unwittingly giving a
+staggering blow to the art of acting in so doing--that the reason
+Rosalind is not more often embodied "in a competent and enthralling
+manner is that her enchanting quality is something that cannot be
+assumed--it must be possessed; it must exist in the fibre of the
+individual, and its expression will then be spontaneous. Art can
+accomplish much, but it cannot supply the inherent captivation that
+constitutes the puissance of Rosalind. Miss Rehan possesses that
+quality, and the method of her art was the fluent method of natural
+grace."
+
+Fie and a fig for Mr. Moore's theory about being beaten and standing
+in the rain, implies Mr. Winter!
+
+To Mr. Winter I am also indebted for a description of Mary Anderson in
+_As You Like It_: "Miss Anderson, superbly handsome as Rosalind,
+indicated that beneath her pretty swagger, nimble satire and silver
+playfulness Rosalind is as earnest of Juliet--though different in
+temperament and mind--as fond as Viola and as constant as Imogen."
+
+Miss Marlowe's Rosalind, somewhat along the same lines as Miss
+Anderson's, and Miss Crosman's, a hoydenish, tomboy sort of creature,
+first cousin to Mistress Nell and the young lady of _The Amazons_,
+should be familiar to theatregoers of the last two decades.
+
+Last Monday evening Margaret Anglin exposed her version of the comedy.
+As might have been expected, it has met with some unfavourable
+criticism. Preconceived notions of Rosalind are as prevalent as
+preconceived notions of Hamlet. And yet if _As You Like It_ had been
+produced Monday night as a "new fantastic comedy," just as _Prunella_
+was, for instance, I am inclined to think that everybody who dissented
+would have been at Miss Anglin's charming heels.
+
+The scenery has been given undue prominence both by the management and
+by the writers for the newspapers. Its most interesting feature is the
+arrangement by which it is speedily changed about. There were no long
+waits caused by the settings of scenes during the acts. To say,
+however, that it has anything to do with the art of Gordon Craig is to
+speak nonsense. The scenes are painted in much the same manner as that
+to which we are accustomed and inured. There is a certain haze over
+the trees, caused partially by the tints and partially by the
+lighting, which produces a rather charming effect, but the outlines of
+the trees are quite definite; no impressionism here.
+
+The acting is quite a different matter. _As You Like It_ is one of the
+most modern in spirit of the Shakespeare plays. This air of modernity
+is still further emphasized by the fact that the play, for the most
+part, is written in prose. I feel certain that Bernard Shaw derived
+part of his inspiration for _Man and Superman_ from _As You Like It_.
+Only in Shakespeare's play Ann Whitefield (Rosalind) pursues Octavius
+(Orlando) instead of Jack Tanner. I am inclined to believe that Shaw's
+psychology in this instance is the more sound. It seems incredible
+that a girl so witty, so beautiful, and so intelligent as Rosalind
+should waste so much time on that sentimental, uncomprehending
+creature known as Orlando. Every line of Orlando should have sounded
+the knell of his fate in her ears. However, it must be remembered that
+Orlando was young and good-looking, and that, at least in the play,
+men of the right stamp seemed to be scarce. Of course, it is out of
+Touchstone that Shaw has evolved his Jack Tanner.
+
+Whether Miss Anglin had this idea in mind or not when she produced the
+comedy I have no means of ascertaining. It is not essential to my
+point. At least she has emphasized it, and she has done the most
+intelligent stage directing that I have observed in the performance of
+a Shakespeare play for many a long season. There is consistency in the
+acting. Rosalind, Jaques, Touchstone, Celia, Oliver, the dukes,
+Charles, Sylvius, the whole lot, in fact, are natural in method and
+manner. There is no striving for the fantastic. Let that part of the
+comedy take care of itself, undoubtedly suggested Miss Anglin.
+
+Jaques, finely portrayed by Fuller Mellish, delivers that arrant bit
+of nonsense "The Seven Ages of Man" in such a manner as a man might
+tell a rather serious story in a drawing room. "The Seven Ages of
+Man," of course, is just as much of an aria as _La Donna e Mobile_. It
+always awakens applause, but this time the applause was deserved. Mr.
+Mellish emphasized the cynical side of the role. He smiled in and out
+of season, and his most "melancholy" remarks were delivered in such a
+manner as to indicate that they were not too deeply felt. Jaques was a
+little bored with the forest and his companions, but he would have
+been quite in his element at Mme. Recamier's. Such was the impression
+that Fuller Mellish gave. Bravo, Mr. Mellish, for an impression!
+
+Similarly the Touchstone of Sidney Greenstreet. We are accustomed to
+more physically attractive Touchstones, fools with finer bodies, and
+yet this keen-minded, stout person spoke his lines with such pertness
+and spontaneity that they rarely failed of their proper effect. As for
+Orlando, it seemed to me that Pedro de Cordoba was a little too
+rhetorical at times to fit in with the spirit of the performance, but
+Orlando at times does not fit into the play. For instance, when he
+utters those incredible lines:
+
+    "If ever you have looked on better days,
+    If ever been where bells have knolled to church,
+    If ever sat at any good man's feast,
+    If ever from your eyelids wiped a tear...."
+
+I do not know whether Miss Anglin is a disciple of George Moore or
+William Winter in her acting of Rosalind. How she acquired her charm
+is not for us to seek into. It is only for us to credit her with
+having it in great plenty. A charming natural manner which made the
+masquerading lady seem more than a fantasy. Her warning to Phebe,
+
+"Sell when you can; you are not for all markets,"
+
+was delicious in its effect. I remember no Rosalind who wooed her
+Orlando so delightfully. For Rosalind, as Woman the Pursuer, driven
+forward by the Life Force, is convincingly Miss Anglin's conception--a
+conception which fits the comedy admirably.
+
+As to the objections which have been raised to Miss Anglin's
+assumption of the masculine garments without any attempt at
+counterfeiting masculinity, I would ask my reader, if she be a woman,
+what she would do if she found it necessary to wear men's clothes. If
+she were not an actress she would undoubtedly behave much as she did
+in women's, suppressing unnecessary and telltale gestures as much as
+possible, but not trying to imitate mannish gestures which would
+immediately stamp her an impostor. There is no internal evidence in
+Shakespeare's play to prove that Rosalind was an actress. She might
+have appeared in private theatricals at the palace, but even that is
+doubtful. Consequently when she donned men's clothes it became evident
+to her that many men are effeminate in gesture and those that are do
+not ordinarily affect mannish movements. Her most obvious concealment
+was to be natural--quite herself. This, I think, is one of the most
+interesting and well-thought-out points of Miss Anglin's
+interpretation.
+
+  _March 20, 1914._
+
+
+
+
+The Modern Composers at a Glance
+
+
+
+
+The Modern Composers at a Glance
+
+An Impertinent Catalogue
+
+
+IGOR STRAVINSKY: Paul Revere rides in Russia.
+
+CYRIL SCOTT: A young man playing Debussy in a Maidenhead villa.
+
+BALILLA PRATELLA: Pretty noises in funny places.
+
+ENGELBERT HUMPERDINCK: His master's voice.
+
+LEO ORNSTEIN: A small boy upsetting a push-cart.
+
+GIACOMO PUCCINI: Pinocchio in a passion.
+
+ERIK SATIE: A mandarin with a toy pistol firing into a wedding cake.
+
+PAUL DUKAS: A giant eating bonbons.
+
+RICCARDO ZANDONAI: Brocade dipped in garlic.
+
+ERICH KORNGOLD: The white hope.
+
+ARNOLD SCHOENBERG: Six times six is thirty-six--and six is ninety-two!
+
+MAURICE RAVEL: Tomorrow ... and tomorrow ... and tomorrow....
+
+CLAUDE DEBUSSY: Chantecler crows _pianissimo_ in whole tones.
+
+RICHARD STRAUSS: An ostrich _not_ hiding his head.
+
+SIR EDWARD ELGAR: The footman leaves his accordion in the bishop's
+carriage.
+
+ITALO MONTEMEZZI: Three Kings--but no aces.
+
+PERCY ALDRIDGE GRAINGER: An effete Australian chewing tobacco.
+
+  _August 8, 1917_.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[Footnote 1: One evidence of this is that his works are eagerly sought
+after and treated tenderly by the second-hand book-sellers. Some of
+them command fancy prices.]
+
+[Footnote 2: For an account of Peladan see my essay on Erik Satie in
+"Interpreters and Interpretations."]
+
+[Footnote 3: You will find an account of Balzac's interesting theory
+regarding names and letters, which may well have had a direct
+influence on Edgar Saltus, in Saltus's "Balzac," p. 29 _et seq._ For a
+precisely contrary theory turn to "The Naming of Streets" in Max
+Beerbohm's "Yet Again."]
+
+[Footnote 4: "Wit and Wisdom from Edgar Saltus" by G. F. Monkshood and
+George Gamble, and "The Cynic's Posy," a collection of epigrams, the
+majority of which are taken from Saltus, may be brought forward in
+evidence.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Certain books by Edgar Saltus have been announced from
+time to time but have never appeared; these include: "Annochiatura,"
+"Immortal Greece," "Our Lady of Beauty," "Cimmeria," "Daughters of
+Dream," "Scaffolds and Altars," "Prince Charming," and "The Crimson
+Curtain."]
+
+[Footnote 6: Houghton, Mifflin and Co,; 1884. Reprinted 1887 and
+1890.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Houghton, Mifflin and Co.; 1885. Reprinted by the Belford
+Co.]
+
+[Footnote 8: George J. Coombes; 1886. Reprinted by Brentano's.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Scribner and Welford; 1887. Revised edition, Belford,
+Clarke and Co.; 1889.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Brentano's; 1887.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Benjamin and Bell; 1887.]
+
+[Footnote 12: Belford Co.; 1888.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Belford, Clarke and Co.; 1888.]
+
+[Footnote 14: Belford Co.; 1889.]
+
+[Footnote 15: Belford Co.; 1889.]
+
+[Footnote 16: Belford, Clarke and Co.; 1889.]
+
+[Footnote 17: Belford Co.; 1890.]
+
+[Footnote 18: Belford Co.; 1891.]
+
+[Footnote 19: Belford Co.; 1891. Reprinted by Mitchell Kennerley;
+1906.]
+
+[Footnote 20: P. F. Collier; 1892; "Written especially for 'Once a
+Week Library.'"]
+
+[Footnote 21: Morrill, Higgins and Co;. 1893. Reprinted by Mitchell
+Kennerley; 1906.]
+
+[Footnote 22: F. Tennyson Neely; 1893.]
+
+[Footnote 23: Tudor Press: 1894.]
+
+[Footnote 24: The Transatlantic Publishing Co.; 1895.]
+
+[Footnote 25: Ainslee; 1903.]
+
+[Footnote 26: A. Wessels Co.; 1905.]
+
+[Footnote 27: Mitchell Kennerley; 1906.]
+
+[Footnote 28: J. B. Lippincott Co.; 1906.]
+
+[Footnote 29: Mitchell Kennerley; 1907.]
+
+[Footnote 30: Mitchell Kennerley; 1907.]
+
+[Footnote 31: Mitchell Kennerley; 1909.]
+
+[Footnote 32: Pulitzer Publishing Co.; 1912.]
+
+[Footnote 33: In an essay entitled "The Great American Composer" in my
+book, "Interpreters and Interpretations."]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+Index
+
+
+Abbott, Emma, 220
+
+Academy of Arts and Letters, 80, 225, 227
+
+Acting, 111, 113, 119, 120, 272, 283, 293 _et seq._
+
+Adam, Villiers de l'Isle, 48, 49
+
+Adams, Maude, 295
+
+Adams, Oscar Fay, 38
+
+AEschylus, 103, 303
+
+Agrippina, 69
+
+Aguglia, Mimi, 284, 304, _et seq._
+
+Ainslee's Magazine, 75
+
+Alary, Signor, 248
+
+Alboni, Marietta, 169
+
+Alchemy, 76
+
+Allegranti, Maddalena, 254, 255
+
+Alma Tadema, 296
+
+Alvary, Max, 99
+
+Anderson, Mary, 319, 320
+
+Anfossi, Pasquale, 169
+
+Anglin, Margaret, 321 _et seq._
+
+d'Annunzio, G., 284, 305
+
+Apaches, 126, 135, 138, 140, 141 _et seq._, 182
+
+Apthorp, W. F., 99, 168
+
+Arabanek, 164
+
+Archilei, 94
+
+Arditi, Luigi, 288
+
+Argentina, La, 284, 287
+
+Argus, The, 54
+
+Aristotle, 291
+
+Arne, 257
+
+Arnould, Sophie, 82, 96, 259 _et seq._
+
+Astor, J. J., 227
+
+Atilla, 79
+
+Audran, 216
+
+Augustus, 69, 70
+
+d'Aurevilly, Barbey, 43, 63, 66, 87, 315
+
+Ayres, Frederick, 200
+
+
+Bach, 24, 28, 150, 199
+
+Badarzewska, Thecla, 23
+
+Baedeker, 58
+
+Bag-pipe, 135, 136, 137
+
+Bahamas, 136
+
+Baker, J. Duncan, 211
+
+Baker, Prof., 298
+
+Bakst, Leon, 16
+
+Bal des Gravilliers, 141 _et seq._
+
+Balfe, Michael William, 27, 165
+
+Bal musette, 125, 134 _et seq._
+
+Balzac, 43, 50, 55, 56, 57, 63, 76, 86, 187, 225
+
+Banti, Brigitta, 93, 164
+
+Bara, Theda, 80
+
+Barnabee, Henry Clay, 221
+
+Barnet, R. A., 216
+
+Barrison, Mabel, 219
+
+Barry, Mme. du, 260
+
+Bassoonists, 157
+
+Bataille, Henry, 228, 230, 232
+
+Bates, Katherine Lee, 38
+
+Battistini, 102
+
+Baudelaire, Charles, 43, 52, 131
+
+Baumgarten, C. F., 171
+
+Bayes, Nora, 110
+
+Beardsley, Aubrey, 45
+
+Becque, Henry, 230
+
+Beerbohm, Max, 45, 50, 177, 238
+
+Beethoven, 24, 27, 28, 32, 98, 150, 151, 170, 175, 200, 219, 298, 300
+
+Begue, Bernard, 156
+
+Belasco, David, 294
+
+Bel canto, 97, 101, 105
+
+Belford's Magazine, 37
+
+Bell, Digby, 222
+
+Bellini, Vincenzo, 24, 25, 77, 79, 97, 100, 101, 114, 175, 248, 267,
+  270, 273
+
+Bel-Marduk, 82
+
+Bergstrom, Hjalmar, 90
+
+Berlin, Irving, 25, 222, 234
+
+Berlioz, Hector, 27, 104
+
+Bernacchi, Antonio, 99
+
+Bernhardt, Sarah, 106, 222, 227, 245, 295, 297, 302
+
+Bernstein, Henry, 228, 230, 232, 302
+
+Bible, The, 67
+
+Bichara, 15
+
+Bilbao, 287
+
+Billington, Mrs., 172
+
+Bizet, Georges, 108, 113, 275
+
+Blanche, Jacques, 183, 184
+
+Blei, Franz, 69, 78, 259
+
+Bocklin, Arnold, 89
+
+Bonci, Alessandro, 102
+
+Booth, Edwin, 111, 302, 305
+
+Bouguereau, 61, 293
+
+Bourget, Paul, 76
+
+Boyden, Frank L., 203
+
+Boynton, Henry Walcott, 38
+
+Brahma, 82
+
+Brahms, 25, 274
+
+Brann-Brini, Mlle., 164
+
+Branscombe, Gena, 200, 202
+
+Brenon, Algernon St. John, 162
+
+Breton, Tomas, 113
+
+Brian, Donald, 217
+
+Brice, Fannie, 110
+
+Brieux, 230
+
+Brignoli, Pasquale, 155
+
+Broadhurst, George, 302
+
+Bromley, Eliza, 74
+
+Brothers of the Book, 85
+
+Browning, Robert, 307
+
+Bunn, Alfred, 165
+
+Burke, Billie, 295
+
+Burney, Dr., 258
+
+Butler, Samuel, 21
+
+Byzance, 80
+
+
+Cabanel, 61
+
+Caesar, Julius, 69
+
+Caffarelli, 95, 96, 112
+
+Cahill, Marie, 110
+
+Cairns, William B., 38
+
+Caligula, 51, 69, 79
+
+Calve, Emma, 106, 275
+
+Camargo, 258, 259
+
+Campanari, Giuseppe, 161, 162
+
+Campbell, Mrs. Patrick, 299
+
+Caracalla, 79
+
+Carestini, Giovanni, 95, 96
+
+Carmencita, 285
+
+Carnegie Hall, 25
+
+Carre, Albert, 133
+
+Carreno, Teresa, 153
+
+Caruso, Enrico, 272
+
+Cassive, Armande, 232
+
+Catalani, Angelica, 93, 265 _et seq._
+
+Cato, 69
+
+Cats, 59, 69, 77, 102, 127, 131, 132, 233, 258, 259, 298
+
+Cavalazzi, Malvina, 310
+
+Cesare Borgia, 79
+
+Cezanne, 301
+
+Chabrier, Emmanuel, 285
+
+Chadwick, George W., 197, 199, 212
+
+Chambers, Robert W., 290
+
+Chaliapine, Feodor, 114, 155
+
+Charpentier, Gustave, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 173
+
+Cherubini, 98
+
+Cherubino's question, 54
+
+Chinese plays, 103
+
+Chopin, 23, 26, 55, 112, 239, 240, 301, 310
+
+Chorley, Henry Fothergill, 98, 169, 247, 249, 261
+
+Christ, 58, 67, 185, 191, 192
+
+Christianity, 57, 68, 82, 83
+
+Christy, Howard Chandler, 293
+
+Churchill, Lady Randolph, 185
+
+Cimarosa, Domenico, 255
+
+Cinderella, 137
+
+Cicisbeism, 82
+
+Clairon, 96, 260, 302
+
+Classical music, 23
+
+Claudius, 69
+
+Cleopatra, 82
+
+Cline, Maggie, 107
+
+Coerne, L. A., 199, 202
+
+Cohan, George M., 288
+
+Colles, Ramsay, 39
+
+Colonne Orchestra, 310
+
+Coloratura singing, 103, 104
+
+Columbia University, 43
+
+Comstock, Anthony, 59
+
+Condamine, Robert de la, 183
+
+Congreve, 303
+
+Conrad, Joseph, 299
+
+Conried, Henrich, 161, 162
+
+Converse, Frederick, 212
+
+Cooking, 26, 50, 78, 129, 130, 149 _et seq._
+
+Cordoba, Pedro de, 324
+
+Corneille, 104
+
+Costa, Michael, 163
+
+Cou-Cou Restaurant, 125 _et seq._, 183
+
+Courts of Love, 65, 82
+
+Cox, J. E., 165, 173, 264
+
+Cox, Kenyon, 62
+
+Craig, Gordon, 321
+
+Critics, 24, 26, 30, 33, 34, 96, 97, 99, 100, 105, 111, 115, 228, 234
+
+Crosman, Henrietta, 319, 321
+
+Crowest, Frederick, 163, 164
+
+Current Literature, 39
+
+Cushman, Charlotte, 302
+
+Cuzzoni, Francesca, 95, 258
+
+
+Daly, Augustin, 319
+
+Daly, Dan, 222
+
+Damrosch, Walter, 157, 314
+
+Dancing, 112, 113, 137 _et seq._, 281 _et seq._, 307 _et seq._
+
+Dante, 76
+
+Darby, W. D., 200
+
+Davis, Cecilia, 253
+
+Davis, Jessie Bartlett, 221
+
+Davis, Owen, 93
+
+Debussy, Claude, 30, 33, 96, 113, 116, 117, 118, 119, 121, 200, 315, 329
+
+Decoration, Interior, 11 _et seq._
+
+Delacroix, 19
+
+Delibes, Leo, 108, 113
+
+Deslys, Gaby, 222
+
+Destinn, Emmy, 114, 155
+
+Devi, Ratan, 109
+
+Dickens, Charles, 187
+
+Dolmetsch, Arnold, 192
+
+Doloretes, 286, 287, 288
+
+Donizetti, Gaetano, 61, 79, 88, 97, 101, 108, 113, 114, 166, 173, 247,
+  248, 249, 250, 251, 263
+
+Doubleday, 203
+
+Dreiser, Theodore, 202, 203
+
+Dresser, Paul, 202, 203
+
+Dressler, Marie, 222
+
+Drew, John, 111, 295, 300
+
+Duclos, 259
+
+Duff-Gordon, Lady, 222
+
+Dukas, Paul, 104, 113, 114, 329
+
+Dumas, Alexandre, _fils_, 106, 205
+
+Duncan, Isadora, 307 _et seq._
+
+Duse, Eleanora, 277, 295, 303
+
+Dussek, Johann Ludwig, 171
+
+Dyer, Edward, 209
+
+
+
+Eames, Emma, 275
+
+Earle, Virginia, 219
+
+Ehrhard, Auguste, 55
+
+Elgar, Sir Edward, 329
+
+Elizabethan plays, 51, 103
+
+Ellis, Havelock, 281, 285, 286, 291
+
+Ellis, Melville, 222
+
+Elman, Mischa, 298
+
+Elson, L. C., 198, 199
+
+Elssler, Fanny, 55
+
+Eltinge, Julian, 96
+
+Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 43
+
+Euripides, 103
+
+Evertson, Admiral Kornelis, 42
+
+
+
+Fall, Leo, 216
+
+Fame, 42
+
+Farinelli, 95
+
+Farwell, Arthur, 200, 202
+
+Faustina, 95, 96, 258
+
+Fawcett, Edgar, 66
+
+Fevrier, Henry, 113, 115, 118, 119, 120
+
+Feydeau, Georges, 129, 229, 230, 231, 232, 233, 236, 237, 308
+
+Finck, H. T., 24, 25, 30, 32, 58, 95, 99, 153, 272
+
+Fischer, Johann Christian, 161
+
+Fiske, Mrs., 297, 303
+
+Fitzgerald, Percy, 296
+
+Flaubert, Gustave, 66, 76, 87
+
+Folk-song, 30, 33, 100, 106, 109, 152
+
+Follies, The, 16, 222, 223
+
+Foote, Arthur, 199, 202
+
+Ford, Richard, 285, 291
+
+Formes, Karl, 164
+
+Forum, The, 87
+
+Foster, Stephen, 29, 33, 152
+
+Fox, Della, 217, 218, 219
+
+Fox, Helen Kelsey, 208
+
+Fragonard, 18
+
+France, Anatole, 68, 185, 193
+
+Franck, Cesar, 151, 315
+
+Franz, Robert, 23, 26, 93, 111
+
+Fremstad, Olive, 108, 156, 298, 300
+
+Freud, 50
+
+Frezzolini, Erminia, 261 _et seq._
+
+Frohman, Charles, 85, 296
+
+
+Gadski, Johanna, 155
+
+Galli, Signora, 254
+
+Galli-Curci, Amelita, 101, 102, 104, 114
+
+Gamble, George, 39, 54
+
+Ganne, Louis, 313
+
+Garcia, Manuel, 160
+
+Garcia, Manuel, _fils_, 252
+
+Garden, Mary, 84, 114 _et seq._, 131, 133, 155
+
+Gardiner, William, 267
+
+Garrick, David, 96, 260, 302
+
+Gautier, Theophile, 46, 58, 87, 131, 190, 225
+
+German music, 150
+
+Gerome, 61
+
+Gerster, Etelka, 269
+
+Giacosa, 284, 305
+
+Giardini, Felice de, 164
+
+Gibbons, Grinling, 19
+
+Gilbert, W. S., 107, 216, 221
+
+Giovannitti, Arturo, 305
+
+Gipsy, 100, 286
+
+Gizziello, 95
+
+Glaser, Lulu, 219
+
+Gluck, 29, 30, 96, 108, 135, 170, 232, 258, 259, 260, 310
+
+Goncourt, Brothers de, 302
+
+Goodrich, A. J., 199, 202
+
+Goodwin, Nat, 295
+
+Gosse, Edmund, 179
+
+Gounod, 117, 151, 272, 273
+
+Gourmont, Remy de, 48, 229
+
+Goya, 59, 287
+
+Grainger, Percy, 30, 330
+
+Grau, Maurice, 161
+
+Greek Plays, 103
+
+Greenstreet, Sidney, 324
+
+Greenwich Village, 16
+
+Gregory, Lady, 192
+
+Gretry, 170
+
+Grieg, Edvard, 93
+
+Grimm, 259
+
+Grisi, Giulia, 166, 263 _et seq._
+
+Grove, Sir George, 171, 202, 271
+
+Guilbert, Yvette, 107, 113, 114, 277
+
+
+Hadley, Henry, 197, 212
+
+Hadrian, 69
+
+Hale, Philip, 33
+
+Halevy, Jacques, 248
+
+Hall, Pauline, 219
+
+Handel, George Frederick, 25, 95, 97, 102, 113, 119, 172, 254
+
+Hanslick, Eduard, 102, 263
+
+Harris, Charles K., 202
+
+Harris, Frank, 55, 189, 190
+
+Hartmann, Eduard von, 43, 56, 60
+
+Hawthorne vases, 18
+
+Hay, Reverend John Stuart, 72
+
+Haydn, 28
+
+Heidelberg, 43
+
+Heifetz, Jascha, 287
+
+Heine, Heinrich, 82, 240, 286, 287
+
+Heinrich, Max, 107, 155, 246
+
+Helen of Troy, 82
+
+Heliogabolus, 68, 69, 72
+
+Heloise, 82
+
+Helvetius, 259
+
+Henderson, W. J., 33, 115
+
+Herbert, Victor, 155, 216
+
+Hergesheimer, Joseph, 44, 153
+
+Herodotus, 86
+
+Hertz, Alfred, 155
+
+Hervieu, Paul, 228
+
+Heyse, Paul, 67
+
+Hichens, Robert, 75, 81
+
+Higginson, Thomas Wentworth, 38
+
+Hirsch, Charles-Henry, 141
+
+Hirsch, Louis A., 222
+
+Hoff, Edwin, 221
+
+Hollins, Mabel, 219
+
+Homer, 76, 86
+
+Hopper, De Wolf, 107, 221
+
+Hopwood, Avery, 101, 236 _et seq._
+
+Horace, 76
+
+Howells, W. D., 74, 191
+
+Hubbard, Elbert, 39, 48
+
+Hughes, Rupert, 198, 199
+
+Hugo, Victor, 52, 55, 76, 87, 105
+
+Humperdinck, Engelbert, 24, 29, 173, 329
+
+Huneker, James, 33, 38, 55, 153, 154, 164, 173
+
+Huss, Henry Holden, 199, 202
+
+Huysmans, J. K., 43, 53, 70, 76, 80, 87, 151, 191, 308
+
+
+Ibsen, 302
+
+Incest, 60, 74, 84
+
+d'Indy, Vincent, 200
+
+Irving, Sir Henry, 294, 302
+
+Irwin, May, 110
+
+Ivan the Terrible, 79
+
+
+Jackson, Holbrook, 44, 63
+
+James, Henry, 59, 68, 231
+
+Janis, Elsie, 110, 222
+
+Jansen, Marie, 219, 222
+
+Jefferson, Joseph, 303, 304
+
+Jehovah, 82
+
+Jensen, Adolph, 24
+
+Jew, 58, 71, 152
+
+Joachim, Joseph, 156
+
+Jolson, Al, 110, 222
+
+Jones, Henry Arthur, 234
+
+Joseffy, Rafael, 155
+
+Judic, 220
+
+Jupiter, 82
+
+
+Kaiser, The, 79
+
+Kapila, 57
+
+Keane, Doris, 13
+
+Kellogg, Clara Louise, 166, 268, 269
+
+Kellow, Lottie A., 203, 204
+
+Kelly, Michael, 159, 160, 161, 170, 256
+
+Kendal, Mrs., 318
+
+Kenton, Edna, 41, 53
+
+Ker, Ann, 74
+
+Kern, Jerome, 23, 222
+
+Korngold, Erich, 329
+
+Koven, Reginald de, 216, 221
+
+Krehbiel, H. E., 100, 153, 155
+
+Krishna, 83
+
+
+Labatt, 104
+
+Lablache, Luigi, 163
+
+Laforgue, Jules, 43
+
+Laguerre, Mme., 260
+
+La Harpe, 260
+
+Lalo, Pierre, 33
+
+Lampridius, 70, 72
+
+Lavignac, Albert, 173
+
+Lecocq, Charles, 173, 216
+
+Lehar, Franz, 216
+
+Lehmann, Lilli, 100, 107, 155, 269, 270, 274
+
+Leoncavallo, Ruggiero, 32, 149
+
+Lesbian, 75
+
+Lessing, Madge, 219
+
+Levey, Ethel, 110
+
+Lewes, George Henry, 294, 301
+
+Lienau's, 154
+
+Lind, Jenny, 248, 253, 265 _et seq._, 298
+
+Lindsay, Vachell, 314
+
+Lippincott's Magazine, 63
+
+Lisle, Leconte de, 57, 76
+
+Liszt, 25, 32, 240
+
+Lombard, Jean, 69
+
+Lombroso, 308
+
+Loomis, Harvey W., 200
+
+Louis XIV, 135, 137
+
+Louis XV, 12
+
+Love, 81, 82
+
+Loy, Mina, 188
+
+Lucca, Pauline, 269
+
+Lulli, 172
+
+Lumley, Benjamin, 162, 285, 286
+
+
+MacDowell, Edward, 25
+
+Macdonald, John Z., 208
+
+MacGill, Patrick, 299
+
+MacKaye, Percy, 235
+
+McCutcheon, George Barr, 296
+
+McIntosh, Nancy, 219
+
+Macy, John, 38
+
+Maeterlinck, Maurice, 117
+
+Mahler, Gustav, 28
+
+Male sopranos, 94
+
+Malibran, Maria, 164, 165, 166, 253
+
+Mallarme, Stephane, 43, 301
+
+Manet, 61, 289, 308
+
+Mapleson, J. H., 159, 284
+
+Mara, Gertrude Elisabeth, 255 _et seq._
+
+Marchesi, Mathilde, 102, 149, 252, 297
+
+Marco, Maria, 108, 288
+
+Marie Antoinette, 259, 260
+
+Marinetti, 282
+
+Mario, 102
+
+Marion, George, 28
+
+Marlowe, Julia, 319, 321
+
+Marnold, Jean, 32
+
+Marseillaise, 310 _et seq._
+
+Martyn, Edward, 192, 294
+
+Mary Magdalen, 66, 67, 68
+
+Mascagni, Pietro, 28, 275, 301
+
+Massenet, 27, 28, 116, 117, 119, 120, 151, 275
+
+Matisse, 19
+
+Maurel, Victor, 107, 120, 246
+
+May, Edna, 219
+
+Mayhew, Stella, 110
+
+Mazantinita, 287
+
+Mazarin, Mariette, 114
+
+Mazzoleni, 166
+
+Melba, Nellie, 102, 104, 107, 108, 114, 155, 156, 187, 271 _et seq._,
+  297
+
+Mellish, Fuller, 323
+
+Melody, 29, 93
+
+Mencken, H. L., 59, 65, 153, 197, 198, 202, 203, 212
+
+Mendelssohn, 23, 24, 26, 171, 202
+
+Mendes, Catulle, 43
+
+Meredith, George, 187
+
+Merimee, Prosper, 58, 87, 131, 142
+
+Meyerbeer, Giacomo, 28, 29, 102, 157, 164, 252
+
+Michael Angelo, 227, 312
+
+Michelet, 76
+
+Milton, 257
+
+Mirbeau, Octave, 229, 230, 231, 232, 233
+
+Mitchell, Julian, 281
+
+Mitchell, Langdon, 303
+
+Modern Orchestra, 98
+
+Modulation, 30
+
+Moeller, Philip, 26, 236, 238 _et seq._
+
+Moliere, 225, 230, 231, 298, 302
+
+Monbelli, 256
+
+Monkshood, G. F., 39, 54
+
+Montaigne, 150
+
+Montemezzi, Italo, 24, 330
+
+Montes, 189
+
+Monteverde, 102
+
+Montmartre, 126 _et seq._
+
+Monvel, Boutet de, 142
+
+Moore, George, 67, 134, 184 _et seq._, 231, 232, 294, 295, 307, 318,
+  320, 324
+
+Moors, The, 65
+
+Moreau, Gustave, 44, 61, 89, 191
+
+"Morrill, Higgins, and Co.," 71
+
+Moulin de la Galette, 133, 134
+
+Mount Edgcumbe, Earl of, 93, 94, 253, 254, 255
+
+Moussorgsky, 23, 152
+
+Mozart, 23, 24, 27, 28, 29, 31, 54, 88, 97, 101, 108, 119, 161, 173,
+  174, 205, 234, 248, 268, 269, 270, 275, 276, 289, 298, 300, 305
+
+Mullin, W. T., 204 _et seq._
+
+Murillo, 190
+
+Murphy, Agnes G., 155
+
+Murska, Ilma de, 269
+
+Musset, Alfred de, 239, 240, 252
+
+Musette, 135
+
+
+Nachbaur, Franz, 164
+
+Names, Theory of, 49, 50, 56, 76
+
+Napoleon, 79, 192
+
+Naldi, Giuseppe, 160
+
+Nathan, George Jean, 283, 295
+
+Nazimova, Alla, 283, 305
+
+Negro Players, 283
+
+Newman, Ernest, 32, 150
+
+Niemann, Albert, 164
+
+Nero, 69, 71, 72
+
+Nerval, Gerard de, 31
+
+New York Times, The, 233
+
+Nicolai, Carl, 173
+
+Nicolini, 95
+
+Nielsen, Alice, 219
+
+Nijinsky, Waslav, 112, 183, 285, 301
+
+Nillson, Carlotta, 237
+
+Nilsson, Christine, 268, 269
+
+Nordica, Lillian, 270
+
+
+Offenbach, 216, 219
+
+Opera-Comique, Paris, 131
+
+Orleneff, Paul, 283, 305
+
+Ornstein, Leo, 30, 104, 121, 298, 329
+
+Oysters, American, 158
+
+
+Pacchierotti, 93, 94, 95
+
+Pachmann, Vladimir de, 301
+
+Paganini, 172
+
+Palmer, Delmar G., 210, 211
+
+Pan, Peter, 137
+
+Parke, W. T., 171, 172, 256, 257, 258
+
+Parker, Horatio W., 23, 197, 212
+
+Pasta, Giuditta, 97, 249 _et seq._
+
+Pater, Walter, 70, 72, 137, 190, 307
+
+Pattee, Fred Lewis, 38
+
+Patti, Adelina, 101, 102, 104, 115, 153, 253, 269, 288, 298
+
+Payton, Corse, 304
+
+Peacock, Thomas Love, 301
+
+Peladan, Josephin, 43
+
+Persian miniatures, 19
+
+Pessimism, 56, 60, 61, 65
+
+Petrarch, 76
+
+Pfitzner, Hans, 200
+
+Perfumes, 79
+
+Phelps, William Lyon, 38
+
+Pheme, 86
+
+Philip II, 79
+
+Philistine, The, 39
+
+Philosophy of Edgar Saltus, 54, 56
+
+Picasso, Pablo, 19, 183
+
+Piccinni, Niccola, 24, 258
+
+Pinero, Arthur Wing, 234, 295, 302, 303, 321
+
+Pinto, Mrs., 257
+
+Pischek, Johann, 173
+
+Pistocchi, Francesco, 99
+
+Plagiarism, 79
+
+Poe, Edgar Allan, 44, 87
+
+Pogliani, Giacomo, 157
+
+Poiret, Paul, 154, 222
+
+Poisons, 51, 52, 59, 64, 76
+
+Pollard, Percival, 48
+
+Pompadour, Mme. de, 260
+
+Ponchielli, Amilcare, 175
+
+Popular music, 23
+
+Porpora, 95, 96, 99
+
+Pougy, Liane de, 201
+
+Pratella, Balilla, 329
+
+Puccini, Giacomo, 24, 26, 29, 100, 103, 108, 113, 157, 173, 175, 318,
+  329
+
+Puchol, Luisita, 288
+
+Puente, del, 159
+
+Purcell, Henry, 152
+
+Puritanism, 65
+
+Pyrrhonist, 179
+
+
+Quincy, de, 31
+
+Quinlan, Gertrude, 219
+
+
+Rabusson, 63
+
+Rachel, 250, 301, 302, 310
+
+Radcliffe, Mrs., 74
+
+Raff, Joseph Joachim, 23
+
+Ragtime, 110, 152, 290
+
+Rankin, Phyllis, 219
+
+Ravel, Maurice, 200, 315, 329
+
+Realism in fiction, 56, 77, 88
+
+Realistic acting, 105, 111
+
+Reeves, Sims, 263
+
+Reger, Max, 27, 29
+
+Rehan, Ada, 319, 320
+
+Reicher, Frank, 300
+
+Reinhardt, Max, 282
+
+Renan, 76
+
+Renaud, Maurice, 107, 246
+
+Repplier, Agnes, 9, 38, 69
+
+Reszke, Jean de, 100
+
+Retz, Gille de, 80
+
+Rimbaud, Arthur, 43
+
+Rimsky-Korsakov, 157, 299, 315
+
+Ring, Blanche, 110
+
+Ristori, 302
+
+Rives, Mme. Amelie, 48
+
+Rodin, Auguste, 129, 227, 228, 312
+
+Rome, 70, 71
+
+Ronalds, Lorillard, 69
+
+Ronconi, Giorgio, 97, 98, 246
+
+Ronsard, 76
+
+Roosevelt, Theodore, 120, 209
+
+Rops, Felicien, 312
+
+Rorer, Mrs., 149
+
+Rossini, Gioacchino, 25, 26, 28, 31, 33, 61, 97, 101, 102, 103, 142,
+  149, 168, 169, 248, 273, 288
+
+Rostand, 228
+
+Rowland, Adele, 222
+
+Rubgam, 164
+
+Rubini, Giovanni Battista, 163
+
+Rubinstein, Anton, 24, 112
+
+Runciman, J. F., 32, 234
+
+Russell, Lillian, 160, 220
+
+Russian Ballet, 282, 288, 315
+
+Rutherford, John S., 63
+
+
+Sacre-Coeur, Church of, 126, 130
+
+Sagan, Princesse de, 84
+
+St. Giorgio, Signor, 159, 160
+
+St. Paul's School, 42
+
+Salieri, Antonio, 170
+
+Salome, 66, 67, 86, 287
+
+Saltus, Edgar, 37 _et seq._, 117, 154, 187, 191, 225
+
+Saltus, Francis, 42
+
+Sanborn, Pitts, 118
+
+Sand, George, 26, 239, 240, 252
+
+Sanderson, Julia, 217
+
+Santley, Charles, 158, 167, 174, 264
+
+Sappho, 76, 82
+
+Sardou, 302, 303
+
+Satan, 58, 78, 286, 287
+
+Satie, Erik, 30, 329
+
+Saturday Review, The, 18
+
+Savoyarde, restaurant, 125, 126, 130, 131
+
+Scharwenka, Xaver, 155
+
+Scheherazade, 82
+
+Schillings, Max, 150
+
+Schoenberg, Arnold, 30, 32, 121, 329
+
+Schopenhauer, 43, 56
+
+Schroeder, Edwin Albert, 71
+
+Schroeder-Devrient, Wilhelmine, 99
+
+Schubert, 24, 27, 28, 33, 170, 205, 305, 310
+
+Schumann, 111, 274
+
+Scott, Cyril, 29, 329
+
+Scotti, Antonio, 107
+
+Scriptores Historiae Augustae, 70
+
+Seidl, Anton, 155
+
+Sembrich, Marcella, 104, 107, 108, 114, 115, 153, 271, 273 _et seq._
+
+Senesino, 95
+
+Shakespeare, 73, 76, 98, 147, 284, 298, 302, 305, 318 _et seq._
+
+Sharp, Cecil J., 30, 109
+
+Shaw, George Bernard, 42, 234, 235, 239, 318, 322
+
+Shepherd, Arthur, 200
+
+Sherwin, Louis, 222, 291, 293, 295
+
+Shield, William, 171, 172
+
+Siddons, Mrs., 18, 302, 303
+
+Simonds, W. E., 38
+
+Singing, 93 _et seq._
+
+Smith, Harry B., 222
+
+Snob, 50
+
+Socrates, 117
+
+Solomon, 19, 80, 82
+
+Sonata form, 33
+
+Sontag, Henrietta, 246 _et seq._
+
+Sophocles, 103, 302
+
+Sorbonne, 43
+
+Sousa, John Philip, 202, 209, 216
+
+Southeim, 164
+
+Spain, 19, 59, 62, 94, 100, 106, 142, 189, 190, 281 _et seq._
+
+Spiritualism, 43
+
+Spohr, Louis, 24
+
+Stanislavski, 283
+
+Stanton, Theodore, 38
+
+Starr, Hattie, 202
+
+Starr, Muriel, 253
+
+Steger, 164
+
+Stein, Gertrude, 19, 79, 229
+
+Steinlen, 139
+
+Steinway, William, 154
+
+Stevenson, R. L., 58, 74
+
+Stigelli, 166
+
+Stillman-Kelley, Edgar, 199, 202
+
+Straus, Oskar, 216
+
+Strauss, Johann, 25, 139, 216
+
+Strauss, Richard, 25, 30, 31, 32, 33, 100, 104, 113, 114, 120, 175, 330
+
+Stravinsky, Igor, 32, 100, 104, 114, 121, 152, 329
+
+Stuck, Franz von, 89
+
+Style in Singing, 98, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 116, 117, 118, 119,
+  245, 246, 249, 250, 251, 270, 273, 274, 276
+
+Style in Writing, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 53, 55, 56
+
+Suetonius, 70, 72
+
+Sullivan, Sir Arthur, 107, 169, 216, 220, 221
+
+Swinburne, 76, 307
+
+Symonds, J. A., 72
+
+Symons, Arthur, 188, 232, 245, 293, 301, 303
+
+Synge, J. M., 103
+
+
+Tacitus, 72
+
+Taggart, Lucy L., 209
+
+Tamagno, Francesco, 120
+
+Tasso, 62
+
+Taste, 11 _et seq._
+
+Tchekhov, 303
+
+Tempest, Marie, 219, 252, 301
+
+Temps, Le, 18
+
+Terence, 302
+
+Terry, Ellen, 301
+
+Tetrazzini, Luisa, 102, 160
+
+Thebes, Mme. de, 79
+
+Thomas, Ambroise, 173
+
+Thomas, Augustus, 235, 236, 295
+
+Thomas, Olive, 223
+
+Thomas, Theodore, 155
+
+Tiberius, 69
+
+Tichatschek, Joseph Aloys, 164
+
+Tilzer, Harry von, 202
+
+Tinney, Frank, 222
+
+Tissot, 67
+
+Toscanini, Arturo, 156
+
+Tradition, 24, 97, 281
+
+Troubetskoy, Prince, 157
+
+Tschaikovsky, 59, 312
+
+Turgeniev, 187, 252
+
+Twain, Mark, 261, 265
+
+
+Urban, Joseph, 222, 223
+
+
+Vagaries of genius, 55
+
+Valliere, Louise, de la, 13
+
+Valverde, Joaquin, 284 _et seq._
+
+Vaughn, Theresa, 219
+
+Verelst, Myndart, 56, 58
+
+Veiller, Bayard, 68
+
+Velasquez, 16, 190
+
+Verdi, Giuseppe, 120, 149, 173, 221, 270, 275, 298, 323
+
+Verlaine, Paul, 43
+
+Veronese, 16
+
+Versatility in acting, 300
+
+Vespasian, 69
+
+Viafora, 157
+
+Viardot, Pauline, 98, 250, 251, 252, 253
+
+Victory of Samothrace, The, 17, 312
+
+Vinci, Leonardo da, 190, 191, 301
+
+
+Wachtel, Theodor, 164
+
+Wagner, Richard, 23, 29, 32, 93, 96, 99, 100, 102, 104, 108, 113, 120,
+  150, 162, 173, 175, 270, 271, 274, 298, 301, 314
+
+Walter, Eugene, 68
+
+Walter, Gustav, 164
+
+Warfield, David, 295
+
+Wayburn, Ned, 281
+
+Weber, 27, 31, 98, 175
+
+Webster, 51
+
+Weckerlin, J. B., 169
+
+Weichsell, Carl, 172
+
+Weichsell, Charles, 172
+
+Weidley, David, 210
+
+Wendell, Barrett, 38
+
+Westminster Magazine, 39
+
+Whitmer, T. Carl, 200, 202
+
+Wilde, Oscar, 20, 43, 48, 55, 63, 64, 66, 70, 85, 86, 87, 187, 239,
+  282, 307
+
+Winter, William, 320, 324
+
+Wodehouse, P. G., 222
+
+Women, Saltus's opinion of, 73
+
+Wullner, Ludwig, 246
+
+
+Yeats, W. B., 192
+
+Yohe, May, 219
+
+
+Zandonai, Riccardo, 329
+
+Zeus, 82
+
+Ziegfeld, Florenz, 283
+
+Zuloaga, 290
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES
+
+
+Variations in spelling, hyphenation, and punctuation have been
+retained from the original book except for the following changes:
+
+Table of Contents: Added listings for FOOTNOTES and INDEX.
+
+Page 32: Used oe for the oe ligature in "oeuvre batarde".
+
+Page 189: Changed "their's" to "theirs".
+
+Page 227: Added "Young" to the chapter title, "Two Young American
+Playwrights," to match the Table of Contents and section title.
+
+Page 259: Changed "Eightenth Century" to "Eighteenth Century".
+
+Page 303: "Mrs. Siddone" might be a typo for "Mrs. Siddons". Retained.
+
+Page 320: Capitalized "It" in "As You Like It" for consistency.
+
+Page 331: (Index) Changed "Aeschylus" to "AEschylus" to match text.
+
+Page 332: (Index) The reference for Bergstrom, Hjalmar, 90 was not found
+anywhere in the original book, and page 90 was a blank page.
+
+Page 332: (Index) Changed page ref. 122 to 222 for Bernhardt, Sarah.
+
+Page 332: (Index) Changed "Caesar, Julius," to "Caesar, Julius," to
+match text.
+
+Page 338: (Index) Changed page ref. 176 to 76 for Michelet.
+
+Page 339: (Index) Changed "Peladin, Josephin" to "Peladan, Josephin"
+to match text.
+
+Page 341: (Index) Changed "Scriptores Historiae Augustae" to
+"Scriptores Historiae Augustae" to match text.
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