The Crayon Papers Part 8

Among the decorations of the kitchen was a printed sheet of woodcuts, representing the various holiday customs of Holland, with explanatory rhymes. Here I was delighted to recognize the jollities of New Year's Day; the festivities of Paas and Pinkster, and all the other merry-makings handed down in my native place from the earliest times of New Amsterdam, and which had been such bright spots in the year in my childhood. I eagerly made myself master of this precious doc.u.ment for a trifling consideration, and bore it off as a memento of the place; though I question if, in so doing, I did not carry off with me the whole current literature of Broek.

I must not omit to mention that this village is the paradise of cows as well as men; indeed you would almost suppose the cow to be as much an object of worship here as the bull was among the ancient Egyptians; and well does she merit it, for she is in fact the patroness of the place. The same scrupulous cleanliness, however, which pervades everything else, is manifested in the treatment of this venerated animal. She is not permitted to perambulate the place, but in winter, when she forsakes the rich pasture, a well-built house is provided for her, well painted, and maintained in the most perfect order. Her stall is of ample dimensions; the floor is scrubbed and polished; her hide is daily curried and brushed and sponged to her heart's content, and her tail is daintily tucked up to the ceiling, and decorated with a ribbon!

On my way back through the village, I pa.s.sed the house of the prediger, or preacher; a very comfortable mansion, which led me to augur well of the state of religion in the village. On inquiry, I was told that for a long time the inhabitants lived in a great state of indifference as to religious matters; it was in vain that their preachers endeavored to arouse their thoughts as to a future state; the joys of heaven, as commonly depicted, were but little to their taste. At length a dominie appeared among them who struck out in a different vein. He depicted the New Jerusalem as a place all smooth and level; with beautiful d.y.k.es, and ditches, and ca.n.a.ls; and houses all shining with paint and varnish, and glazed tiles; and where there should never come horse, or a.s.s, or cat, or dog, or anything that could make noise or dirt; but there should be nothing but rubbing and scrubbing, and washing and painting, and gilding and varnishing, for ever and ever, amen! Since that time, the good housewives of Broek have all turned their faces Zionward.

SKETCHES IN PARIS IN 1825

FROM THE TRAVELING NOTE-BOOK OF GEOFFREY CRAYON, GENT.

A Parisian hotel is a street set on end, the grand staircase forming the highway, and every floor a separate habitation. Let me describe the one in which I am lodged, which may serve as a specimen of its cla.s.s. It is a huge quadrangular pile of stone, built round a s.p.a.cious paved court. The ground floor is occupied by shops, magazines, and domestic offices. Then comes the _entre-sol_, with low ceilings, short windows, and dwarf chambers; then succeed a succession of floors, or stories, rising one above the other, to the number of Mahomet's heavens. Each floor is like a distinct mansion, complete in itself, with ante-chamber, saloons, dining and sleeping rooms, kitchen and other conveniences for the accommodation of a family. Some floors are divided into two or more suites of apartments. Each apartment has its main door of entrance, opening upon the staircase, or landing-places, and locked like a street door. Thus several families and numerous single persons live under the same roof, totally independent of each other, and may live so for years without holding more intercourse than is kept up in other cities by residents in the same street.

Like the great world, this little microcosm has its gradations of rank and style and importance. The _Premier_, or first floor, with its grand saloons, lofty ceilings, and splendid furniture, is decidedly the aristocratical part of the establishment. The second floor is scarcely less aristocratical and magnificent; the other floors go on lessening in splendor as they gain in alt.i.tude, and end with the attics, the region of petty tailors, clerks, and sewing-girls. To make the filling up of the mansion complete, every odd nook and corner is fitted up as a _joli pet.i.t appartement a garcon_ (a pretty little bachelor's apartment), that is to say, some little dark inconvenient nestling-place for a poor devil of a bachelor.

The whole domain is shut up from the street by a great _porte-cochere_, or portal, calculated for the admission of carriages.

This consists of two ma.s.sy folding-doors, that swing heavily open upon a s.p.a.cious entrance, pa.s.sing under the front of the edifice into the courtyard. On one side is a s.p.a.cious staircase leading to the upper apartments. Immediately without the portal is the porter's lodge, a small room with one or two bedrooms adjacent, for the accommodation of the _concierge_, or porter and his family. This is one of the most important functionaries of the hotel. He is, in fact, the Cerberus of the establishment, and no one can pa.s.s in or out without his knowledge and consent. The _porte-cochere_ in general is fastened by a sliding bolt, from which a cord or wire pa.s.ses into the porter's lodge. Whoever wishes to go out must speak to the porter, who draws the bolt. A visitor from without gives a single rap with the ma.s.sive knocker; the bolt is immediately drawn, as if by an invisible hand; the door stands ajar, the visitor pushes it open, and enters. A face presents itself at the gla.s.s door of the porter's little chamber; the stranger p.r.o.nounces the name of the person he comes to seek. If the person or family is of importance, occupying the first or second floor, the porter sounds a bell once or twice, to give notice that a visitor is at hand. The stranger in the meantime ascends the great staircase, the highway common to all, and arrives at the outer door, equivalent to a street door, of the suite of rooms inhabited by his friends.

Beside this hangs a bell-cord, with which he rings for admittance.

When the family or person inquired for is of less importance, or lives in some remote part of the mansion less easy to be apprised, no signal is given. The applicant p.r.o.nounces the name at the porter's door, and is told, _"Montez au troisieme, au quatrieme; sonnez a la porte a droite ou a gauche."_ ("Ascend to the third or fourth story; ring the bell on the right or left hand door"); as the case may be.

The porter and his wife act as domestics to such of the inmates of the mansion as do not keep servants; making their beds, arranging their rooms, lighting their fires, and doing other menial offices, for which they receive a monthly stipend. They are also in confidential intercourse with the servants of the other inmates, and, having an eye on all the incomers and outgoers, are thus enabled, by hook and by crook, to learn the secrets and domestic history of every member of the little territory within the _porte-cochere_.

The porter's lodge is accordingly a great scene of gossip, where all the private affairs of this interior neighborhood are discussed. The courtyard, also, is an a.s.sembling place in the evenings for the servants of the different families, and a sisterhood of sewing girls from the entre-sols and the attics, to play at various games, and dance to the music of their own songs, and the echoes of their feet, at which a.s.semblages the porter's daughter takes the lead; a fresh, pretty, buxom girl, generally called "_La Pet.i.te_," though almost as tall as a grenadier. These little evening gatherings, so characteristic of this gay country, are countenanced by the various families of the mansion, who often look down from their windows and balconies, on moonlight evenings, and enjoy the simple revels of their domestics. I must observe, however, that the hotel I am describing is rather a quiet, retired one, where most of the inmates are permanent residents from year to year, so that there is more of the spirit of neighborhood than in the bustling, fashionable hotels in the gay parts of Paris, which are continually changing their inhabitants.

MY FRENCH NEIGHBOR

I often amuse myself by watching from my window (which, by the bye, is tolerably elevated) the movements of the teeming little world below me; and as I am on sociable terms with the porter and his wife, I gather from them, as they light my fire, or serve my breakfast, anecdotes of all my fellow lodgers. I have been somewhat curious in studying a little antique Frenchman, who occupies one of the _jolie chambres a garcon_ already mentioned. He is one of those superannuated veterans who flourished before the revolution, and have weathered all the storms of Paris, in consequence, very probably, of being fortunately too insignificant to attract attention.

He has a small income, which he manages with the skill of a French economist; appropriating so much for his lodgings, so much for his meals; so much for his visits to St. Cloud and Versailles, and so much for his seat at the theater. He has resided in the hotel for years, and always in the same chamber, which he furnishes at his own expense. The decorations of the room mark his various ages. There are some gallant pictures which he hung up in his younger days; with a portrait of a lady of rank, whom he speaks tenderly of, dressed in the old French taste; and a pretty opera dancer, pirouetting in a hoop petticoat, who lately died at a good old age.

In a corner of this picture is stuck a prescription for rheumatism, and below it stands an easy-chair. He has a small parrot at the window, to amuse him when within doors, and a pug dog to accompany him in his daily peregrinations. While I am writing he is crossing the court to go out. He is attired in his best coat, of sky-blue, and is doubtless bound for the Tuileries. His hair is dressed in the old style, with powdered ear-locks and a pig-tail. His little dog trips after him, sometimes on four legs, sometimes on three, and looking as if his leather small-clothes were too tight for him. Now the old gentleman stops to have a word with an old crony who lives in the entre-sol, and is just returning from his promenade. Now they take a pinch of snuff together; now they pull out huge red cotton handkerchiefs (those "flags of abomination," as they have well been called) and blow their noses most sonorously. Now they turn to make remarks upon their two little dogs, who are exchanging the morning's salutation; now they part, and my old gentleman stops to have a pa.s.sing word with the porter's wife; and now he sallies forth, and is fairly launched upon the town for the day.

No man is so methodical as a complete idler, and none so scrupulous in measuring and portioning out his time as he whose time is worth nothing.

The old gentleman in question has his exact hour for rising, and for shaving himself by a small mirror hung against his cas.e.m.e.nt. He sallies forth at a certain hour every morning to take his cup of coffee and his roll at a certain cafe, where he reads the papers. He has been a regular admirer of the lady who presides at the bar, and always stops to have a little _badinage_ with her _en pa.s.sant_. He has his regular walks on the Boulevards and in the Palais Royal, where he sets his watch by the petard fired off by the sun at midday. He has his daily resort in the Garden of the Tuileries, to meet with a knot of veteran idlers like himself, who talk on pretty much the same subjects whenever they meet. He has been present at all the sights and shows and rejoicings of Paris for the last fifty years; has witnessed the great events of the revolution; the guillotining of the king and queen; the coronation of Bonaparte; the capture of Paris, and the restoration of the Bourbons. All these he speaks of with the coolness of a theatrical critic; and I question whether he has not been gratified by each in its turn; not from any inherent love of tumult, but from that insatiable appet.i.te for spectacle which prevails among the inhabitants of this metropolis. I have been amused with a farce, in which one of these systematic old triflers is represented. He sings a song detailing his whole day's round of insignificant occupations, and goes to bed delighted with the idea that his next day will be an exact repet.i.tion of the same routine:

"Je me couche le soir, Enchante de pouvoir Recommencer mon train Le lendemain Matin."

THE ENGLISHMAN AT PARIS

In another part of the hotel a handsome suite of rooms is occupied by an old English gentleman, of great probity, some understanding, and very considerable crustiness, who has come to France to live economically. He has a very fair property, but his wife, being of that blessed kind compared in Scripture to the fruitful vine, has overwhelmed him with a family of buxom daughters, who hang cl.u.s.tering about him, ready to be gathered by any hand. He is seldom to be seen in public without one hanging on each arm, and smiling on all the world, while his own mouth is drawn down at each corner like a mastiff's with internal growling at everything about him. He adheres rigidly to English fashion in dress, and trudges about in long gaiters and broad-brimmed hat; while his daughters almost overshadow him with feathers, flowers, and French bonnets.

He contrives to keep up an atmosphere of English habits, opinions, and prejudices, and to carry a semblance of London into the very heart of Paris. His mornings are spent at Galignani's news-room, where he forms one of a knot of inveterate quidnuncs, who read the same articles over a dozen times in a dozen different papers. He generally dines in company with some of his own countrymen, and they have what is called a "comfortable sitting"

after dinner, in the English fashion, drinking wine, discussing the news of the London papers, and canva.s.sing the French character, the French metropolis, and the French revolution, ending with a unanimous admission of English courage, English morality, English cookery, English wealth, the magnitude of London, and the ingrat.i.tude of the French.

His evenings are chiefly spent at a club of his countrymen, where the London papers are taken. Sometimes his daughters entice him to the theaters, but not often. He abuses French tragedy, as all fustian and bombast, Talma as a ranter, and d.u.c.h.esnois as a mere termagant. It is true his ear is not sufficiently familiar with the language to understand French verse, and he generally goes to sleep during the performance. The wit of the French comedy is flat and pointless to him. He would not give one of Munden's wry faces or Liston's inexpressible looks for the whole of it.

He will not admit that Paris has any advantage over London. The Seine is a muddy rivulet in comparison with the Thames; the West End of London surpa.s.ses the finest parts of the French capital; and on some one's observing that there was a very thick fog out of doors: "Pish!" said he, crustily, "it's nothing to the fogs we have in London."

He has infinite trouble in bringing his table into anything like conformity to English rule. With his liquors, it is true, he is tolerably successful.

He procures London porter, and a stock of port and sherry, at considerable expense; for he observes that he cannot stand those cursed thin French wines, they dilute his blood so much as to give him the rheumatism. As to their white wines, he stigmatizes them as mere subst.i.tutes for cider; and as to claret, why, "it would be port if it could." He has continual quarrels with his French cook, whom he renders wretched by insisting on his conforming to Mrs. Gla.s.s; for it is easier to convert a Frenchman from his religion than his cookery. The poor fellow, by dint of repeated efforts, once brought himself to serve up _ros bif_ sufficiently raw to suit what he considered the cannibal taste of his master; but then he could not refrain, at the last moment, adding some exquisite sauce, that put the old gentleman in a fury.

He detests wood-fires, and has procured a quant.i.ty of coal; but not having a grate, he is obliged to burn it on the hearth. Here he sits poking and stirring the fire with one end of a tongs, while the room is as murky as a smithy; railing at French chimneys, French masons, and French architects; giving a poke at the end of every sentence, as though he were stirring up the very bowels of the delinquents he is anathematizing. He lives in a state militant with inanimate objects around him; gets into high dudgeon with doors and cas.e.m.e.nts, because they will not come under English law, and has implacable feuds with sundry refractory pieces of furniture. Among these is one in particular with which he is sure to have a high quarrel every tune he goes to dress. It is a _commode_, one of those smooth, polished, plausible pieces of French furniture that have the perversity of five hundred devils. Each drawer has a will of its own, will open or not, just as the whim takes it, and sets lock and key at defiance. Sometimes a drawer will refuse to yield to either persuasion or force, and will part with both handles rather than yield; another will come out in the most coy and coquettish manner imaginable; elbowing along, zig-zag; one corner retreating as the other advances; making a thousand difficulties and objections at every move; until the old gentleman, out of all patience, gives a sudden jerk, and brings drawer and contents into the middle of the floor. His hostility to this unlucky piece of furniture increases every day, as if incensed that it does not grow better. He is like the fretful invalid who cursed his bed, that the longer he lay the harder it grew. The only benefit he has derived from the quarrel is that it has furnished him with a crusty joke, which he utters on all occasions. He swears that a French _commode_ is the most _incommodious_ thing in existence, and that although the nation cannot make a joint-stool that will stand steady, yet they are always talking of everything's being _perfectionee_.

His servants understand his humor, and avail themselves of it. He was one day disturbed by a pertinacious rattling and shaking at one of the doors, and bawled out in an angry tone to know the cause of the disturbance.

"Sir," said the footman, testily, "it's this confounded French lock!" "Ah!"

said the old gentleman, pacified by this. .h.i.t at the nation, "I thought there was something French at the bottom of it!"

ENGLISH AND FRENCH CHARACTER

As I am a mere looker on in Europe, and hold myself as much as possible aloof from its quarrels and prejudices, I feel something like one overlooking a game, who, without any great skill of his own, can occasionally perceive the blunders of much abler players. This neutrality of feeling enables me to enjoy the contrasts of character presented in this time of general peace, when the various peoples of Europe, who have so long been sundered by wars, are brought together and placed side by side in this great gathering-place of nations. No greater contrast, however, is exhibited than that of the French and English. The peace has deluged this gay capital with English visitors of all ranks and conditions. They throng every place of curiosity and amus.e.m.e.nt; fill the public gardens, the galleries, the cafes, saloons, theaters; always herding together, never a.s.sociating with the French. The two nations are like two threads of different colors, tangled together but never blended.

In fact they present a continual ant.i.thesis, and seem to value themselves upon being unlike each other; yet each have their peculiar merits, which should ent.i.tle them to each other's esteem. The French intellect is quick and active. It flashes its way into a subject with the rapidity of lightning; seizes upon remote conclusions with a sudden bound, and its deductions are almost intuitive. The English intellect is less rapid, but more persevering; less sudden, but more sure in its deductions. The quickness and mobility of the French enable them to find enjoyment in the multiplicity of sensations. They speak and act more from immediate impressions than from reflection and meditation. They are therefore more social and communicative; more fond of society, and of places of public resort and amus.e.m.e.nt. An Englishman is more reflective in his habits. He lives in the world of his own thoughts, and seems more self-existent and self-dependent. He loves the quiet of his own apartment; even when abroad, he in a manner makes a little solitude around him by his silence and reserve; he moves about shy and solitary, and, as it were, b.u.t.toned up, body and soul.

The French are great optimists; they seize upon every good as it flies, and revel in the pa.s.sing pleasure. The Englishman is too apt to neglect the present good, in preparing against the possible evil. However adversities may lower, let the sun shine but for a moment, and forth sallies the mercurial Frenchman, in holiday dress and holiday spirits, gay as a b.u.t.terfly, as though his sunshine were perpetual; but let the sun beam never so brightly, so there be but a cloud in the horizon, the wary Englishman ventures forth distrustfully, with his umbrella in his hand.

The Frenchman has a wonderful facility at turning small things to advantage. No one can be gay and luxurious on smaller means; no one requires less expense to be happy. He practices a kind of gilding in his style of living, and hammers out every guinea into gold leaf. The Englishman, on the contrary, is expensive in his habits, and expensive in his enjoyments. He values everything, whether useful or ornamental, by what it costs. He has no satisfaction in show, unless it be solid and complete.

Everything goes with him by the square foot. Whatever display he makes, the depth is sure to equal the surface.

The Frenchman's habitation, like himself, is open, cheerful, bustling, and noisy. He lives in a part of a great hotel, with wide portal, paved court, a s.p.a.cious dirty stone staircase, and a family on every floor. All is clatter and chatter. He is good-humored and talkative with his servants, sociable with his neighbors, and complaisant to all the world. Anybody has access to himself and his apartments; his very bedroom is open to visitors, whatever may be its state of confusion; and all this not from any peculiarly hospitable feeling, but from that communicative habit which predominates over his character.

The Englishman, on the contrary, ensconces himself in a snug brick mansion, which he has all to himself; locks the front door; puts broken bottles along his walls, and spring guns and man-traps in his gardens; shrouds himself with trees and window-curtains; exults in his quiet and privacy, and seems disposed to keep out noise, daylight, and company. His house, like himself, has a reserved, inhospitable exterior; yet whoever gains admittance is apt to find a warm heart and warm fireside within.

The French excel in wit, the English in humor; the French have gayer fancy, the English richer imagination. The former are full of sensibility; easily moved, and p.r.o.ne to sudden and great excitement; but their excitement is not durable; the English are more phlegmatic; not so readily affected, but capable of being aroused to great enthusiasm. The faults of these opposite temperaments are that the vivacity of the French is apt to sparkle up and be frothy, the gravity of the English to settle down and grow muddy. When the two characters can be fixed in a medium, the French kept from effervescence and the English from stagnation, both will be found excellent.

This contrast of character may also be noticed in the great concerns of the two nations. The ardent Frenchman is all for military renown; he fights for glory, that is to say, for success in arms. For, provided the national flag is victorious, he cares little about the expense, the injustice, or the inutility of the war. It is wonderful how the poorest Frenchman will revel on a triumphant bulletin; a great victory is meat and drink to him; and at the sight of a military sovereign, bringing home captured cannon and captured standards, he throws up his greasy cap in the air, and is ready to jump out of his wooden shoes for joy.

John Bull, on the contrary, is a reasoning, considerate person. If he does wrong, it is in the most rational way imaginable. He fights because the good of the world requires it. He is a moral person, and makes war upon his neighbor for the maintenance of peace and good order, and sound principles.

He is a money-making personage, and fights for the prosperity of commerce and manufactures. Thus the two nations have been fighting, time out of mind, for glory and good. The French, in pursuit of glory, have had their capital twice taken; and John, in pursuit of good, has run himself over head and ears in debt.