Part 4
And though fond of romancing a little now and then, and embellishing a good story, he was absolutely truthful in important matters, and to be relied upon implicitly.
He seemed also to be quite without the sense of physical fear--a kind of callousness.
Such, roughly, was the boy who lived to write the _Motes in a Moonbeam_ and _La quatrième Dimension_ before he was thirty; and such, roughly, he remained through life, except for one thing: he grew to be the very soul of passionate and compassionate sympathy, as who doesn't feel who has ever read a page of his work, or even had speech with him for half an hour?
Whatever weaknesses he yielded to when he grew to man's estate are such as the world only too readily condones in many a famous man less tempted than Josselin was inevitably bound to be through life. Men of the Josselin type (there are not many--he stands pretty much alone) can scarcely be expected to journey from adolescence to middle age with that impeccable decorum which I--and no doubt many of my masculine readers--have found it so easy to achieve, and find it now so pleasant to remember and get credit for. Let us think of _The Footprints of Aurora_, or _Étoiles mortes_, or _Déjanire et Dalila_, or even _Les Trépassées de François Villon!_
Then let us look at Rajon's etching of Watts's portrait of him (the original is my own to look at whenever I like, and that is pretty often). And then let us not throw too many big stones, or too hard, at Barty Josselin.
Well, the summer term of 1847 wore smoothly to its close--a happy "trimestre" during which the Institution F. Brossard reached the high-water mark of its prosperity.
There were sixty boys to be taught, and six house-masters to teach them, besides a few highly paid outsiders for special classes--such as the lively M. Durosier for French literature, and M. le Professeur Martineau for the higher mathematics, and so forth; and crammers and coachers for St.-Cyr, the Polytechnic School, the École des Ponts et Chaussées.
Also fencing-masters, gymnastic masters, a Dutch master who taught us German and Italian--an Irish master with a lovely brogue who taught us English. Shall I ever forget the blessed day when ten or twelve of us were presented with an _Ivanhoe_ apiece as a class-book, or how Barty and I and Bonneville (who knew English) devoured the immortal story in less than a week--to the disgust of Rapaud, who refused to believe that we could possibly know such a beastly tongue as English well enough to read an English book for mere pleasure--on our desks in play-time, or on our laps in school, _en cachette_! "Quelle sacrée pose!"
He soon mislaid his own copy, did Rapaud; just as he mislaid my _Monte Cristo_ and Jolivet's illustrated _Wandering Jew_--and it was always:
"Dis donc, Maurice!--prête-moi ton _Ivanhoé_!" (with an accent on the e), whenever he had to construe his twenty lines of Valtère Scott--and what a hash he made of them!
Sometimes M. Brossard himself would come, smoking his big meerschaum, and help the English class during preparation, and put us up to a thing or two worth knowing.
"Rapaud, comment dit-on '_pouvoir_' en anglais?"
"Sais pas, m'sieur!"
"Comment, petit crétin, tu ne sais pas!"
And Rapaud would receive a _pincée tordue_--a "twisted pinch"--on the back of his arm to quicken his memory.
"Oh, là, là!" he would howl--"je n' sais pas!"
"Et toi, Maurice?"
"Ça se dit '_to be able_,' m'sieur!" I would say.
"Mais non, mon ami--tu oublies ta langue natale--ça se dit, '_to can_'! Maintenant, comment dirais-tu en anglais, '_je voudrais pouvoir_'?"
"Je dirais, '_I would like to be able._'"
"Comment, encore! petit cancre! allons--tu es Anglais--tu sais bien que tu dirais, '_I vould vill to can_'!"
Then M. Brossard turns to Barty: "A ton tour, Josselin!"
"Moi, m'sieur?" says Barty.
"Oui, toi!--comment dirais-tu, '_je pourrais vouloir_'?"
"Je dirais '_I vould can to vill_,'" says Barty, quite unabashed.
"À la bonne heure! au moins tu sais ta langue, toi!" says Père Brossard, and pats him on the cheek; while Barty winks at me, the wink of successful time-serving hypocrisy, and Bonneville writhes with suppressed delight.
What lives most in my remembrance of that summer is the lovely weather we had, and the joy of the Passy swimming-bath every Thursday and Sunday from two till five or six; it comes back to me even now in heavenly dreams by night. I swim with giant side-strokes all round the Île des Cygnes between Passy and Grenelle, where the École de Natation was moored for the summer months.
Round and round the isle I go, up stream and down, and dive and float and wallow with bliss there is no telling--till the waters all dry up and disappear, and I am left wading in weeds and mud and drift and drought and desolation, and wake up shivering--and such is life.
As for Barty, he was all but amphibious, and reminded me of the seal at the Jardin des Plantes. He really seemed to spend most of the afternoon under water, coming up to breathe now and then at unexpected moments, with a stone in his mouth that he had picked up from the slimy bottom ten or twelve feet below--or a weed--or a dead mussel.
Part Second
"Laissons les regrets et les pleurs À la vieillesse; Jeunes, il faut cueillir les fleurs De la jeunesse!"--Baïf.
Sometimes we spent the Sunday morning in Paris, Barty and I--in picture-galleries and museums and wax-figure shows, churches and cemeteries, and the Hôtel Cluny and the Baths of Julian the Apostate--or the Jardin des Plantes, or the Morgue, or the knackers' yards at Montfaucon--or lovely slums. Then a swim at the Bains Deligny. Then lunch at some restaurant on the Quai Voltaire, or in the Quartier Latin. Then to some café on the Boulevards, drinking our demi-tasse and our chasse-café, and smoking our cigarettes like men, and picking our teeth like gentlemen of France.
Once after lunch at Vachette's with Berquin (who was seventeen) and Bonneville (the marquis who had got an English mother), we were sitting outside the Café des Variétés, in the midst of a crowd of consommateurs, and tasting to the full the joy of being alive, when a poor woman came up with a guitar, and tried to sing "Le petit mousse noir," a song Barty knew quite well--but she couldn't sing a bit, and nobody listened.
"Allons, Josselin, chante-nous ça!" said Berquin.
And Bonneville jumped up, and took the woman's guitar from her, and forced it into Josselin's hands, while the crowd became much interested and began to applaud.
Thus encouraged, Barty, who never in all his life knew what it is to be shy, stood up and piped away like a bird; and when he had finished the story of the little black cabin-boy who sings in the maintop halliards, the applause was so tremendous that he had to stand up on a chair and sing another, and yet another.
"Écoute-moi bien, ma Fleurette!" and "Amis, la matinée est belle!" (from _La Muette de Portici_), while the pavement outside the Variétés was rendered quite impassable by the crowd that had gathered round to look and listen--and who all joined in the chorus:
"Conduis ta barque avec prudence, Pêcheur! parle bas! Jette tes filets en silence Pêcheur! parle bas! Et le roi des mers ne nous échappera pas!" (_bis_).
and the applause was deafening.
Meanwhile Bonneville and Berquin went round with the hat and gathered quite a considerable sum, in which there seemed to be almost as much silver as copper--and actually _two five-franc pieces and an English half-sovereign_! The poor woman wept with gratitude at coming into such a fortune, and insisted on kissing Barty's hand. Indeed it was a quite wonderful ovation, considering how unmistakably British was Barty's appearance, and how unpopular we were in France just then!
[Illustration: "AMIS, LA MATINÉE EST BELLE"]
He had his new shiny black silk chimney-pot hat on, and his Eton jacket, with the wide shirt collar. Berquin, in a tightly fitting double-breasted brown cloth swallow-tailed coat with brass buttons, yellow nankin bell-mouthed trousers strapped over varnished boots, butter-colored gloves, a blue satin stock, and a very tall hairy hat with a wide curly brim, looked such an out-and-out young gentleman of France that we were all proud of being seen in his company--especially young de Bonneville, who was still in mourning for his father and wore a crape band round his arm, and a common cloth cap with a leather peak, and thick blucher boots; though he was quite sixteen, and already had a little black mustache like an eyebrow, and inhaled the smoke of his cigarette without coughing and quite naturally, and ordered the waiters about just as if he already wore the uniform of the École St.-Cyr, for which he destined himself (and was not disappointed. He should be a marshal of France by now--perhaps he is).
Then we went to the Café Mulhouse on the Boulevard des Italiens (on the "_Boul. des It._," as we called it, to be in the fashion)--that we might gaze at Señor Joaquin Eliezegui, the Spanish giant, who was eight feet high and a trifle over (or under--I forget which): he told us himself. Barty had a passion for gazing at very tall men; like Frederic the Great (or was it his Majesty's royal father?).
Then we went to the Boulevard Bonne-Nouvelle, where, in a painted wooden shed, a most beautiful Circassian slave, miraculously rescued from some abominable seraglio in Constantinople, sold pen'orths of "galette du gymnase." On her raven hair she wore a silk turban all over sequins, silver and gold, with a yashmak that fell down behind, leaving her adorable face exposed: she had an amber vest of silk, embroidered with pearls as big as walnuts, and Turkish pantalettes--what her slippers were we couldn't see, but they must have been lovely, like all the rest of her. Barty had a passion for gazing at very beautiful female faces--like his father before him.
There was a regular queue of postulants to see this heavenly Eastern houri and buy her confection, which is very like Scotch butter-cake, but not so digestible; and even more filling at the price. And three of us sat on a bench, while three times running Barty took his place in that procession--soldiers, sailors, workmen, chiffonniers, people of all sorts, women as many as men--all of them hungry for galette, but hungrier still for a good humanizing stare at a beautiful female face; and he made the slow and toilsome journey to the little wooden booth three times--and brought us each a pen'orth on each return journey; and the third time, Katidjah (such was her sweet Oriental name) leaned forward over her counter and kissed him on both cheeks, and whispered in his ear (in English--and with the accent of Stratford-atte-Bowe):
"You little _duck_! _your_ name is _Brown_, _I_ know!"
And he came away, his face pale with conflicting emotions, and told us!
How excited we were! Bonneville (who spoke English quite well) went for a pen'orth on his own account, and said: "My name's Brown too, Miss Katidjah!" But he didn't get a kiss.
(She soon after married a Mr. ----, of ----, the well-known ---- Of ----shire, in ----land. She may be alive now.)
Then to the Palais Royal, to dine at the "Dîner Européen" with M. Berquin père, a famous engineer; and finally to stalls at the "Français" to see the two first acts of _Le Cid_; and this was rather an anticlimax--for we had too much "Cid" at the Institution F. Brossard already!
And then, at last, to the omnibus station in the Rue de Rivoli, whence the "Accélérées" (en correspondence avec les Constantines) started for Passy every ten minutes; and thus, up the gas-lighted Champs-Élysées, and by the Arc de Triomphe, to the Rond-point de l'Avenue de St.-Cloud; tired out, but happy--happy--happy _comme on ne l'est plus_!
Before the school broke up for the holidays there were very severe examinations--but no "distribution de prix"; we were above that kind of thing at Brossard's, just as we were above wearing a uniform or taking in day boarders.
Barty didn't come off very well in this competition; but he came off anyhow much better than I, who had failed to be "diligent and attentive"--too much _Monte Cristo_, I'm afraid.
At all events Barty got five marks for English History, because he remembered a good deal about Richard Coeur de Lion, and John, and Friar Tuck, and Robin Hood, and especially one Cedric the Saxon, a historical personage of whom the examiner (a decorated gentleman from the Collège de France) had never even heard!
* * * * *
And then (to the tune of "Au clair de la lune"):
"Vivent les vacances-- _Denique tandèm_; Et les pénitences-- _Habebunt finèm_! Les pions intraitables, _Vultu Barbarò_, S'en iront aux diables, _Gaudio nostrò_."
N.B.--The accent is always on the last syllable in French Latin--and _pion_ means an usher.
[Illustration: "TOO MUCH 'MONTE CRISTO,' I'M AFRAID"]
Barty went to Yorkshire with the Rohans, and I spent most of my holidays with my mother and sister (and the beautiful Miss ----) at Mademoiselle Jalabert's, next door--coming back to school for most of my meals, and at night to sleep, with a whole dormitory to myself, and no dreadful bell at five in the morning; and so much time to spare that I never found any leisure for my holiday task, that skeleton at the feast; no more did Jules, the sergeant's son; no more did Caillard, who spent his vacation at Brossard's because his parents lived in Russia, and his "correspondant" in Paris was ill.
The only master who remained behind was Bonzig, who passed his time painting ships and sailors, in oil-colors; it was a passion with him: corvettes, brigantines, British whalers, fishing-smacks, revenue-cutters, feluccas, caïques, even Chinese junks--all was fish that came to his net. He got them all from _La France Maritime_, an illustrated periodical much in vogue at Brossard's; and also his storms and his calms, his rocks and piers and light-houses--for he had never seen the sea he was so fond of. He took us every morning to the Passy swimming-baths, and in the afternoon for long walks in Paris, and all about and around, and especially to the Musée de Marine at the Louvre, that we might gaze with him at the beautiful models of three-deckers.
He evidently pitied our forlorn condition, and told us delightful stories about seafaring life, like Mr. Clark Russell's; and how he, some day, hoped to see the ocean for himself before he died--and with his own eyes.
I really don't know how Jules and Caillard would have got through the hideous _ennui_ of that idle September without him. Even I, with my mother and sister and the beautiful Miss ---- within such easy reach, found time hang heavily at times. One can't be always reading, even Alexandre Dumas; nor always loafing about, even in Paris, by one's self (Jules and Caillard were not allowed outside the gates without Bonzig); and beautiful English girls of eighteen, like Miss ----s, don't always want a small boy dangling after them, and show it sometimes; which I thought very hard.
It was almost a relief when school began again in October, and the boys came back with their wonderful stories of the good time they had all had (especially some of the big boys, who were "en rhétorique et en philosophie")--and all the game that had fallen to their guns--wild-boars, roebucks, cerfs-dix-cors, and what not; of perilous swims in stormy seas--tremendous adventures in fishing-smacks on moonlight nights (it seemed that the moon had been at the full all through those wonderful six weeks); rides _ventre à terre_ on mettlesome Arab steeds through gloomy wolf-haunted forests with charming female cousins; flirtations and "good fortunes" with beautiful but not happily married women in old mediæval castle keeps. Toujours au clair de la lune! They didn't believe each other in the least, these gay young romancers--nor expect to be believed themselves; but it was very exciting all the same; and they listened, and were listened to in turn, without a gesture of incredulity--nor even a smile! And we small boys held our tongues in reverence and awe.
When Josselin came back he had wondrous things to tell too--but so preposterous that they disbelieved him quite openly, and told him so. How in London he had seen a poor woman so tipsy in the street that she had to be carried away by two policemen on a stretcher. How he had seen brewers' dray-horses nearly six feet high at the shoulder--and one or two of them with a heavy cavalry mustache drooping from its upper lip.
How he had been presented to the Lord Mayor of London, and even shaken hands with him, in Leadenhall Market, and that his Lordship was quite plainly dressed; and how English Lord Mayors were not necessarily "hommes du monde," nor always hand in glove with Queen Victoria!
Splendide mendax!
But they forgave him all his mendacity for the sake of a new accomplishment he had brought back with him, and which beat all his others. He could actually turn a somersault backwards with all the ease and finish of a professional acrobat. How he got to do this I don't know. It must have been natural to him and he never found it out before; he was always good at gymnastics--and all things that required grace and agility more than absolute strength.
Also he brought back with him (from Leadenhall Market, no doubt) a gigantic horned owl, fairly tame--and with eyes that reminded us of le grand Bonzig's.
School began, and with it the long evenings with an hour's play by lamp-light in the warm salle d'études; and the cold lamp-lit ninety minutes' preparation on an empty stomach, after the short perfunctory morning prayer--which didn't differ much from the evening one.
Barty was still _en cinquième_, at the top! and I at the tail of the class immediately above--so near and yet so far! so I did not have many chances of improving my acquaintance with him that term; for he still stuck to Laferté and Bussy-Rabutin--they were inseparable, those three.
At mid-day play-time the weather was too cold for anything but games, which were endless in their variety and excitement; it would take a chapter to describe them.
It is a mistake to think that French school-boys are (or were) worse off than ours in this. I will not say that any one French game is quite so good as cricket or football for a permanency. But I remember a great many that are very nearly so.
Indeed, French rounders (la balle au camp) seems to me the best game that ever was--on account of the quick rush and struggle of the fielders to get home when an inside boy is hit between the bases, lest he should pick the ball up in time to hit one of them with it before the camp is reached; in which case there is a most exciting scrimmage for the ball, etc., etc.
Barty was good at all games, especially la balle au camp. I used to envy the graceful, easy way he threw the ball--so quick and straight it seemed to have no curve at all in its trajectory: and how it bounded off the boy it nearly always hit between the shoulders!
At evening, play in the school-room, besides draughts and chess and backgammon; M. Bonzig, when _de service_, would tell us thrilling stories, with "la suite au prochain numéro" when the bell rang at 7.30; a long series that lasted through the winter of '47-'48. _Le Tueur de Daims_, _Le Lac Ontario_, _Le Dernier des Mohicans_, _Les Pionniers_, _La Prairie_--by one Fénimore Coupère; all of which he had read in M. Defauconpret's admirable translations. I have read some of them in their native American since then, myself. I loved them always--but they seemed to lack some of the terror, the freshness, and the charm his fluent utterance and solemn nasal voice put into them as he sat and smoked his endless cigarettes with his back against the big stone stove, and his eyes dancing sideways through his glasses. Never did that "ding-dang-dong" sound more hateful than when le grand Bonzig was telling the tale of Bas-de-cuir's doings, from his innocent youth to his noble and Pathetic death by sunset, with his ever-faithful and still-serviceable but no longer deadly rifle (the friend of sixty years) lying across his knees. I quote from memory; what a gun that was!
Then on Thursdays, long walks, two by two, in Paris, with Bonzig or Dumollard; or else in the Bois to play rounders or prisoners' base in a clearing, or skate on the Mare aux Biches, which was always so hard to find in the dense thicket ... poor Lord Runswick! _He_ found it once too often!
La Mare d'Auteuil was too deep, and too popular with "la flotte de Passy," as we called the Passy voyous, big and small, who came there in their hundreds--to slide and pick up quarrels with well-dressed and respectable school-boys. Liberté--égalité--fraternité! ou la mort! Vive la république! (This, by-the-way, applies to the winter that came _next_.)
So time wore on with us gently; through the short vacation at New-year's day till the 23d or 24th of February, when the Revolution broke out, and Louis Philippe premier had to fly for his life. It was a very troublous time, and the school for a whole week was in a state of quite heavenly demoralization! Ten times a day, or in the dead of night, the drum would beat _le rappel_ or _la générale_. A warm wet wind was blowing--the most violent wind I can remember that was not an absolute gale. It didn't rain, but the clouds hurried across the sky all day long, and the tops of the trees tried to bend themselves in two; and their leafless boughs and black broken twigs littered the deserted playground--for we all sat on the parapet of the terrace by the lingerie; boys and servants, le père et la mere Jaurion, Mlle. Marceline and the rest, looking towards Paris--all feeling bound to each other by a common danger, like wild beasts in a flood. Dear me! I'm out of breath from sheer pleasure in the remembrance.
One night we had to sleep on the floor for fear of stray bullets; and that was a fearful joy never to be forgotten--it almost kept us awake! Peering out of the school-room windows at dusk, we saw great fires, three or four at a time. Suburban retreats of the over-wealthy, in full conflagration; and all day the rattle of distant musketry and the boom of cannon a long way off, near Montmartre and Montfaucon, kept us alive.
Most of the boys went home, and some of them never came back--and from that day the school began to slowly decline. Père Brossard--an ancient "Brigand de la Loire," as the republicans of his youth were called--was elected a representative of his native town at the Chamber of Deputies; and possibly that did the school more harm than good--ne sutor ultra crepidam! as he was so fond of impressing on _us_!
However, we went on pretty much as usual through spring and summer--with occasional alarms (which we loved), and beatings of _le rappel_--till the July insurrection broke out.