CHAPTER VI

CONVERSATION

We come at last to conversation.

This was the goal, the sanctuary of happiness, nay, bliss itself. All that we have hitherto spoken of led up to this all-engrossing object, for love was the supreme end, and speech is the vehicle of love. A circle of men about a lady, and she talking or making them talk,—this was the supreme and final formula of life.

Conversation, then, was the great art of the platonists, infinitely greater than painting or sculpture, greater than music, poetry or oratory, because it alone established real communication between soul and soul, it alone was privileged to body forth a whole realm of unexpressed emotions which would freeze at the end of a pen or pencil, and which music itself would render but ill. Words that well up with the eloquence of spontaneity possess an indescribable vital force impossible to analyse; innumerable details contribute to it—the inflection of the voice, the gesture, the expression of the eyes, the movement of the lips, the play of all the features. A mineral water taken at its source has, as every one knows, singular virtues which are impoverished if it is carried to a distance, and which the most skilful chemist cannot restore. So also the fount of human intelligence must be drunk at its source. If need be, it is well worth a journey.

Without women there would be no conversation. For a man who thinks he can converse without wearing the feminine yoke there is nothing but to go off by himself like Cardan, that intolerable chatterbox, who, though the author of two hundred and fifty-five volumes, had the audacity to publish a book _In Praise of Silence_. “Never,” he exclaims, “am I more truly with those I love than when I am alone.” Our opinion would rather coincide with that of the amiable emigré whom his friends urged to marry the object of his passion, and who answered, “But then, where should I spend my evenings?” To draw a man out and show him what he is capable of, it is necessary for a woman to throw out the bait; an ambition to please, an instinct of sympathy, a thousand fleeting intangible nothings, veritable microbes of sentiment, will do the rest. But we do not hesitate to add that, without men, women would hardly know how to talk. Men have often inveighed against the loquacity,[253] the backbiting,[254] the imprudence, the frivolity, the paltry and scandalmongering spirit of the rudimentary and inartistic conversations that women engage in when left to themselves; this kind of conversation can no more be called conversation than certain intrigues can be called love, or than daubing a house front can be called painting a picture.

Certain of women’s little defects remain defects or become virtues according as the women know or do not know how to make use of them. Gossips, the women who can think and talk certainly are, and they plume themselves on the fact. That can only be called a defect in those who have nothing to say. Margaret of France confesses that when she opened her mouth, it was long before she shut it again.[255] Sometimes, however, women are troubled with a certain intellectual timidity arising either from their education, as their friends say, or from their temperament, as their enemies maintain. They easily make up their minds, but can seldom give you their reasons; their intellect clings like ivy to some principle reputed substantial, in other words, one that is affirmed by their neighbours, or is traditional, or is ingrained from childhood; and the slightest breath of raillery only attaches them to it the more closely.

This disposition would be fatal to a writer. To write one needs the power to think for oneself and to give virile expression to one’s thoughts, at the risk of getting a name for paradox or eccentricity; but for conversation nothing is less necessary; on the contrary, the trite is eminently serviceable. Conversation serves to test current ideas; it gives them so to speak a stamp, a hall-mark, a label, and women understand its utility all the better because they largely avail themselves of it and acquire their convictions through it. On the other hand they possess as the gift of Nature that which is the very life of conversation,—facility of assimilation without the necessity of going to the root of the matter; the ability to express quickly, clearly and copiously the impression of the moment; a feeling for fine shades; skill in fitly garbing their thoughts, and in maintaining them with the necessary unction, grace, and warmth. No more is needed.

The age in which we live, priding itself on its practical spirit, has neglected this art of conversation. We have almost entirely lost the feeling for it because of its unpretentiousness, and we declare it unimportant on the ground that we are no longer platonists and can no longer find in mere phrases the supreme felicity of life. Yet it is an art of eminent utility in regard to the charm of existence,—a genuine and highly intellectual art, an art that in the 18th century was one of our national glories. By their witty conversation the ladies of the house of Mortemart did more to make their race illustrious than all the artists and all the soldiers. Saint-Simon has given us an excellent description of the talent of three of them, who boasted neither of mysticism nor perhaps of philosophy—Mesdames de Montespan, de Fontevrault, and de Thianges: “Their court was the centre of wit, and wit of so special and fine a savour, yet withal so natural and pleasant, that it came to be noted for its unique character.... All three possessed it in abundance, and appeared to impart it to others. This charming sympathy of theirs still delights us in the survivors of those whom they bred up and attached to themselves; you could tell them among a thousand in the most miscellaneous company.” That was the goal aimed at by the 16th-century women, since it made men immortal, and gave them a full life on earth meanwhile—since, in a word, it was happiness.

We could scarcely realise the empire certain women exercised if we neglected to take into account their wonderful conversational powers, and judged them merely by their writings, or by their letters even. Justly or unjustly, the writings of Margaret of France met with no success. Marot, in complimenting his dear princess on them, had recourse to an evasion of no little ingenuity: “When I see your poems only, I marvel that people do not admire them more; but when I hear you speak, I veer completely round, amazed that anyone is so foolish as to marvel thereat.” Like many others, Margaret held sway through conversation.

Some cross-grained people imagine that to women talking is the easiest thing in the world, that friends spring up around them spontaneously, that the art reduces itself to finishing their toilette by lunch time and then letting their tongues wag till evening. It is extremely simple, they say. Simple! They think it sufficient then to fling their doors open on certain days, and to deal out here and there among their guests a few formal and chilling inanities! “Men are so scarce that when you have them you should rate them very high,” said Anne of France, very justly. Simple, not to rest satisfied with the mere glitter of small talk, but to take full possession of one’s visitors, to form a warm nest of friends! It is a heavy task. If in these days women no longer exercise any serious influence, is it not to some extent their own fault? A superficial and cramped education has often rendered them incapable of effort. They are afraid of a conversation on broad, serious lines; they will not be bothered with it. But to form a set, a woman must belong to herself no longer, she must belong to her friends; conversation is her bread of life, to adopt an expressive phrase, and she does in fact become so habituated to her part that she cannot do without it; she _must_ talk, if only with her husband. Mary of England used to talk to Louis XII.—

Soubz le drap couvert d’orfebvrerie, Qui reluisoit en fine pierrerie, Passions temps en dictz solatieux Et en propos plaisans et gratieux.[256]

Bereavements and misfortunes only render conversation more necessary. Emilia Pia,[257] proscribed, stripped of her all, and persecuted, could not appear in the streets of Rome without an adoring throng of prelates and admirers, just as there was never more laughter and gossip than in the crowded cells of the Reign of Terror.

A well-bred man considered himself literally entitled to command the conversational abilities of women. In this connection a very curious misadventure befell some judges of the Parliament of Paris who in the course of their duty went to hold assize at Poitiers. In the heart of the 16th century, when everybody went the pace, and the air was charged with moral electricity, there was still found one town where the women would have believed, as they did three hundred years earlier, that they were lost if they opened their doors. Jean Bouchet,[258] loyal Poitevin as he was, has described the boisterous amusement with which France heard that some bashful ladies answered these poor judges through a peep-hole with a _Non possumus_. The ladies of Paris themselves sent a petition to their “colleagues” at Poitiers, begging them not to let their husbands die of dulness. The ladies of Poitiers replied with blushing cheeks: “’Tis not our way at Poitiers.” They hugged the tradition of dulness.

At Lyons, which on the contrary was a modern town, squire Sala, chancing to be at his window one fine spring morning, perceived in the street three ladies to whom he was related, going on pilgrimage to St. Irenaeus. To dash after them and make them promise to call in on their way back was the affair of a moment; and then he was a happy man, sure of a pleasant day. We are no longer, you perceive, at Poitiers. The ladies return; they dine gaily with their cousin, and pass into the library; and then, during a desultory conversation, one of the fair guests mechanically opens a Bible at the book of Kings. Nothing more is needed. What a charming subject! The lady avows that she loves to lie back in a cosy chair and read the history of the kings of France; everyone joins in the conversation and cites some notable fact about royalty; and thus the procession defiles past—Alexander, Agis, Brennus, Caesar, the Merovingians, the classic heroes (Charlemagne, Godfrey of Bouillon), divers kings of France, Louis surnamed the Fat, Philip the August, the noble St. Louis, all the princes of the 15th century; finally Sala promises to relate a story of Francis I. Unhappily it is long past the hour for separating, for tearing themselves from this intoxicating pastime; and, to tell the truth, when they got home these ladies found that their husbands had put the lights out.

If this was bondage the ladies took it in very good part, and the men left nothing undone to soften it for them. We have all known men expert in the manipulation of feminine conversations, and deriving from them a large measure of influence; for instance (to speak only of the dead), Monsignor Dupanloup,[259] or in a different kind M. Mérimée, that waif from the 16th century, who combined with extraordinary scepticism an incurable impressibility, and, while free in mind and heart, was always leaning on a woman! The men of the 16th century became charmers. A political exile from Milan, fresh from a milieu of women—the physician Marliano—acquired an unprecedented influence in the Low Countries by the mere attractiveness of his conversation; people vied with each other in praising its suavity, its “heavenly ambrosia,” its “honey,” its “sweetness.”

Men moulded by the hands of Italian ladies could be distinguished among a thousand; they could talk about anything and everything. Many writers of eminent ability would have gained much by being less serious.

No one could help succumbing to this charm; and in truth it is easy to believe that the platonists sought happiness from conversation, futile as it was reputed to be, since they were constantly saying: “I was happy, we are all happy.” Cardan himself recalls with enthusiasm the time when he was supposed to be studying medicine at Venice: “I was happy.”[260] Ever the same word! People cultivated their happiness.

“Ferrara,” says Lamartine, “resembled a colony from the court of Augustus, Leo X., or the Medici; cultured princes—princesses who were heroines of love, poetry, or romance,—cardinals aspiring to the papacy—scholars—artists—poets half knights, half bards—met there every evening, in the splendid halls of Ercole d’Este, in town or country.”

At Urbino, the conversations were broken by riding-parties, hawking expeditions, balls, sports, music; life resembled a kaleidoscope, but wit slipped into every pattern as the necessary element of beauty. The duke was in bad health and used to retire early. After his departure the evening flew by delightfully: the young duchess “seems a chain holding us all pleasantly together,” said Castiglione. There was no standing on ceremony; she was always the centre of a circle composed of men or women alternately as chance directed. In addition to the regular group, the company pretty often included some accomplished stranger, some scholar or artist who happened to be passing through. They spoke freely to the ladies on a footing of friendliness. As the evening drew on, some went off for dancing or music, the others continued to start discussions or tell stories enlivened with transparent allegories. In summer this brilliant reunion was held in the garden.

Our pictures of society in olden times may often give the impression that only wolves, lions, wild beasts, or else strutting cocks and clucking hens served as models. But to paint this polished society of Urbino, so enthusiastically bent on happiness, we should need colours no palette contains,—transparencies of the Grecian sky, the indigo of certain seas, the liquid azure of certain eyes. For more than a century the court of Urbino was regarded as the supreme exemplar; in the 17th century the Hôtel de Rambouillet was still striving to make itself a copy of it; unluckily such things as these are not easily copied.

It would be difficult enough to deduce from the conversations at Urbino a series of rules for the art. No programme was pasted on the walls. But still we may note certain principles: a remarkable good-fellowship, ranging from perfect courtesy to affectionate familiarity; a real sentiment of equality, genuine equality, springing from an exact appreciation of the various degrees of worth, and consequently in that sense aristocratic; finally and especially, freedom, the most absolute openness of mind, the absence of ambitions and pretensions, at any rate so far as appeared; a joyous skilfulness in playing on the surface of things, or in striking out into the vastest regions of thought without effort or constraint.

Throughout Italy a somewhat Ciceronian and Attic beauty of form played a highly important part in conversation. Men were distinguished by their dignity of style and by a high-bred refinement free from the slightest taint of the stable. We can only judge of their manner of talk indirectly, through their letters; but an idea of it may be gained from the letters of Bembo, Castiglione, and others, in which a lady could see how to win men’s hearts while retaining all womanliness of style, and how much affection—whether it be called love, friendship, or simply a good understanding—gains by displaying itself delicately. Women played the part of judges: they were permitted, if need were, to stand on their dignity, to be silent or to speak freely at pleasure; but no man could succeed without a highly suave manner; merit had to be shown by some external mark: “Merit is not enough unless prolific in the outward graces on which the praiseworthiness of actions depends.” But appearances were sometimes sufficient. Even in their portraits, men like Castiglione retain a something infinitely engaging and attractive—a bloom on the lips, a softness in the eyes.[261] When at Venice we come upon portraits of men all energy and self-assertion, the inference is that the women must have lost their empire; and we do in fact see opposite them portraits of passive women, all softness and sensuousness.

And these tender lips that opened only to speak to women, these caressing eyes, do not deceive us. The prattle of these men was impregnated with a dove-like gentleness, an adoration, in appearance wholly spiritual, for the beautiful. Castiglione, an eminently graceful, caressing, and persuasive talker, spoke with fluency, with something of flabbiness and redundance, perhaps—a sort of perfumed talk, with nothing of “French filthiness,” as he said. Vittoria Colonna wrote a charming letter to Paul Jove, in which she spoke with great enthusiasm of “her” divine Bembo. Paul Jove lost no time in passing this letter on to Bembo. “I send you,” he writes, “a letter from your lady-love, the most illustrious marchioness. It is very pretty, and speaks of you, and I send it you at once without any of that resentment which rivals are so apt to feel, for I am fully assured that Her Excellency’s love for your lordship is in all points like to my own love for her, that is, celestial, holy, altogether platonic. Her Excellency is come from Ischia to Naples with the other noble dames; I mean the serene Amalfia and the superb Vasta, with the Francavila, a mirror of virtue and verily a matchless beauty.”

Apart from the graces of manner, the charm of these relations between the ladies and the prelates sprang from their perfect skill in effacing their own personality, in suggesting that what they were giving was pure soul—for suggestion was enough. A boor will strut about, listen to his own voice, arrange his smile, select his words with a view to effect—little absurdities, much less easy to endure than a really serious fault. It was by their overweening though unconscious self-conceit that the inferior clergy made themselves so odious in Renaissance society; the monk would talk of nothing but his order, the parish parson fancied that no service was so attractive as his, and that good music was not to be heard except in his church.[262] They had better have been less virtuous—and less fatiguing.

Conversation can glide along like a shallow stream. A pleasant talker is not always capable of writing or painting profundities; there is something more beautiful than a picture, and that is the face of the woman watching him and enjoying his talk. In those days they ridiculed—and not without cause—certain brilliant talkers clever enough to win a wide-spread renown (without ruining their health by profound study of Horace or Virgil) by nothing in the world but talking on every subject in the same airy way—appearing to have forgotten half they knew and to know half they had forgotten—able to bring in without false modesty a stanza pat to the occasion. Such talkers are in reality very second-rate, and it is not long before they get into difficulties. Sometimes abstruse subjects crop up without warning in a drawing-room, and then the conversation takes a course which gives opportunity for judging men. At the instant when it appears to be merely disporting itself on the surface, shining in full view, it takes a sudden plunge, rises again, starts on another flight and again plunges; to follow it demands an intellectual force and suppleness that cannot be improvised. We can see this from the portrait Castiglione draws of the duke of Urbino. The duke, notwithstanding his habit of keeping early hours, was a good talker, like his guests; his speech was bland, polished, fluent, and picturesque; he brought down his bird with one shot. But under this appearance of ease and readiness he possessed an unequalled fund of information. He could reel off long passages from all the classical writers, particularly from Cicero. He spoke ancient Greek perfectly, and lived by choice in intimate fellowship with the Greeks—with Lucian, and more especially with Xenophon, whom he called “the Siren of antiquity.” “We used to call the duke,” adds Castiglione, “a second Siren.”

Ancient and modern history, geography, the learning of the East, were familiar to him. He died at thirty-six, after a long and very painful illness; he had studied his complaint, and watched the slow-paced approach of death, knowing perfectly that neither the pleasant climate of Urbino nor the most assiduous attentions would retard it by an hour. And yet, even under the burden of his last anguish, he retained full possession of his intellect, with its charm and flame and serenity. His friends pretended not to have given up hope: “Why envy me so desirable a blessing?” he said to them gently. “To be freed from this load of terrible suffering—tell me, is not that a blessing?” At the very last he turned to Castiglione and recited to him one of the finest passages in Virgil. He died talking. Thus, with noble colloquies like these, radiant with natural kindliness, men lulled even pain asleep.

Philosophy and love were naturally frequent subjects of conversation. People sought by their means to refine their sentiments, to analyse themselves, to set themselves ingenious problems to be investigated at leisure, to spiritualise love. For example:

“Is it easier to feign love than to dissemble it?—_Answer_: Yes, because a voluntary act is always easier than an involuntary one.”

“Is it more meritorious for love to lead the wise to folly than fools to wisdom?—No; it is better to build up than to destroy, and you can build nothing on folly.”

“Is excess of love fatal?—Galen says yes; indirectly, through disease.”

“Who loves the more easily?—Woman, because of her fickle nature.”

“Who can best dispense with love?—Woman.”

“Which is easier, to win love or to keep it?—To keep it.”

“After perseverance, what is the best proof of love?—The sharing of joys and sorrows.”

“Which is the stronger, hate or love?—Love.”

“Can a miser love?—Yes, love can destroy avarice.”

And so on.

Bembo, in a little book dedicated to Lucretia Borgia (for three years the object of his passionate admiration), has left us an account of three days of conversation which followed a wedding. After a charming fête, in which young maidens furnished with tuneful viols had chanted hymns for and against love in turn, three noble damsels remained in discourse with three gentlemen on a flowery lawn, amid marble fountains and well-trimmed groves.

One of their number, selected as the detractor of love, conscientiously makes the most of its bitternesses, despairs, tears, revolts, catastrophes. A discussion ensues, so searching, so touching, that at times real tears are shed. The people who are perpetually at a white heat and flaunt a salamander as their emblem come in for some ridicule. But with what warmth the friends of love take up the defence of this divinity, who is represented as nude because he is devoid of reason; as a child, because like Medea he inspires eternal youthfulness; and torch in hand, because in his school there is much burning of fingers! It is towards this little torch that the whole world flits and gravitates like a swarm of moths, while the divine archer speeds his shaft at the heart of his victim.

Love, they add, is strength and life. When a man loves, he has no fear of death. One of the company even declares in his excitement that he invites death, and when the rest twit him with being beside himself, he persists, and explains his subtle languor; he invites death, but does not desire that most miserable condition! In spite of the extreme gravity and conviction with which these questions of the heart were always handled in Italy, the company cannot here repress a smile. But the speaker sees nothing and waxes warm; his martyrdom is only too serious; the flame of love can only be extinguished in a “lake of tears.” And another makes answer: “When you see in famous sanctuaries a heap of votive offerings bearing witness to the innumerable perils of the sea, do you go and deny that these perils exist, or resign yourself never to set foot on a boat? You do not, I trow. Well, we must likewise accept love’s crosses with resignation.” And thereupon he glowingly describes its advantages.

At the end of three days, a hermit closes the discussion with a short and sedative discourse on the vanity of the world!

Naturally conversation, even in Italy, did not always soar to such altitudes. It passed easily from a vast subject to a pin’s point; to make bricks without straw was a mark of talent! It was not everyone who had the wit to frame an original remark about the weather, and follow it up with a brilliant firework display of paradox! What did the idea matter, so long as the shaft flew home? They would just as soon concern themselves about the canvas a picture was painted on! They expatiated at leisure on a large subject; but no one dwelt on trifles; they laughed, wept, sparkled, they were pleasant and gay, elegant, coquettish, artistic;[263] and all that they said was excellently expressed, with a sure, keen, delicate touch. Conversation took a feminine stamp which it had never had in olden times; it was the art of paying honourable court to a lady.

The French did not approve of conversation taking this sentimental and emotional turn. They talked to amuse themselves, for laughter’s sake. To laugh was their chief concern; it was a mark of taste to take everything with a laugh, even affairs of the heart; and any genuineness of sentiment was sure to appear ridiculous, whereas in Italy a false sentiment strove to appear genuine. Moreover, to speak of serious things, to appear in any other character than that of an absolutely useless and incapable man, far above (or below) everything literary, was unfashionable. On the other hand the French appreciated the unexpected, a crispness of phrase, the sword-play of wit, smart retorts.[264] Conversation was a duel. The Frenchmen of that time were inimitable in verve and wit; they had a really unrivalled ease and sprightliness of manner. When the Italians tried to imitate them, they only succeeded in losing their suavity and making themselves look foolish.

At the court of Francis I. talking and flirting were subdued to no platonic considerations. If a man was inspired with a good thing, he said it frankly and bluntly and with much gesturing. As La Bruyère observes: “It costs women little to tell what they do not feel; it costs men still less to tell what they do feel”;[265] and the more crudely the latter expressed themselves, the more they were looked upon as right good fellows. A woman of the world would listen to anything, and reply with her “yes” or “no,” without ever taking offence.

The more the domination of man asserted itself, the more pronounced this liberty in word and action became, and women came to think that they could employ no better means of getting even with men than to adopt the language of the barrack-room, and make frequent quotations from the grossest books. They made men a present of their garters. Naturally the men were very well pleased, by no means detesting women of so facile a disposition. A German would entertain the young lady next him at table with tomfoolery of the coarsest description, prating, for instance, about heavy drinking, or low-necked dresses, or a woman showing her leg or hunting for fleas: or perhaps, to appear intellectual, he would maintain that evil has no real existence, but is only a human invention. Another would allow fun to be poked at his wife or fiancée. Rabelais and Hütten were the shining lights of this class of talkers. Even Savonarola, in his character of a monk of the people, sometimes went very near the border line; here and there in his sermons there are phrases at which a salted skipper would blush.

Italian platonism was no enemy to laughter; it was quite the other way. In the evening after dinner (the time when in these days men are lighting their cigars), men who had wit and gaiety and no cares (three conditions for which the cigar alone would hardly be a sufficient substitute), laughed without stint and told pretty warm stories as a relaxation from the ideal; but as the ladies were present and no one would have dreamt of doing without them, form was always more carefully studied. Platonism was nothing if not fastidious, correct, and ceremonious; and a platonist, even when retailing a broad joke or when there was no occasion to put himself about, did not cease to employ exquisite phraseology.

The French, on the contrary, laughed somewhat boisterously after dinner, or on one of those oppressive afternoons when the dull sky seems to seize us like mice in a trap. Our passion for broad wit has never allowed itself to be cooled by the exhortations of moralists[266] or preachers. Nor were ladies more successful in selecting subjects for conversation; they had either to leave us to our own devices and be regarded as nuisances, or to pitch their tune to the same key. An awkward dilemma for them! They faced the music, and contented themselves with declining to laugh when the jest displeased them; but in their hearts they preferred a lady’s man who knew how to show them tenderness and respect.

Conversation is naturally composed of dialogues. Whenever it attains a certain height, contradiction is necessary to keep the ball rolling. Some one has said that contradiction is woman’s forte, and in this connection La Fontaine retold the old fable about the drowned woman whose corpse, from sheer perversity, insisted on floating up stream.

That may be true of worn, untutored women, good housewives to whom the artifices of taste are a sealed book. The woman of fashion, preferring to profit by all her privileges, hovers over a conversation, mingling with it only to throw out a suggestion, a criticism, a reflection, an argument, or to give a finishing touch. Margaret, for instance, launched this aphorism in the midst of a discussion on love: “Women of large heart yield rather to the spirit of vengeance than to the tenderness of love.”[267]

It was often a man who had to devote himself to this duty of contradiction; intellectual epicures took rather kindly to the little amusement, and acquitted themselves with at least every appearance of conviction. It was even a mark of genuine dilettantism to maintain now one idea, now the contrary, like Filippo Beroaldo,[268] who has recorded two of his declarations, one in favour of drunkenness, the other against it. The question of the merits and defects of women furnished in France an inexhaustible theme for social debate, and there was no lack of disputants on either side. In Italy this subject was less popular, because the ranks of the anti-feminists were thinner. At Urbino, however, Fregoso[269] threw himself into the ungrateful task of attacking women, and valiantly depicted them as imperfect animals of no intrinsic value, whom it was impossible to compare with men, upon whom only modesty and self-respect had any restraining power, and whose few merits were a purely artificial endowment.

Yet, as it was impossible to be always engaged in dialogues or debates, there was a large field for clever retailers of anecdotes and stories grave and gay, and the talent was cultivated to perfection by certain men of the world. Among these witty story-tellers we find another member of the Mortemart family, Aimery de Mortemart, and the name of Germain de Bonneval used also to be cited.

Story-telling in Italy was conducted with the same gravity and method that were carried into everything. A “queen” was first elected,[270] and she called upon each member of the company in turn. The stories very easily verged towards salaciousness, but art ennobles everything! Firenzuola dedicated a collection of such stories to the memory of an idolised lady whom he calls his Diotima, his Monica, his Vittoria Colonna.

In France, story-telling ranked high among social amusements, filling up the interval between mass and vespers. Everyone had fair notice of his turn to speak, and made provision accordingly, whetting his own invention on what fell from the lips of others. The _Heptameron_ is, so to speak, nothing but a succession of conferences (without the platform and the glass of water), at which each person present contributes his mite to the discussion. Sometimes the remarks are rather free; when the anecdote is likely to overstep the recognised limits, the speaker saves himself by a gentle preliminary precaution:

Si ce n’estoit que j’ay peur d’offenser La netteté de vos chastes oreilles.

_Des Périers._[271]

Margaret of France, who was not specially bashful, “could tell a capital story, and could laugh, too, when she heard one.”

Another art which was still highly appreciated—a very elegant, charming, and widely cultivated art—was that of impromptu verse-making—a pastime for prelates and men of keen literary tastes. Leo X.[272] and Octavien de Saint-Gelais[273] practised it with eminent success.

Boutrimés, or “_ventes d’amour_,” though somewhat antiquated, contributed a share to the entertainment. A man gave a lady, or vice versa, the name of some flower, and a response had to be made in verse of as epigrammatic or complimentary a turn as possible. As aids to improvisation, manuals of polite rhymes were published.

Such was happiness! Conversation in its various forms was the port to which the barque of life made under full sail, trimmed with all the safeguards, manœuvred with all the dexterities which we have described! And the difficulties were compensated by the satisfaction derived from bringing souls into communion one with another, from closely uniting them, welding them in one enthusiasm of affection. Such a result is beyond the attainment of writing. Genuine exquisites like Inghirami thought writing was overdone, and if they employed the pen it was from necessity, or at most to preserve for posterity the conversations, the tales, the sonnets that pleased them; when a work involving time and labour was asked of them, they wrapped themselves in an air of austere solemnity, like people going to a funeral. All these brilliant talkers lived quiet lives out of the public eye, seldom shifting their quarters, with none of that moral trepidation in which the railway and the telegraph keep us: they were light-hearted but not shallow, with something of oriental insouciance, never forgetting that man has but one life on this nether world, squandering their wealth of wit in lavish profusion, with no attempt to economise it in order to sell specimens to an innominate mob. They enjoyed to the full the exquisite pleasure of letting their ideas float off at the mercy of chance; their thoughts took flight and were seen no more, it is true; they burst like bubbles in the air; but there remained the wherewithal to shape others like them.

And here was the great sphere of women. Their mission was to cause this happiness to blossom, to tend it, nurture it, turn it to fitting use—to make these bubbles a source of good.

This duty like every other had stern laws. It was not enough to be a “queen” by election, or even by birthright, to fancy that the goal was attained.

Women’s sway only imposed itself by dint of patience, tact, and a nice regard for detail, and above all at the cost of genuine self-denial. How many little trials and crosses had to be endured! To make herself agreeable to the starched Spaniard and the boastful Neapolitan; to listen resignedly while a Frenchman discoursed about his hunting and his limited income, or while a Milanese or Genoese prated about his business; and then with all gentleness, with a woman’s instinctive subtlety, almost by stealth, to select among these men—to hold by an unconstrained and loyal welcome those in whom she perceived some merit, and to bind them to her by speaking their own tongue—wisdom to the wise, piety to the pious, practical interests to the practical, gaiety to the young—and thus to set them all on the path towards the desired perfection—what a task for a woman! However, all that she needed in the rudimentary stages of this education was to plant herself securely on her own rudimentary gifts—in other words, to avoid scandal and tittle-tattle. But how difficult her task became when she had to deal with men of parts, of warm affections, of ardent temperament! Then, no doubt, it became interesting, and the woman herself was reaping a profit which amply repaid her trouble. “Ladies,” cries Champier, “if you must take pleasure in hob-nobbing with men, choose at least those who can improve you and guide you.” There was no question now of retiring to the Aventine, and fancying themselves constantly in mortal peril[274]; a lady had to hold herself erect and tighten the rein on these unruly men—to know the power of a word, a gesture, a flash of silence.[275]

To retire to the Aventine! That would be criminal! Speech is necessary to one who would minister to a mind diseased.

Conversation was not merely a pleasure. If they strove earnestly after the Beautiful, it was because the reign of beauty is the most effectual assurance of the reign of truth and goodness. Does anyone imagine that a woman can shut herself in her drawing-room, and that all she need do is to show herself beautiful, amiable, sweet, intelligent, tender to the men worthy of forming her circle? No one thinks so. Woman rules because she redeems. To direct or actively to engage in works of charity, to send money to the wretched, without looking out of doors to see what men are actually suffering or dying—this would be the absolute negation of the social aim of conversation. Through conversation a woman comes into living touch with realities. She must show herself as real flesh and blood to the wretched; she owes them her smile, her beauty and her grace; aye, it is her bounden duty to be beautiful, amiable, gentle, intelligent, tender for the sake of those whose lot is solaced by no ray from heaven. She must welcome the poor and lowly, and though she may not be able to speak to them in Plato’s language, she must none the less tend them with the supreme medicine of the Beautiful, enter into their interests and their troubles, talk with them, shower on them her manna of hope and patience, and—if she have it—light.

Perhaps we shall now be asked how many women attained to these altitudes in the apostleship of beauty, and if we can cite many who attempted to put their ideas into practice. Assuredly, we can. In spite of the somewhat too artistic cast into which social intercourse was thrown by platonism, more than one woman found in her own heart a commentary which neither Ficino nor Bembo ever knew. In France we may mention Anne of France as one who was thoroughly convinced that conversation was a duty to society at large. In Italy, ladies of the highest rank, like Isabella d’Este and Vittoria Colonna, slightly intoxicated with Beauty, consorted almost exclusively with princes and prelates and men of culture, and in this regard the Renaissance is perhaps rightly accused of over-refinement; yet they possessed in a rare degree the talent of diffusing around them an atmosphere of sweetness. At Urbino, a provincial court of no little exclusiveness, even the stalls of the handicraftsmen were lapped in a delicious air; Raphael grew up like a natural plant; a thousand trivial incidents in the life of the place give us glimpses of grace and amiability. The influence was indirect, but very powerful.

CORRESPONDENCE.

It would seem logical to consider correspondence as the complement of conversation—as talk between persons at a distance. But it was not so; talk it might be, but in writing, and consequently no one was very fond of it; people distrusted it because of the risks involved. Yet certain intellectual women of the 16th century displayed amazing activity as letter-writers. While one might have supposed them to be wholly engrossed with their rouge-pots or their friends, their intelligence and vivacity actually carried them away; the pen appeared too lumbering a vehicle for their impatient thought. In the letters of Julia Gonzaga, for instance, it is often evident that the lady took the pen from her secretary at the third or fourth line and finished the letter herself, rapidly, and without troubling her head about grammar, handwriting, or decorum.[276]

To the student of handwriting, letters betray many little philosophic secrets which are well worth attention. The handwritings of the 16th century (for the most part illegible, particularly in France) are large and free, highly nervous and characteristic of the writers, released from the methodical and commonplace style of former days. The strokes are fine and distinguished, sometimes a little angular, displaying all sorts of vagaries, abbreviations and flourishes. What a “mirror of the soul” is the close and tangled handwriting of Margaret of France, or the gaunt, nervous, firm, aristocratic, jerky, disorderly style of the duchess of Etampes![277]

The style of Vittoria Colonna is clear and plain, somewhat masculine in character, but equally nervous and irregular, with a multitude of abbreviations and splotches. A mere glance at the letters of these influential women fills one with pity. Poor souls! At what a cost of secret torment, distress, and agitation did they mould happiness and peace for men! Looking at these human documents, these nervous handwritings, one asks oneself if those sages are right who assure us that to bestow happiness on others one must needs possess it oneself. Was it at the cost of His happiness, or at the cost of His blood, that Christ redeemed us? I may be deceived, but I sometimes fancy that I see in these handwritings as it were a drop of blood. It was otherwise with the men: they were happy. Castiglione’s writing has a graceful, tranquil movement; his pen ran lightly and cursively; and if sometimes the strokes seem laboured, it is due to an affectation in his manner of joining the letters. Bembo placidly retains the old style, stunted, heavy, and sprawling.

The tone of the letters confirms the casual glimpses we have already obtained into the social relations of the time. People troubled little about family letters; these were simple and short, of the “dutifully affectionate” order, and composed of almost stereotyped commonplaces. Hardly anything is referred to in them except the material affairs of life—business, medicine, health, domestic events;[278] the sentimental part is dismissed very briefly—probably because family sentiments are necessarily sincere.

On the other hand, letters written to friends, which were very numerous in Italy, were charming, tender, and graceful, ending often most prettily: “Your little sister ... who loves your lordship as her own soul—Isabella, with her own hand.”

These last words, “with her own hand,” were not unnecessary, for a fashionable lady, not pluming herself on a telegraphic style, was obliged on principle and out of regard for her dignity to leave as much as possible to the pen of her secretary. Unhappily the secretary, not caring to serve as a mere scribe, pays attention to style, and touches up his periods, so that, failing an actual autograph, it is impossible to be sure what in a lady’s letter was really her own. Moreover, a lady of any position knew that her letter would be shown about, perhaps even transcribed or published. Bernardo Tasso, Aretino and many another were not startled when they saw books made out of their letters or of letters written to them; and the most interesting letters of Vittoria Colonna appeared early in the 16th century. It may be said then that letters came midway between conversation and books. In a lady’s letter there was nothing directly from the writer but the signature and the one or two autograph words preceding; in spite of which, the letters of the marchioness of Pescara and of Isabella d’Este form very pleasing and characteristic collections.

After a visit from Isabella, the duchess Elizabeth of Urbino addressed this note to her: “I know not how to cure myself of the regret your ladyship’s departure has left me in. Methinks I have not only seen a dearly loved sister leave me, but that my very soul is gone. I must needs write you ever and anon, and make shift to say on this paper what I would fain say with my lips; if therein I could clearly express my sorrow, I am very sure ’twould be so potent as to cause your highness out of compassion to turn back. If I feared not to be a burden to you, methinks I should not hesitate myself to follow you. Neither thing is possible; my sole resource is to beg your highness to think of me as often as I bear you in my heart.”

Many examples of this delicate and sweet—almost too sweet—graciousness might be cited. Emilia Pia, for instance, one of the Urbino set, writes almost as she speaks, with great liveliness and humour, and always with equal vivacity whether the subject be toilet specifics or philosophy. The men have the same charm, and sometimes think themselves entitled to employ the same exquisitely tender formulas. Brocardo calls Marietta Myrtilla “my very sweet and dear little sister ... my sweet and matchless little sister, loved as my own soul,” and signs himself: “Thy sweetest, sweetest Brocardo.”

The terms in which a well-bred man could, indeed was expected to, address a fashionable lady, may be seen from a letter from Castiglione, then ambassador in Spain, to Vittoria Colonna.

“I have felt,” he says, “so much joy in the victories of the marquis that at first I would not write a letter—a letter is so vulgar a thing! One writes letters about events of no importance. I had thought of fireworks, fêtes, concerts, songs, and other vigorous demonstrations, but reflection has shown me that these are inferior to the concert of my own affections; and so I am come back to the idea of a letter, convinced that my marchioness will be able to see what I have in my soul, even though my words fail to express it.” And he dilates on this talent of the divine marchioness for penetrating hearts, and for reading there what the lips fail to utter, and then congratulates her on the delight which she cannot but feel. “And as to my duty towards your highness, seek, I beseech you, the testimony of your own heart, and give it credence, for I am sure your heart will not lie to you on what not only yourself, but the whole world, sees shining through my soul, as through the purest crystal. And thus I remain, kissing your hands and humbly commending myself to your good favour. Madrid, March 21.”

Two years afterward he wrote in regard to the death of her husband: “Calamity has fallen upon you like a deluge. I durst not write to your highness at first, for I deemed you had died with the marquis; to-day in all verity and admiration I hold that the marquis still liveth in you.”

Do we need other specimens of these gracious and somewhat ultra-refined letters? Here is a letter from Castiglione to the famous Marchesa Hippolyta Florimonda Scaldasole: “Most excellent lady, if your ladyship were as pleased to know you dwell eternally in my memory, as ’twould be infinitely delightful for me to dwell in yours, I should be keenly desirous of giving you proof of it in this letter, since for the moment I can do it in no other way. But as your ladyship has shown the world, along with your many other wondrous gifts, that you are a woman valiant in fight, and not only beautiful, but warlike also like Hippolyta of old, I fear me lest you be somewhat puffed up with pride, and somewhat forgetful of your servitors—and I would not have it so. Therefore have I made bold to write to you, and to pray Messer Camillo Ghilino, my very dear friend, to speak on my behoof, and to tell you that in Spain, as at Milan and at Pavia, I am your man; and that, when I had come to Pavia, whither the army led me, those walls, those ramparts, those towers, that artillery, all those things spoke to me of your highness, knowing that behind them you were all aglow with the thought of combatting so great a prince as the King of France. You have gotten the victory, and now and henceforth no one will be so daring-hardy, I trow, as to fight with you. Deign to believe him, lady, as myself; and I beseech you, if you be not of all ladies the least loving, bid me to be at Milan and where you are. Messer Camillo will be able to tell how different it is to be in such sweet company as your ladyship’s and to be in Spain. I kiss your hands, and ever commend myself to you, deeply desiring to know that this _benedictus fructus_ be reaped by a husbandman worthy of it. Toledo, June 21, 1525.”

After all, there was a necessary resemblance between a letter and a conversation. In Italy, the note of tenderness is always dominant, flattering and caressing even when gay. Some of Bibbiena’s letters are full of deep feeling, and yet it is impossible to mention a more jovial man: his fun bubbled over at the slightest provocation. Isabella d’Este once scolded him for no longer visiting Mantua. “How,” retorts he with affected indignation—“how have they managed to drop into those dainty little ears so many gross accusations against me?... Here I see your daughter, who appears to me the very image of that serene highness her mother. Tell me again I am a lecher, and by God it shall be true as Gospel! Would you have me swear otherwise?... Most devoutly do I kiss your hands, and to my dear lady Alda I commend myself a thousand times.” The amiable prelate was at that time assiduously courting Signorina Alda Boiarda, maid of honour to the marchioness; and, as usual, the mistress was not altogether pleased.

Another charming custom in Italy was for a lady to recall herself to the recollection of her friends by means of a little present. Vittoria Colonna sent her portrait to Bembo, accompanied by a few verses from her own hand: “Verses pure and dainty!” cries Bembo, “that touch the heart far more than a mere letter.” On another occasion she charged one of her friends, who was going to Mantua, to convey to the marquis “a friendly and sympathetic” greeting, with some small token of her regard. The friend thought he was doing right in offering a basket of roses, and the marquis lost no time in sending his respectful thanks direct to the fair donor. And then Vittoria formally apologised in very affectionate terms that her messenger had “honoured him so little” as to offer so modest a souvenir.

Truth to tell, Frenchwomen showed much less feminine grace in this matter, which explains our dwelling on the charm of their Italian neighbours. The most Italianised of them could not attain this seductive charm. In all the correspondence of Margaret of France you will not find one letter recalling those we have just quoted almost haphazard. Margaret did indeed sedulously strive to attain that charm, as we cannot but perceive, but her languishings resulted in little else than prolixity. It will not do to strain one’s talent.

Renée of France, though she became duchess of Ferrara, never acquired the Italian trick; she continued to write with French brevity. Diana of Poitiers and the duchess of Etampes amaze us by the almost arid precision of their style; they might have given points to the most dry-as-dust of attorneys; there is never a sign of a gust of passion or of love’s finesse. The rising generation of Henri II.’s time came nearer the attainment of a pleasant style. The king’s two daughters, Madeline and Margaret, wrote excellent hands—easy, graceful, even, with a uniform slope, the letters broad and clear, the whole style very distinguished; and they employed pleasant and engaging forms, phrases of genuine affection, especially in their family correspondence.[279] But they too were at their best in short notes, and their most pleasing letters are always very brief. The higher charm remained the secret of Italy.

BOOK III. THE INFLUENCE OF WOMEN