The Life and Writings of Alexandre Dumas/Reign
The Reign of Dumas I (1830-1848)
The successful young dramatist was preparing to visit Algiers, which had just been captured by the French, and which, (with that instinct which he developed in later years, Dumas was anxious to explore and exploit), when the Revolution of July 1830 broke out.
It is not our intention to describe the political crisis which led to the downfall of Charles X., and the accession of the younger branch of the Bourbons in the person of Louis Philippe, Duke of Orleans, but sufficient must be told to explain the part which our hero played in the strange tragic-farce.
Charles X. had done much, during his brief reign, to rouse the old revolutionary spirit by his autocratic measures. On the 25th July 1830, he caused the famous "Ordonnances" to be issued, "putting an end to the freedom of the press, already largely curtailed, appointing a new mode of election, and dissolving the recently-elected chamber." Once more Paris saw the old familiar barricades rise in a single night; faded flags were brought forth, old watch-words were revived, and old veterans reappeared; the roll of the drums, and the thrilling notes of the "Marseillaise" resounded once more in the streets of the city. The revolutionaries, to which party the son of the General Dumas belonged, hoped to see a second Republic rise out of the ruins of the discredited monarchy, and the story of "the days of July" is told in Dumas's Mémoires," by himself as an eye-witness. M. Parigot, commenting on this description, in his study of our author, says:—
"If you have any desire to breathe a little of the atmosphere which heated all brains at that moment you need only read 'the three days of July' in Volume VI. There the different means are described, as well as the concentration of sentiments, which united to make the throne of Charles X. totter. Turn over the leaves of Louis Blanc and compare. Dumas is a magician for demonstrating the picturesque. The ever-growing enthusiasm which cut the streets into barricades, uprooted the trees on the boulevards and burnt the guard-house of the Exchange, to the cry of 'Vive la Charte!'; the indecision of journalists and politicians, the discontent of the public, who wished to 'avenge Waterloo in the streets of Paris'; the excitement of the young collegians, Lafayette domiciled at the Town Hall—and along with all this the opposition which was beginning against the Provisional Government—all is painted with the exactitude of an eye-witness who has a fine sense of spectacular effect. And, moreover, Dumas was one who had the courage to lash the 'comfortable middle-classes' for their politic opportunism. They kept securely indoors, during the fray, but were quite ready to take advantage of the popular movement, after the danger. He denounced the timorous and underhand conduct of these people, and the work of reaction which they insidiously accomplished, even at the moment when the people were triumphing."
Alexandre's share in the Revolution was chiefly confined to two exploits—the saving of precious military relics, during the sacking of the artillery-museum, and the fetching of the powder from Soissons. This latter episode, though it had no very important bearing on the fate of the revolution, was a brilliant coup in its way, worthy of the son of Napoleon's brave general, and of the creator of D'Artagnan.
Charles X. had fled from Paris in the first days of the tumult, but remained outside the city at Saint Cloud, with an imposing army, awaiting the turn of events, and in particular the action of his representatives in Paris. Dumas heard Lafayette (who was informally the Minister of War of the insurgents) remark that if the King advanced on Paris the revolutionaries would have no powder wherewith to defend themselves; and he at once offered to go to Soissons, a town some sixty miles away, and in his native department, where, as he knew, a powder-magazine was located, and to bring the ammunition back. His wild proposal was laughed at; but by his persistence Dumas obtained an order for the powder, and a recommendation to the people of Soissons; and with these credentials (which he boldly took upon himself to strengthen by interpolation) he prepared for his daring expedition.
The bold young "red" posted for Soissons on the afternoon of July 30th, with a comrade named Bard. On the way, as one of the postillions refused to keep his horses up to the pace of the young adventurer's impatience, Dumas fired a blank cartridge at the man, who fell from the horse in affright. Young Alexandre promptly donned the posting-boots and took the coach forward himself. At his own beloved Villers-Cotterets the hero halted and supped hastily, in the midst of enthusiastic fellow-townsmen; and having recruited a young friend named Hutin, whose mother lived in Soissons and who was a native of the place, the party drove forward and entered the gates of that town at one o'clock in the morning.
All the rest of the night Madame Hutin and her household worked to make a tricolour, which was to float from the flagstaff of the cathedral that morning. Bard and Hutin set out to smuggle the flag into the church, to overpower the sacristan and exchange the Bourbon white for republican red-white-and-blue; and Dumas himself lingered about a small pavilion at the Fort St Jean, which was used as a magazine, until he saw the tricolour floating where a minute before the Royalist flag had waved. Then he climbed the wall of the pavilion, and dropping into the garden, confronted with his gun two soldiers who were peacefully hoeing the beds, and announced his errand. After a parley the three guardians of the magazine agreed to remain indoors, and behave as neutrals, until some decisive order came from headquarters, and Dumas went off to accomplish the second and more difficult part of his enterprise.
Commandant Liniers, in charge of the depôt at Soissons, found himself that morning confronted by a swarthy and very earnest young man with a gun, who demanded the ammunition in his keeping. He scoffed at the youth and his written order, and denied that there was any quantity of powder in the magazine. Dumas retired to assure himself of the truth or untruth of this statement, and on his return found that Liniers was reinforced by three other officers, and therefore still more scornful and incredulous.
Dumas did not hesitate, for he saw that he must act promptly, or he was lost. "I had gone too far to withdraw," he says; "I was almost alone, in the midst of officials hostile to the new government. It was a question of life or death for me." He pulled out a pair of double-barrelled pistols, and swore that unless he received an order for the powder in five seconds, he would blow out the brains of the whole party! At this critical moment the commandant's wife, who had evidently got wind of the affair, rushed in, and flung herself into the midst of the company, imploring her husband to yield. Liniers was now willing to give way, if his "face" could be "saved." Dumas took the hint, sent for two or three of his comrades to assemble in the court outside, threw open the window, and bade them fire when he gave the signal. Liniers sat down and wrote the order.
Then followed denials and delays on the part of the mayor and other authorities. At last Dumas in anger broke open the magazine himself, procured carts and loaded them with the powder, and at five o'clock the adventurous little band were on their way back to Paris. At nine next morning Dumas delivered his precious convoy, so daringly procured, at the "rebel" headquarters, the Hôtel de Ville.
But even while the young Dumas was "bluffing" the Soissons garrison so gloriously, the cause of Republicanism was being betrayed. Between the alternatives of Charles X. and an elected President a compromise was made; and the Duke of Orleans, having abandoned his King and promised all things democratic, entered Paris, and was presently chosen lieutenant-general of the kingdom, and then "monarch by the will of the pcople." A "moderate" party, who believed in constitutional government, acting with the very best intentions, had given away in reality all that their "extremist" allies had fought and died for; and Louis Philippe began to reign, the revolution having made a distinction without a difference. The new ruler, all affability, congratulated his employee on his return from Soissons, sayng, "You have just written your best drama!"
The affair of Soissons, and the excited state of public affairs unsettled our susceptible Dumas. Charles X. had taken refuge in England, but there had been for a moment a fear that he might flee to La Vendée, the Royalist provinces, and let loose upon France the horrors of civil war. Dumas, knowing that the late king had renounced the throne in favour of his grandson "Henri V." (the Comte de Chambord) whose mother, the Duchesse de Berri, was a woman of much courage and determination, suggested that to prevent the possibility of any future rising, a national guard should be organised in the Royalist department, and that he should be sent as a special commissioner to consult the responsible officials upon the subject. Lafayette gave Dumas the required mandate, and on August 10th he set out.
Except that by his intercession a poor wretch of a coiner was saved from the galleys, Dumas did nothing notable during his six weeks in La Vendée; and when on his return Louis Philippe sent for him, the envoy declared very frankly that it was useless to attempt to organise the national guard in La Vendée; but that if the West were opened up, by means of high-roads, so that communication between all parts of it might be rapid and easy, this would decrease the chances of a second outbreak of guerilla-warfare. The "poet" prophesied—so he tells us—another, though a less serious, La Vendée, if occasion offered. Indeed, only two years later, the Duchesse de Berri aroused the "Chouans" once more and created a little Vendéan rising on behalf of her son.
But the King did not like the prophecy.
"You are a poet: write poetry, and leave politics to kings and ministers," he said with a frown.
"Sire," answered Dumas, "the ancients called their poets 'seers.'"
The young author was dismissed from the Royal presence, and sent in his resignation forthwith.
The dramatist in Dumas was still subservient to the would-be politician, when he wrote his next play "Napoléon," which, if we may believe the "Mémoires," was produced under novel and comic circumstances. For some time Harel, the manager of the Odéon theatre, had been pressing Dumas to write him a play on this subject; but the young republican could not give his mind to desk-work, and moreover, the theme did not appeal to him. One night, after a première at the Odéon, Dumas and several other guests went to sup with Harel, and after the feast Mademoiselle Georges led the unsuspecting playwright into another room, "to show him something." On their return Dumas found that the guests had disappeared, and the smiling Harel informed his coy young author that he was a prisoner. Dumas was startled, but took his imprisonment in good part. He was fed sumptuously and treated like a lord; all the books which he required to consult were at his elbow, and in eight days this enormous play was ready. Its author confesses frankly that it is a bad piece of work; but under the circumstances the blanie can scarcely be laid upon him, for with him the quality of his work depended entirely upon his inspiration, which in turn was a matter of his own initiative.
One of the causes of the failure of "Napoléon" as a work of stagecraft was possibly the author's preoccupation, for his mind was full of the prospects of his famous play, "Antony." To the bulk of British admirers of Dumas the very title will be strange; but in France our dramatist was better known, for generations, as the author of "Antony," than as the writer of any romance or play whatever. He tells us that the idea of the drama came to him at the time when "Christine" was temporarily forbidden.
"One day I was pacing the boulevards... I stopped suddenly, and said to myself, 'A man who, when surprised by the husband of his mistress, should kill her, saying that she had resisted him, and who should die on the scaffold in consequence, would save the honour of that woman, and expiate his crime.' The idea of 'Antony' was found: six weeks afterwards the play was written."
"When I was writing 'Antony,'" says Dumas elsewhere, "I was in love with a woman of whom I was terribly jealous: jealous because she was in the position of Adèle (in the play) in that she had a husband, an officer in the army.... Read 'Antony': he will tell you what I suffered then."
M. Parigot, in his study "Le Drame d'Alexandre Dumas," throws further light on this subject. A number of unpublished letters from the lover to the lady were placed in the critic's hands, and he has quoted from them exhaustively. The "Adèle" appears to have been one Melanie W———, to whom Dumas was presented (as he tells us in "Le Testament de M. Chauvelin ") at the house of her father-in-law, the bibliophile Villenave, in 1827. The conquest of a lady of position and of some pretentions to learning evidently flattered the young man's vanity—"there was something of the air of Villers-Cotterets about him still" and the young lover vowed, cursed, adored, despaired, and rhapsodised for three years. Then "Antony" was written; the intimacy had unconsciously fulfilled its purpose, and came to an end accordingly. Meanwhile this amorous heart, overflowing with passion, had found opportunity to fall in love with another Melanie (the mother of Marie-Alexandre Dumas), with Marie Dorval, and others. The need for love had for the time possessed this ardent nature as with a fever.
It was of this experiment-in-love, in which he took himself and his passion in such tragic earnest, that Dumas was thinking when he wrote these verses, with which he prefaced "Antony":—
Que de fois tu m'as dit, aux heures du délire,
Quand mon front tout à coup devenait souci eux:
"Sur ta bouche pourquoi cet effrayant sourire?
Pourquoi ces larmes dans tes yeux?"
Pourquoi? C'est que mon cœur, au milieu des délices,
D'un souvenir jaloux constamment oppressé,
Froid au bonheur présent, va chercher ses supplices,
Dans l'avenir et le passé.
Jusque dans tes baisers je retrouve des peines;
Tu m'accables d'amour: l'amour, je m'en souviens,
Pour la première fois s'est glissé dans tes veines,
Sous d'autres baisers que les miens.
Du feu des voluptés vainement tu m'enivres;
Combien pour un beau jour de tristes lendemains!
Ces channes qu'à mes mains en palpitant tu livres,
l'alpiteront sous d'autre mains.
Et je ne pourrai pas, dans ma fureur jalouse,
De l'infidélité te réserver le prix!
Quelques mots à l'autel l'ont faite son épouse,
Et te sauvent de mon mépris.
Car ces mots pour toujours ont vendu tes caresses,
L'amour ne les doit plus donner ni recevoir;
L'usages des époux a réglé les tendresses
Et leurs baisers sont un devoir!
Malheur? Malheur à moi que le ciel en ce monde
A jeté comme un hôte à ses lois étranger!
A moi qui ne sais pas dans ma douleur profonde
Souffrir longtemps sans me venger.
Malheur! Car une voix qui n'a rien de la terre
M'a dit "Pour ton bonheur c'est sa mort qu'il te faut;"
Et cette voix m'a fait comprendre le mystère
Et du meurtre et de l'échafaud.
Viens, donc, Ange du Mal, dont la voix me convie!
Car il est des instants où, si je te voyais,
Je pourrais pour son sang t'abandonner ma vie,
Et mon âme... si j'y croyais!
Years after, in his "Mémoires," Dumas confessed that the verses were poor, the sentiment was affected, and the blasphemy was a wanton one—prompted, his son has shrewdly suggested, by the rhyme.
Once set at liberty by the tyrannical Harel, Dumas hastened to the Comédie Française, where "Antony" had been accepted and placed in rehearsal. But Mars and Firmin, the leading actor and actress of the national theatre at that time, were accustomed to more orthodox rôles than those of the weak, fascinated Adèle, and Antony, the masterful Ishmael-of-society; and the Comédie Française itself, as our author confesses, was not the frame for such a picture. The two artists, losing faith in their parts, hinted as much to the author, Firmin with diffidence, Mars with a bold pretext. Dumas astonished them by demanding the manuscript from the prompter, and walking out of the theatre.
It so happened that M. Crosnier, of the Porte St Martin, had received Hugo's "Marion Delorme," when that poet had also abandoned the stifling atmosphere of the Française to breathe freer air elsewhere. The young dramatist, although profoundly discouraged concerning the merits of his latest born, went forthwith to Marie Dorval, the leading lady of the Porte St Martin, a clever actress, ready-witted, naïve, and full of nervous energy. He read the play to her, and her trained and receptive intelligence at once saw the possibilities of the piece. She shut the young author into a room, to spend the night in rewriting the last act, which did not appeal to her in its original form; and next day negotiations began. The play was duly read to the manager of the Porte St Martin and accepted; but it was something of a blow to the author's vanity when M. Crosnier politely struggled with slumber during the third act, slept comfortably in the fourth, and snored unrestrainedly through the fifth!
At length the night of "Antony's" birth arrived, and the miserable infant, which had now been waiting two years for its delivery, had given its parent much anxiety. For once Dumas had lost that magnificent confidence in himself which aided him so powerfully in his career.
But if the moment for producing the play was inopportune—appearing as it did in the midst of distracting political ferment—the social atmosphere was charged with a feverish electricity, which the story of "Antony" attracted irresistibly to itself. How is a social outlaw like Antony to win for himself the lovely wife of a man in high society—how is he to break through, and persuade her to break through, all the bars to self-abandonment which society has erected? By will-power—by the strength of an unscrupulous individuality! For such a story of power and passion the Parisian of that day was fully ripe.
As the play progressed, the emotion of the audience mounted to a painful height. The first act ended in applause; and the second was as warmly received. In the midst of the play the author, unconsciously copying Goldsmith, rushed out for a time and paced the boulevards, unable to face his fate. The startling climax to the third act took away the breath; and for a moment the fate of the play hung in suspense: then the theatre shook with a rushing storm of applause. The curtain fell on the fourth act amid frenzied "bravos." "A hundred francs," cried the excited author to the scene-shifters, "if the curtain goes up again before they stop applauding!" And the fifth act actually commenced before the audience had finished acclaiming the fourth.
We have already indicated the dénouement of "Antony." That "hero," surprised by the husband, stabs Adèle, and throws the dagger at the wronged man's feet, saying, "She resisted me; and I killed her!"[1]
The curtain down, the audience in a fury of impatience demanded a sight of the author. Calls and recalls followed. Dumas, in rushing behind the scenes from his box, took a short cut through the corridors; he was recognised, and chased by a crowd of young enthusiasts, and his coat was torn to ribbons.
"Antony" excited much enthusiasm and opposition. It was a daring, provocative play, destined to set the fashion in French society dramas for the rest of the century. When it was about to be revived, three years later, this time at the Comédie Française, one of the many journals hostile to Dumas attacked "Antony" for its immorality. The denunciation came from such a powerful quarter that Thiers, who had arranged not only for the revival, but for new plays from its author's pen, was forced to forbid the performance. Dumas went to law, and obtained £400 damages, and an order that the piece should be produced within a certain time.
But even "Antony" failed to bring its author fortune, so greatly were the public preoccupied by things political; and to avoid the unsettling atmosphere of Paris, Dumas went for a holiday to Trouville, which in those days was a quiet and charming little Normandy seaside village. As usual with him, Dumas's holiday meant a different working-place, for here he was busy evolving his most poetical play, "Charles VII.," inspired, as he acknowledges, by De Musset's "Marrons au feu," and by "The Cid" and "Andromaque." Here also one M. Beudin came to him with the prologue of a play which afterwards became "Richard Darlington."
It was on our author's return from Trouville, to witness the first night of Hugo's "Marion Delorme," that Dumas encountered a kind friend who told him that he was too late, and informed him of the comparative failure of the play. The critic-friend was astounded to hear a detailed and eloquent eulogy of "Marion" from the lips of the author of "Christine."
When Dumas had finished, the critic shrugged his shoulders with an air of profound amazement. "A confrère!" he said. Further words failed him.
"Charles VII.," like "Henri Trois" and "Antony," was, in spite of its historical setting, a play of the times—a challenge to the old social régime; a part of the romantic movement; a powerful plea for individuality. This Dumas himself declared, in the lines which he prefixed to his "Comme je devins auteur dramatique" (the first draft of his "Mémoires") in 1833—
{{block center| <poem> "Un jour on connaîtra quelle lutte obstinée A fait sous mon genou plier la destinée; A quelle source amère en mon âme j'ai pris Tout ce qu'elle contient de haine et de mépris: Quel orage peut faire, en passant sur la tête, Qu'on prenne pour le jour l'éclair d'un tempête, Et ce que l'homme souffre en ses convulsions, Quand au volcan du cœur grondent les passions. Je ne cacherai plus où ma plume fidèle A trouvé d'Antony le type et le modèle, Et je dirai tout haut à quels foyers brûlants Yaquoub[2] et Saint Mégrin puisèrent leurs élans...." </poem>}}
"Charles VII." was a failure, or at best a succés d'estime. Dumas fils has told us how sadly he and his father walked homeward after the play; for the tragedy had contained its author's most conscious and most literary attempt at poetry; and all his many successes in life never compensated Dumas for the fact that he was not in the strict sense of the word a poet, and could not disguise the fact from himself.
"Charles VII." was of the school of "Christine," and was the result of Dumas's occasional yearnings after a classical reputation; but the drama-proper was his more congenial métier. "Richard Darlington," a legitimate son of "Antony," was successfully produced, and became one of its author's favourite plays. In spite of this Dumas, who on this occasion had collaborators, refused to allow his name to be announced, even as part-author. Unfortunately "Richard Darlington" will be read by English people—if it is read at all—with more amusement than respect; for the scene is laid in England, and the details of our social life which it offers have all the piquancy of novelty, and discount the dramatic strength of the play.
An incident which we find in the "Mémoires' gives us an interesting insight into the author's skill and knowledge of stage-craft. Whilst Dumas was busy writing "Richard Darlington" with Goubaud, he stopped short at one point, unable to advance. It was at the crisis when the ambitious Richard, anxious to get rid of Jenny, his plebeian wife, so that he may marry into higher society, determines to make away with her. Someone is coming up the stairs; if the existence of this wife is discovered by the newcomer, all Darlington's plans will be overthrown. The only obvious resource is to throw Jenny out of the window into the rushing torrent below. This is where the skilled dramatist discovers and resolves a problem of stage-management. It would revolt the audience to see a woman struggling for life every inch of the way to that window; it would make them laugh, if the husband, in lifting his victim to hurl her to death, should expose her ankles.
At length the idea came, and Dumas like Columbus with the egg, broke the end, and made it stand, thus:
Darlington threatens Jenny; she rushes towards the balcony, crying for help. He follows her, closing the folding doors of the recess behind them. "A cry pierces the silence. Richard strikes the doors with his fist, they fly open and disclose him on the balcony, pale, wiping the sweat from his brow, and alone.
Jenny has disappeared—Voilà tout!"
It was at this period of his fortunes, when he was writing with Anicet Bourgeois "Teresa," which he describes as "one of my worst," and "Angèle," which he considered one of his best plays, that Dumas gave his famous ball. As he wished to invite three hundred guests, and had only four rooms in which to receive them, he hired another suite from his landlord. Three days before the eventful night, Dumas turned ten of the foremost painters of France into these empty rooms to decorate them, and as the great men were all friends of the young author, this was at once an economy, an attraction, and a novelty. With the same object of saving expense, Dumas took some friends out of town, and they shot their own game for the feast.
It was a brilliant affair, for it was a costume ball, and all Bohemia-in-Paris gathered in the little rooms, which by midnight were crowded with dazzling dresses, and filled with laughter and music. Here, among others, came Lafayette, Rossini, De Musset, Suc, Lemaître, Mars, Georges, Dejazet and Delacroix—who had painted the panel allotted to him in two or three hours! M. Tissot, of the Academy, went "made up" as a sick man, whereupon Jadin followed him as a long-faced, funereal-looking undertaker, and dogged the other's footsteps, croaking out lugubriously every other minute, "I'm waiting for you! I'm waiting for you!" The party broke up at nine in the morning, with a wild galop in the street.
And now events conspired to work an important change in Dumas's life. So far, the author of "Antony," under the influence of Goëthe and Byron, had "posed" in his writings, as a Manfred or a Mephistopheles; and with folded arms and cynic laugh had affected to deny, and disdain, the virtues and pleasures of the world. But one day Dumas wrote a begging-letter for his friend Lassailly, who, on reading the note, turned to its author with a stupefied air.
"Well," he said, "this is comical!"
"What is?"
"Why, you have wit!"
"Why shouldn't I? Envious fellow!"
"Well, you're probably the first man of five feet ninc who has ever been witty!"
Dumas has himself defined and described his own gaiety. "Some folk," he says, "are gay because they're well, or have a good digestion, or have nothing to worry about that is the ordinary gaiety. But mine is invariable gaiety, which shines through disturbing influences, through troubles, through danger itself."
The young writer had been unconscious of the existence of this unfashionable quality; but it was destined to show itself henceforth first in his books of travel, and afterwards in his comedies and romances; and, in short, more or less in everything he wrote or spoke.
Dumas's gaiety does not, perhaps, appear in his first romance—if we can call it so—of "Isabel de Bavière." Four of his friends had previously scraped together a little money, and started the world-famous Revue des Deux Mondes, and Dumas agreed to assist the new-born with his pen. The "Histoire des Ducs de Bourgoyne" of Barante made a powerful impression upon him at this time, "finishing," he says, "the work begun by Scott." Still, the young author did not feel strong enough to write an entirely original romance; and he therefore put into a picturesque form, and into dialogue, selected scenes from Barante, which he first called "Scènes Historiques," and which proved a great success in the pages of the Revue. This decided the ambitious author to write forthwith the history of France from the days of Charles VI. to his own. It is hardly credible —and yet Dumas confesses to it—his ignorance of history at this period was so profound that he was studying it by the aid of poetic tags!—
"En l'an quatre-cent-vingt, Pharamond, premier roi,
Est connu seulement par la salique loi,"...
In 1832 the cholera swept over Paris, emptying the theatres, filling the cemeteries, and carrying terror everywhere. Nevertheless it could not daunt our author's new-found gaiety: he wrote the dialogue of one of his wittiest plays—"Le Mari de la Veuve"—for an actress who was about to take a benefit, and who begged from Dumas some novelty to put on the bills. Every night a group of friends forgathered in Dumas's rooms. "We chatted; sometimes Hugo decided to recite us some of his poetry; Liszt thumped hard on a wretched piano, and the evening passed by without one of us thinking any more of the cholera than if it had been at Pekin."
But one evening, immediately after Dumas had watched his joyous friends depart, he himself was seized with the cholera. For five or six days he was prostrate and in great danger, but his wonderful physique withstood the attack of the terrible disease. The first person to greet him in his convalescence was Harel, the manager of the Odéon. The cholera, he cheerfully declared, had "gone away without even making its expenses," and he pressed the fever-ridden author to set about a new play. This was destined to be "La Tour de Nesle." The plot of that drama was common property; from Villon's day all French readers had known of the vile Queen Marguerite of Burgundy, of her foul, nightly revels in the terrible Tower, and of the bodies which were found in the Seine next morning. It may be added that there is not a horror, or an incredible incident in the play, which history has not only justified, but asserted.
The authorship of the play led to a long and acrimonious dispute, which is best described in the words of Mr Walter Herries Pollock:
"It seems to me that no one who devotes a moderate attention to his dramatic works can reasonably doubt that in the celebrated quarrel about the play called the 'Tour de Nesle,' right was on the side of Dumas. This quarrel is worth some attention. The story takes up some four chapters of Dumas's 'Mémoires'; but briefly, the main facts were these:
"Harel, the great theatrical manager, had received a play in manuscript from a young author named Gaillardet. He thought there was capital stuff in it; but as it was written it was quite unfitted for stage representation on account of the author's inexperience. Jules Janin had tried to do something with it, and had failed. Harel then came to Dumas, who, according to his own account, which I for one believe, entirely remodelled it, and made of it one of the most impressive melodramas ever put on the stage. He had previously written a somewhat imprudently self-effacing letter to the young author, who, instead of being grateful, was furious at having, as he said, a collaborator thrust upon him, and ended by writing to the papers to assert that he was the sole author of the piece.
"The matter went through all kinds of intricacies into which it would be tedious to go; but the last word which ought to be said about it is found in a letter written by Gaillardet in 1861 to the manager of the Porte St Martin theatre. The letter runs thus:
"'A judgment of the courts in 1832 decreed that the "Tour de Nesle" should be printed and announced under my name alone; and this was done up to the date of its being forbidden by the censorship in 1851.
"'Now that you are going to put it on the stage again, I give you permission—nay, more, I beg you to join to my name that of Alexandre Dumas, my collaborator. I wish to prove to him that I have forgotten our old quarrel, and that I remember only our later pleasant relations, and the great share which his incomparable talent had in the success of the "Tour de Nesle."'"
The success of the drama, indeed, equalled that of "Antony." Yet, although Dumas was determined that Gaillardet should receive the sole credit of the play, a quarrel developed—for which Harel's unscrupulous behaviour as the go-between was responsible—and a duel was fought, fortunately with no serious results.
But no sooner was our ardent hero out of this scrape than he got into another. There was a Republican riot during the funeral of General Lamarque, a devoted servant of France and of Napoleon. Dumas took part in the riot; and next day he read, in a legitimist paper, that he had been taken with arms in his hand, summarily courtmartialled, and shot!
"The news," says Dumas, "was of so authentic a nature, the details of my execution were so circumstantial, the information came from such an infallible source, that I experienced a moment's doubt. I felt myself all over!" Nodier wrote to say that he had heard of Dumas's death, and expressed a hope that it would not prevent him from dining with a few friends on the morrow. The other replied that he was not at all sure whether he was living or not, but that either in body or in spirit he would come to dinner. He added that, as he had eaten nothing for six weeks there would probably be more of his spirit than his body present.
But if he had not been shot, and if the cholera had failed to kill him, Dumas was still in some danger. One of the king's aides-de-camp gave the literary politician a hint that the question of his arrest was being considered, and advised a temporary absence from Paris. Accordingly Dumas set out in July, 1832 for Switzerland.
This tour, the account of which delighted the public by its freshness, gaiety and picturesque style, possessed one or two notable features. With true journalistic instinct Dumas called on Chateaubriand, the self-exiled Royalist poet, and chatted to him of politics; he interviewed Jacques Balmat, and heard from the lips of the guide his narrative of the first ascent of Mont Blanc; and he wrote the famous fable of the "bear-beefsteak," which he pretended to have eaten at a certain inn. Thenceforth travellers by the score stopped at that inn and called for bear-steak, and the unhappy landlord, quite unable to satisfy the guests either with his explanations or with the required dish, went nearly mad, and cursed the very name of Dumas.
The most interesting portion of the "Impressions de Voyage en Suisse," from a serious point of view, is the account of Dumas's interview at Arenenburg with Hortense Bonaparte, ex-Queen of Holland, and mother of Louis Napoleon, afterwards Napoleon III. The young Republican philosopher did not hold out any hopes to the royal exile of a restoration by force, or by the power of the Napoleonic tradition alone. In reply to a request from the queen for advice as to the means by which one of her family might re-establish the dynasty, Dumas replied:
"I would say to him, obtain the revocation of your exile; buy a home in France; cause yourself to be elected deputy; and try by force of your talent to secure a majority in the chamber, and make use of it to overthrow Louis Philippe, and get yourself chosen king in his stead." Sixteen years later Louis Napoleon followed this advice pretty closely, and his success is a matter of history.
The Swiss holiday was followed by a brief visit to England in 1833, and a tour in the South of France, which was much more lengthy. The following year Dumas started for Italy, with his friend Jadin, and "Mylord," the bull-dog. He was arrested at Naples as a dangerous "red," and it was only when he produced papers proving that he was entrusted with a private mission by the French Government that he was released. In November of the following year the traveller was privileged to have an interview with Pope Gregory XVI.—after which he was arrested a second time!
The next year or two passed in the most delightful way; Dumas enjoyed himself like a schoolboy in holiday-time, sailing round Sicily, exploiting Naples and Florence, and "earning his keep" by writing most entertaining accounts of his adventures.
On his return "Catherine Howard," "Don Juan" and "Kean" were produced in successive years. "Kean," as played by Frederick Lemaître, made a strong impression on Heine and others, but in spite of its English milieu, the play is so French in spirit as to appeal most to our sense of humour. Thackeray, who was visiting Paris about this period, was terribly shocked by the naïve and earnest irreverence of "Don Juan " and "Caligula." In his "Paris Sketch-book" he has denounced them both, in that bluff "damn-everything-that-isn't-English" style, so cheap, yet so dear to the public.
Dumas had been on familiar terms with the young Duke of Chartres, who succeeded to the title of "Duke of Orleans" (which corresponded to our "Prince of Wales"), when his father obtained the throne. In 1836 our author had stayed with the prince at Compiègne, and when the heir was married in 1837, and fêtes were held at Versailles in honour of the occasion, four crosses of the Legion of Honour were placed at the disposal of the young prince. Dumas received one of them—a knight's cross. Seven years before, on the morrow of "Christine," Louis Philippe himself, at his son's request, had asked for the cross for his young employee from Charles X., but had been refused. Dumas's name was on this occasion removed from the list by the King's own order; upon which Hugo, who was about to receive an officer's cross, declined the promotion indignantly. The offending name was accordingly re-entered on the list, and the two friends went to the fête together, and left it arm-in-arm. But Alexandre felt that the honour came too late. Instead of fastening it to his button-hole, he put it in his fob.
By this time Dumas had become so famous that, with his artless vanity, his outspoken ways, and his unbusiness-like methods, he had carned a host of enemies, mockers, detractors, denunciators and the like. His "Caligula" failed, although it was produced at the Comédie Française in the most costly fashion; and its author discovered that the leader of the claque (or organised gang of applauders) had been bribed by a number of actors, who were not performing in the play, to do all he could to damn the piece!
In 1838 Dumas suffered the great misfortune of his life. His mother, to whom he had been so passionately attached, died suddenly. Friends brought him the news that Madame Dumas had been seized with a second apoplectic stroke. The first attack, eight years before, had partly disabled the sufferer, and this one proved almost immediately fatal. The dying woman was able to open her eyes and look on her son once more—and that was all. With a choking heart Dumas sent word of the event to his young patron, and an hour later the kindly duke was at the street door in his carriage. The mourner ran out, at this sign of friendly sympathy, and kneeling at the prince's feet, burst into tears. There was remorse mingled with grief in this passion of regret for the life that was passing away in the room above, for although Alexandre had usually visited his mother constantly, and shown her every loving mark of affection, there had also been periods of absence and neglect, which now he regretted only too keenly.
At the foot of the sketch of his dead mother, which Duval drew, Dumas wrote these lines
"Oh, mon Dieu! Dans ce monde où toute bouche nic,
Où chacun foule aux pieds les Tables de la Loi,
Vous m'avez entendu, pendant son agonie,
Prier à deux genoux, le cour ardent de foi.
Vous m'avez vu, mon Dieu, sur la funèbre route,
Où la mort me courbait devant un crucifix,
Et vous avez compté les pleurs qui, goutte à goutte,
Ruisselaient de mes yeux aux pieds de Votre Fils.
Je demandais, mon Dieu, que moins vite ravie,
Vous retardiez l'instant de son dernier adieu:
Pour racheter ses jours je vous offrais ma vie;
Vous n'avez pas voulu: soyez béni, mon Dieu!"[3]
Dumas now led a roving life. In 1838 he had visited Belgium and the Rhine; two years later he went to Italy, returning there in 1841 and again in 1842. In 1840 he married Mdlle. Ida Ferrier, a fascinating woman but a second-rate actress, who appeared in her husband's tragedy-drama "Caligula," and other subsequent plays. The marriage was a very ill-advised one, and finally extravagance and irreconcilable differences of character combined caused the lady to leave her husband and go to live in Florence. She never returned to France, and died in Italy in 1859.
The "Comtesse Dash," an intimate friend of Dumas and his wife, has given us, if not the real excuse for his "immorality," at least the true explanation of it:
"A woman who would have loved him enough to love him as he wished to be loved (she writes in her "Mémoires d'Autres"), a woman who would have had the tact to close her eyes to his pranks, and make home comfortable, so that he could invite his friends there; and above all, who would not have disturbed him in his work—that woman would have been perfectly and eternally happy with him."
The character of Madame Dumas has been clearly drawn for us by the same pen. "Ida" was a beautiful woman of mediocre abilities and with a jealous, narrow and contemptible nature. She tolerated little Marie, Dumas's daughter, but hated young Alexandre, because of the love his father bore him. The two were obliged to meet by stealth, for the young man was not allowed in the house. As the actress "Mademoiselle Ferrier" forced Dumas to give her parts to which her talents were not equal; as a mistress she was furiously jealous of every other woman, and played practical jokes of doubtful taste on the master. Dumas bore patiently with her extravagance, her constant interruption of his work, and the daily quarrel which seemed necessary to her existence; but soon after the pair were married the connection came to its inevitable end.
Whilst Dumas was staying at the Villa Palmieri at Florence, early in 1842, old Jerome Bonaparte suggested that the author should take the young Prince Napoleon, who was just returning from Wurtemburg, for a cruise, with the object of "teaching him France." The nephew of the great Emperor naturally desired to visit both Elba and Corsica; and it was during this trip that the travellers espied from the mainland of Elba, the insignificant islet of Monte Cristo. Curiosity prompted them to visit it, and Dumas was so much struck by the appearance of the picturesque little spot that he resolved to use its name as the title of his forthcoming romance.
It was one of Dumas's laughing complaints that Scribe was considered a "moral" writer, whilst he himself was looked upon as immoral. Therefore, when the opportunity came to him to play a practical joke on his confrère he could not resist.
Whilst Dumas was staying in Florence about this time an actor-friend of his, named Doligny, came to him and asked permission to play some of his best-known dramas. The author gave his consent willingly, but warned the actor that the authorities would refuse him permission to perform. When Doligny returned he confessed that his friend was right—the censor had rejected the plays by "that immoral writer"—but Dumas came to the rescue. He took Doligny with him to the office of a friendly printer, and ordered new covers for the four plays in question. It was very simple:—
In place of "Richard Darlington, by A. Dumas," was printed "Ambition, or the Executioner's Son, by Eugène Scribe."
In place of "Angèle, by A. Dumas," was printed "A Ladder of Petticoats, by Eugène Scribe."
Instead of "Antony, by A. Dumas," was printed "Love's Victim, by Eugène Scribe."
"Instead of "La Tour de Nesle, by MM. Gaillardet and A. Dumas," was printed "Adultery Punished, by Eugène Scribe."
The old plays with the new coats—if we may believe Dumas—duly passed the censor without comment; the public found the plays masterpieces of improving literature, and the grand-duke applauded them furiously!
In July of the same year Dumas heard of the sudden and shocking death of the young Duke of Orleans, who was thrown from his carriage, through his horses taking fright, and mortally injured. Full of grief, the author hurried post-haste to Paris, and arrived just in time for the funeral ceremonies, and the interment at Dreux. His sorrow for the promising young prince, of which there is no reason for doubting the sincerity, was artless and unrestrained, and afforded his enemies ample scope for mockery.
Dumas, like most French authors, had a desire to be judged Immortal whilst he lived, and had already more than once put himself forward for election to the Academy, and in particular to the seat vacant by the death of his old colleague and rival Casimir Delavigne, the author of "Louis XI." But in 1843, as on previous occasions, he was rejected by the Forty, whose orthodoxy was shocked by the audacious methods of this wicked "Romantic." On one occasion Hugo would have nominated Dumas for a vacant chair, but there were only thirteen Academicians present and twenty-one votes were necessary for election. Dumas consoled himself with the fact that he occupied the "forty-first fauteuil" in good company, and recollecting the treatment which the Academy had meted out to great Frenchmen, from Corneille and Molière, downward. Repulsed once more, he returned to Florence, saying to himself, "Je demande à être le quarantième, mais il paraît qu'on me faire faire quarantaine!" ("I ask to be made the fortieth, but it appears they wish to keep me in quarantine!")
The year 1844 was one of the great years in the life of Dumas. "Les Trois Mousquetaires" and "Monte Cristo" both appeared at that time, and were welcomed enthusiastically by the public. During their progress in feuilleton form, people had discussed the sayings and doings of D'Artagnan or Dantès as if the men were alive, and known to everybody—as, indeed, they were. Villemessant tells us how he woke his wife in the night to tell her of the escape in the sack from the Chateau d'If; and Gautier has described amusingly enough the grip which the two books obtained on the imagination of the Parisian public. Dumas had achieved a second fame.
In his preface to "Les Trois Mousquetaires," Alexandre Dumas fils has left us a charming picture of his father at the time these great romances were written. Their author was then working in some modest lodgings, overlooking the courtyard of the house (No. 22 Rue de Rivoli), his rooms plainly furnished with a big white-wood table, a sofa, two chairs, a few books on the mantelpiece, and an iron bedstead, where he slept for a few hours when the evening's work was prolonged into the night. "It was there," adds the son, addressing his father in apostrophe, "that you sought refuge, to be undisturbed by the importunate, and all the parasites who incessantly besieged that door which you did not close half often enough. Clothed in your pantalons à pied and shirt sleeves, your arms bare to the shoulder, your collar unfastened, you sat down to work at seven in the morning and you kept at it until seven at night, when I came to dine with you.
"Sometimes I found your lunch untouched, on the little table by your side, where the servant had placed it. You had forgotten to eat it. Then, whilst we dined and dined well, on the dishes which you yourself had prepared, you recounted to me, by way of relaxation, all that your characters had done during the day, and rejoiced in the thought of what they were going to do, on the morrow. This lasted for some months.
"Ah, those happy days! We were both of an age: you were forty-two, and I was twenty!"
Fiorentino declares that Dumas, being accustomed to fill his twenty sheets a day, finished "Monte Cristo," in his presence, on the fifteenth page. Not wishing to depart from his rule, the romancer took a fresh sheet, wrote at the top "Les Trois Mousquetaires," and completed five sheets of the new story before finishing for the day!
It will be readily understood that with his bonhomie and contagious wit Dumas's social popularity was enormous. Villemessant, whose stories of "the master" were always amusing and sometimes trustworthy, tells us
"When he spoke, the most celebrated guests were silent, in order to listen to him; when he entered a salon, the wit of the men and the beauty of the women—all that makes for the joy of life—were eclipsed by the glory of this one man. He was really the King of Paris, sovereign by virtue of intelligence and wit—the only man for a whole century, who had made himself adored by all classes of society."
Janin relates that on the occasion of the Duke of Montpensier's wedding with the Infanta of Spain a grand fête was given at Madrid. An old diplomat, arriving late, was astonished to see there a man dressed simply in black, and a perfect stranger, to whom the greatest lords of Spain were listening with all their ears, forgetting the queen and the royal bridal pair in their enjoyment. He asked who the attraction was.
"Pardieu," answered his friend, "that's Alexandre Dumas—who else do you think it would be?"
A certain Parisian named M. Pitre-Chevalier, being a sort of Lyon-Hunter, was (so Villemessant declares) anxious to obtain the presence of all the social celebrities at his salons, and made unheard-of efforts to secure the lion of the hour for one of his evenings. Dumas chose his salons, as he chose his theatre, or the newspaper for his feuilletons, and when it was known in Paris "Dumas will be at So-and-so's tonight!" society attacked the lucky host's house as if it had been the doors of a theatre, on the night of a première; all the company stood up as he entered, and his journey towards his host was a sort of triumphal procession. Pitre-Chevalier had his way; but the next day the gossips of the boulevards talked of nothing but Dumas's latest mot. Asked by a friend whether he had enjoyed the evening with M. Lyon-Hunter, Dumas replied,
"Well, I should have been very bored, if it hadn't been for—myself!"
At one of these soirées Dumas was wearing the ribbon of a certain order, having recently been made a commandant, and an envious friend remarked upon it.
"My dear fellow," he said, "that cordon is a wretched colour! One would think it was your woollen vest that was showing!"
"Oh no, my dear d'E———," replied Dumas with a smile, "you're mistaken; it's not a bad colour: it is exactly the shade of the sour grapes in the fable."
Gozlan one day asked Dumas why a certain bête noir of his had received the Legion of Honour.
"Don't you know?" answered the author, looking wise, and as if he had some State secret to reveal.
"Certainly I don't know—you don't know either!"
"Ah, but I do, though!"
"Then,—tell me!"
They've given him a cross—because—he hadn't one!"
This is as severe as Mark Twain's comment that "few escape that distinction."
Writing furiously at his romances, our author exiled himself from society as much as possible, and for that purpose retired to some rented rooms in the "Henry IV." pavilion at St Germain; but even there he was constantly disturbed by friends, parasites and duns, and in despair found it necessary to move further afield. Driven from St Germain, he discovered between that town and Marly a site which seemed to him to be an ideal one for a quiet, unpretentious house, which should be his own—he was tired of living in other peoples' houses. He arranged with an architect for a two- or three-roomed cottage, where he could work in peace. But as he discussed the plans, the love of splendour with which his African descent had cursed or blessed him, came uppermost, and at the tempting suggestions of others his ideas expanded at such a pace that from a few hundred francs, Dumas found himself paying—or owing—tens of thousands. In July he gave a breakfast on the site of the future palace, inviting his guests to meet him there, three years later, to see his new home. As Mr Fitzgerald says, "this was like one of the dramatic appointments given in 'Monte Cristo.'"
From this period in particular, dated that system of collaboration which lasted for some years, and of which so much too much has been made. The editors who urged this ardent, insouciant worker to undertake twice or three times as much as any ordinary mortal could produce, were the first to attack him, either for non-fulfilment of contract, or for his "workshop" methods, as they were pleased to call them.
Inevitably Dumas, in the full blaze of success, was the butt of the envious, for envy is the shadow thrown by the sun of fame. A young gentleman of the name of Jacquot (who, like a kitchen-rogue, dubbed himself "Eugène de Mirecourt"), choosing to consider himself offended by the great man, brought before the "Société des Gens de Lettres," a resolution levelled at our author (during his absence), condemning him for keeping "a literary factory"; for "setting up as a coryphée of shame"; and for "laying his hand on Reputation, that white-winged maiden, dragging her through the mire, and violating her before the public gaze," with much more to the same effect. Unfortunately Dumas himself, calling in unexpectedly, interrupted the back-biting process; and when he left, after a fierce encounter with his circle of enemies, they passed a mild, emasculated resolution which, coming from so unimportant a body, had little effect.
Theodore de Banville, in his "Odes Funambulesques," has some amusing but quite untranslatable verse on this episode. Dumas is passing by, when "mirecourt" darts out of the crowd, and abuses the great man in the foulest manner. After the thing has exhausted its bag of spleen, Dumas replies,
Docile au mirecourt, il lui laissa tout dire,
Pencha son front rêveur ... puis, avec un sourire,
Fit: 'As-tu déjeuné, Jacquot?'[4]
Thwarted thus, Jacquot published his venomous pamphlet, "Maison Dumas et Cie," by which he got little credit or profit. There was a half-truth in this lie, and if it had been told with moderation and in a friendly and appreciative way, it might have had a salutary effect. As it was, both the squib and the motive for it were alike contemptible. One of the "workmen" attacked challenged the slanderer, who, at the instance of Dumas, was sentenced to fifteen days' imprisonment. Dumas fils took up his father's cause, and challenged Jacquot also; but that gentleman, with characteristic cowardice, shirked the encounter. Yet this contractor for the gutter press of Paris had not written in vain; for most subsequent biographies of Dumas, whether in English or in French, seem to have been founded on Jacquot's statements, and to be actuated by his spirit.
In 1846 the Duke of Montpensier, younger brother of the ill-fated Orleans, was betrothed by Louis Philippe to the Infanta of Spain, and set out for Madrid, for the wedding. The French Government invited Dumas to accompany the prince and act as official histriographer on this important occasion. Further, he was instructed to go forward to Algiers, and, in his gay, informative and incisive way, to "teach" France all about its new colony. A friendship had sprung up between the young Duke and Dumas, and the arrangement was a pleasant one for all parties. The writer, his vanity flattered by the commission, accepted, although at the very shortest notice, and without for a moment considering the consequences to himself.
The Royal party arrived at Madrid in October; the wedding duly took place, and Dumas received the cordon of Charles III. on the occasion of the auspicious ceremony. In due course he visited Tangiers, in the State vessel Le Véloce, called at Gibraltar, crossed again to Tetuan, and took an honourable share in the delivery of some Frenchmen, captured by the Moors. Although he did not make a long stay at Algiers—where Marshal Bugeaud failed to meet him as arranged—Dumas sailed on to Tunis and the site of ancient Carthage, and duly embodied his adventures in two series of "impressions"—"De Paris à Cadix," and "Le Véloce."
All this was wormwood to Dumas's enemies in Paris, and they were numerous and influential. On his return his travels were made the subject of a savage attack on the Government and their envoy, in the press, and in the Chamber of Deputies. Now, although M. Salvandy had expressly charged Dumas with the mission to Algiers, and although M. Guizot, the Foreign Minister, had given the author special instructions, as well as a passport, placing him under national protection, the ministers made a discreditable attempt to explain away their connection with "ce monsieur," as he was insolently called, and to pacify their enemies at the expense of Dumas's reputation. It is pleasant, by way of contrast, to read Madame de Girardin's warm and generous defence of our author, and her scorn of the "gentlemen" who had insulted the man of genius. For, when Dumas and Maquet sent challenges to the deputies who had abused them, those gentlemen sheltered themselves behind their public position and would not "come out and fight."
The following year was a busy one for the returned "envoy," for no less than seven newspapers combined to sue him for arrears of work due. One in particular had a genuine grievance; for the impulsive writer, in order to follow the fortunes of the young Montpensier, had left what is known in English as "The Memoirs of a Physician" in a state of startling incompleteness. The trial was an amusing one, for the culprit conducted his own defence, and proved himself as vivacious in dialogue with his tongue as with his pen. After three days' hearing the court ordered the defendant to resume the "Memoirs" within a month, and pay £4 a day for any delay beyond that time. He was threatened with imprisonment if the arrears of fines became too great; and in addition was fined £120 for each of the seven journals. Needless to say, nothing more was heard of the fines, and the whole affair was naturally a splendid testimony to the author's popularity.
Dumas the playwright had for some time been embroiled with the theatres, and in particular with the Comédie Française—he gives an amusing account of his "Odyssey" at the Française in the "Souvenirs Dramatiques";—and now that fame and fortune had come to him he determined, with his usual magnificence of ideas, to have not only his own chateau, but also his own theatre, where no jealousies should come between his genius and the success of his plays. The young Duke of Montpensier secured for the dramatist a patent for the new theatre, which was to be called the "Théâtre Montpensier"; the Hôtel Foulon, on the Boulevard du Temple, was bought and pulled down, and in its place the new theatre rose—a splendid building costing over £30,000, decorated most artistically and dedicated by its founder to the dramatic art of Europe. Unfortunately for Dumas, the Duke—at the instance of his father, Louis Philippe, it is said—withdrew this permission for the use of his name, and accordingly the new playhouse was christened the "Historique." On the 21st of February 1847 the first performance was given; the duke and his suite being present. The play chosen was a dramatised version of "La Reine Margot."
There is an anecdote told in this connection, which is truly illustrative of the characters of prince and author respectively. When, after the Revolution of '48, the Duke went into exile, his box was religiously 
The "Theatre Historique," Boulevard de Temple, Paris. kept vacant for him for a whole year, although he had long since ceased to pay for it. Dumas learnt later that the Duke, when he received his tickets, was wont to burst out laughing at the quixotic manager's "buffoonery"; and the proprietor then decided that the box should be devoted to public use in future, remarking that the yearly rent of a box was too high a price to pay for the privilege of making a prince laugh.
In July of this year Dumas, according to his pledge, gave a magnificent reception to six hundred guests, as a house-warming for his new palace of "Monte Cristo." The scheme had rapidly outgrown the first modest plan, and had been developed on the most lavish scale. A beautiful building, half-chateau, half-villa, had risen in the meantime," says Fitzgerald, "embowered in trees, and in the centre of a wild garden. Its white stone walls were covered with exquisite traceries and sculptures copied from those of Jean Goujon at the Louvre, and executed by Choistat, conspicuous in the centre being Dumas's arms, with the motto 'Jaime qui m'aime.' Inside, the walls were decorated from designs by Klagmann; while the 'Arabian chamber,' after the pattern of the Alhambra, was a marvel of Eastern gorgeousness and decoration. The gardens were charming, all leafy and shaded. On the little island in the lake rose an exquisite little Norman building, intended as a sort of kiosk, covered with exquisite carvings, the designs being by Mansson, a decorator of great eminence. Blended with the sound of falling waters—for an artificial torrent had been contrived, that tumbled over rocks as artificially arranged—was heard the chattering of monkeys, and the screaming of parrots, while huge barbaric dogs of strange shapes and colour ranged through the groves. Such was 'Monte Cristo,' which was now the talk of Paris."
Here Dumas's hospitality was princely, unlimited. "At his Abbotsford 'Monte Cristo,'" Mr Lang reminds us, "the gates were open to everybody but bailiffs. His dog asked other dogs to come and stay; twelve came, making thirteen in all. The old butler wanted to turn them adrift, and Dumas consented and repented.
"'Michel,' he said, 'there are some expenses which a man's social position and the character which he has had the ill-luck to receive from heaven force upon him. I don't believe these dogs ruin me. Let them bide. But, in the interests of their own good luck, see that they are not thirteen, an unfortunate number!'
"'Monsieur, I'll drive one of them away.'
"'No, no, Michel; let a fourteenth come.... These dogs cost me some £3 a month,' said Dumas. 'A dinner to five or six friends would cost thrice as much, and, when they went home, they would say my wine was good, but certainly that my books were bad.'"
The owner himself retired to the pavilion to work, whilst his parasites enjoyed the unbounded hospitality of the establishment, and roamed at will throughout the splendid mansion. It will readily be understood that under the irresistible influence of this man, St Germain became a new place; it was filled with life and gaiety. Dumas rented the local theatre, hired a company of actors, and produced the translation of "Hamlet," for which Meurice and himself were responsible. Indeed, so transformed was this suburb of Paris, that Louis Philippe, we are told, wondered at the change and wished the same process to be applied to Versailles, which was certainly dull enough. However, when it was suggested to him by Montalivet that Dumas should be brought to Versailles, the king turned his back on the maladroit courtier!
In 1847 the "reform agitation" broke out in France, and ended the following February in the downfall of the house of Orleans[5]. Louis Philippe fled to England; and Louis Napoleon became President of the French Republic, making himself Emperor, in 1851, by means of the infamous coup d'état. And from this epoch onward, the meteoric brilliance of Dumas's star began to fade.
Several causes contributed to this sudden and overwhelming change of fortune. Our author was, as Ferry says, a man of independence of character and opinion, "and this opinion manifested itself in an originality as rare as it was disinterested. When Dumas had known a prince in private life, or in exile, he broke with him as soon as he became King or Emperor,"—as in the cases of Louis Philippe and Napoleon III. "Misfortune and exile found Dumas friendly and respectful; triumph rendered him prudent, even antagonistic." Thus, when he joined with his brother "liberals" in commencing the agitation of 1847, he acted with a difference. He founded a journal (Le Mois) in order to give publicity to his political views; and he protested indignantly against the destruction of the statue of the Duke of Orleans (Louis Philippe's son) as a wanton and disgraceful act. He went further, and dedicated one of his books to the exiled young Montpensier; and by the time that the elections came on, Dumas had achieved the reputation of being an Orleanist!
Still, he decided to offer himself as a candidate for the Chamber of Deputies—not for his native department of the Aisne, where, in consequence of the Soissons exploit, he was considered an extreme "red"; nor for St Germain, because in the revolutionary days of February he had lost his command of the national guard there, by suggesting that he should lead his 750 comrades to Paris, à la Marseillaise, to the help of the people. It was suggested to him that the department of Yonne would be sure to acclaim him, and accordingly he went off to Lower Burgundy. When it was too late Dumas discovered that his chances in this district were fatally compromised because of his "Royalist sympathies"! He was mobbed, and fired at in the street. In vain he harangued a hostile crowd of three thousand Yonnais, and converted them into ardent supporters; he was not elected—perhaps because he had prophesied Prussia's conquest of France, twenty-two years later—although in his chant "Mourir pour la Patrie," which Dumas had introduced into his play of "Le Chevalier de Maison Rouge," he had given the Paris mob its "Marseillaise." (He had previously refused to write a "national anthem" to suit the Government.) Dumas was destined never to achieve a place in French politics, however ardently he desired it.
In M. Blaze de Bury's study of our author there is a witty account, which we wish we could reproduce in full, of a visit to Joigny paid by the writer, a certain M. du Chaffault, with Dumas, during the novelist's electoral campaign.
Du Chaffault, who lived at Sens, was awakened one morning, he tells us, to find a "horrible big devil" standing by his bedside. The apparition laughingly introduced himself as Alexandre Dumas, who had heard that this young man was "a good fellow," and would be of use to him at Joigny. Whilst the host hurriedly and bewilderedly dressed himself, Dumas changed his worn boots for a new pair of his young friend's, and, adds the narrator, "those he left are now in my library. I show thein to visitors as the thousand-and-first volume of Alexandre Dumas." By the time they had started for Joigny the pair were like old friends, and Dumas's chat en route made the time fly wonderfully. At the second stage the candidate borrowed twenty francs from his new acquaintance, for the postillion, and the ingenuous young Du Chaffault duly entered in his note-book, "Alexandre Dumas, twenty francs." The same thing occurred at Joigny, where everyone came to the young man for money; and as Dumas invited everyone who accosted him to dine with them that evening, the six hundred francs which Du Chaffault had taken with him were gone by the following morning. "I returned to Sens," he says, "my heart full of joy at having seen and heard a man of genius. I still preserve the accounts I paid, which recall to me my two days passed in fairyland with 'Monte Cristo.' I regret only one thing—that I had not had the good sense to put ten thousand francs into my pocket, so that I might have prolonged this incomparable experience for a week or two."
Of course this political failure brought social consequences, but worse remained behind. The papers, being filled with public affairs, required no more feuilletons, and the "Théâtre Historique," which at first had succeeded, did terribly bad business, and eventually closed its doors. It was afterwards pulled down to make room for one of the boulevards of the Second Empire. Meanwhile "Monte Cristo" required an enormous income to maintain it, and it will easily be understood that this literary "cigale," who had saved no store for the winter of misfortune, soon came to grief. He was obliged in the end to abandon the scarcely-finished palace and the newly-opened theatre to his creditors. It was a cruel blow to the great man's hopes and vanities; but he bore it well. He had reigned, like his old employer Louis Philippe, from revolution to revolution.
- ↑ Dumas tells a story respecting this famous "tag" which we cannot omit. At a revival of the play, some years later, the prompter, through ignorance, rang down the curtain immediately Antony had stabbed Adèle. The public, furious at being cheated of the famous line, clamoured "Le dénouement le dénouement!" Bocage sulked in his dressing-room, and would not return; but Marie Dorval good-naturedly remained on the stage, and the curtain was rung up again, in the hope that Antony would feel obliged to return.
Adèle was discovered, dead, in her chair. There was a silence. At last Dorval rose slowly, and coming down to the footlights, remarked pleasantly, "Gentlemen, I resisted him, and he killed me." Then she made her best bow, and retired, amidst frantic applause. - ↑ The "hero" of "Charles VII."
- ↑ ("Oh, my God, in this world, where all men deny Thee, where the feet of men spurn the Tables of Thy Laws, Thou hast beard me, as I knelt at her feet, throughout her agony, praying, with a heart full of faith. Thou hast seen me, oh God, go with her on that last sad journey, when Death's hand bowed my back and bent my gaze on the crucifix, and Thou didst count the tears that one by one streamed from my eyes on the feet of Thy Son. I asked, oh God, that Thou wouldst delay for a while, however brief, the last parting of mother and son. To purchase life for her I would have sold my own. It was not Thy will be Thou blest, oh my God!")
- ↑ Dumas politely allowed the mirecourt to say its say; then inclined his thoughtful brow towards the creature and asked with a smile, "Hast thou lunched to-day, Jacquot?"
- ↑ Dumas is silent concerning this Revolution, and Vandam tells us that he never would discuss it. It is the opinion of the author of "An Englishman in Paris" that the romancer was a trifle ashamed of the Republican intriguers of that time.