Old and New Paris: Its History, Its People, and Its Places, v. 2

One of the most interesting of the small professions is that of the “guardian angel.” This ethereal personage conducts drunkards home to their dwellings. Attached to every large Paris tavern is a guardian angel, whose duty it is to escort any late-staying customer whose legs decline their office, and who needs a guide. He must not quit the person entrusted to his charge until the latter is out of the reach of thieves and safely installed in his own house. The chief quality requisite in this angel is sobriety.

We were speaking just now of the man who collects cigar-ends. Another curious picker-up of unconsidered trifles is the man who is always on the look-out for crusts of bread. A crust of bread is found in all sorts of places: in the street, at the corners of lanes and alleys, on heaps of rubbish. Do not imagine that this man, on the hunt for hard, dirty, disgusting pieces of bread, has fallen so low as to be obliged to live on the fruits of his discoveries. He is the sort of person who believes firmly that nothing in this world is lost, and that one morsel of dry bread, added to another, may be the beginning of a sack of fragments which he will be able to sell for some twenty sous to breeders of rabbits. The rabbit, beloved by the frequenters of barrier-taverns, does not feed on grain and cabbage alone. It also eats a good quantity of bread. It is in order to procure it this article of diet that the trade of crust-collector was invented.

Of the ragpicker mention has been made elsewhere. He is essentially eclectic in his tastes: rags, paper, gloves, glass, broken toys, the necks of bottles, nothing comes amiss to him. He puts into the basket he carries on his shoulder whatever he can find. It is the trieur or sorter whom the classification of the different objects concerns.

Another petty trade which should not be forgotten is that of the old-clothesman, who is seen everywhere early in the morning uttering his piercing and well-known cry. He is above all to be met with in the districts where young men abound: in the environs, that is to say, of the School of Law and of the School of Medicine. The old-clothesman is of all the gutter-merchants the most cunning and the most merciless. He wanders around the abodes of the students, knowing well the time when they will probably find it necessary to ease themselves of a portion of their wardrobe. It is, above all, when the Carnival is going on that he does good business. The allowance from home being insufficient for the cost of the masked ball, with its concomitant expenses, he realises money by the sale, now of a light overcoat, now of some other summer garment which can be dispensed with in the depths of winter. If the old-clothesman is waiting for the student, the student is on the look-out for the old-clothesman. The latter enters and the bargaining is at once begun. Whatever the dealer may offer, it is sure, after some haggling as if for form’s sake, to be accepted. Having made his purchase, the old-clothesman hastens with the clothes he has bought for a mere nothing from an improvident student in order to sell them at a moderate rate to a provident one. A story is told of two students, of about the same height and figure, who after a time found that their clothes passed from one to the other, the middleman in the shape of the old-clothesman taking on each transaction his own particular profit. It struck them that the middleman might as well be suppressed; and from that time forward Jules, when he was hard up, sold his clothes to Anatole, while Anatole, when he in his turn fell into an impecunious position, sold them back again to Jules.

In the Temple, which gives its name to one of the lower boulevards, there was formerly a market for all kinds of antiquities, including old clothes; while buying and selling of a like character was carried on until a later period in the Marché des Patriarches. Here, even now, the lovers of the economical may provide themselves with shoes at a franc, and boots at three francs and a half.

There are other petty trades at Paris, such as that of the bird-catcher and the pigeon-fancier.

Nor must the sellers of violets at one sou the bunch be forgotten; though they are not to be confounded with the bouquetière in a far more fashionable walk of life. The dealers in groundsel, too, have a trade of their own.

There are many institutions, professions, and classes which, after being originated on the left bank, have crossed the water to flourish on the right. Among these must be included the claque; though, from whatever quarter it may have sprung, there is now no theatrical district in Paris where it does not thrive.

It originated at the Comédie Française, when that institution had its abode at the theatre now known as the Odéon, where, among other masterpieces, Beaumarchais’s Marriage of Figaro was produced in 1784. Mercier pointed out, about this time, that the masterpiece in question had no need of organised applause. This preconcerted clapping of hands, varied by the stamping of feet and by walking-sticks, had a very bad effect on the taste and temper of the public, and even, at times, on the fortune of a piece. “They clap when the actor appears on the stage; they clap for the author at the end of the play; they clap for the composer, and make more noise than all the instruments of Gluck’s orchestra, which can no longer be heard. This perpetual noise, this artificial excitement, degrades the public taste. An author who was constantly hissed was once advised to construct a machine which would imitate the sound of three or four hundred persons clapping their hands, and to place it in a corner of the theatre under the guidance of some intelligent and devoted friend.”

Another writer on the same subject, M. Prudhomme, tells us in his “Historical and Critical Mirror of Old and New Paris” (1807) that he had once been acquainted with a man who had no means of living but by assisting at first representations. Placed in the middle of the pit, he called attention to the beauties of the piece and led the applause. The name of “Monsieur Claque” had been given to him, and he had hands as hard as the piece of wood with which washerwomen beat their linen. His terms were thirty-six francs if the piece succeeded, and twelve francs if it failed.

The claque, however, did not acquire its greatest importance until the time of the Restoration. At an earlier period Dorat, a popular drawing-room poet, or writer of vers de société, was in the habit of sending persons to the theatre with a free-admission on the understanding that they were to applaud his piece. By this stratagem he managed to secure a run of several nights for more than one of his works; but at each success he might have applied to himself the exclamation of Pyrrhus after the Battle of Asculum: “One more such victory and I am ruined.”

Dorat did, indeed, ruin himself at the game he is said to have invented; but his invention was not lost to posterity. The claque, however, did not work, in these comparatively primitive days, as an organised body. There was a certain Chevalier de la Morlière, a retired musketeer, who undertook the criticism of all new pieces, and offered to dramatic authors his support or his condemnation. His terms were moderate. A few dinners, a few louis, lent without any fixed term of repayment, a little commission on the pit tickets that passed through his hands: that was all he asked. He had volunteers and paid agents equally at his disposal, the former acting under his advice, the latter at his command. The Chevalier de la Morlière placed himself, moreover, at the service of débutants and débutantes, or rather he imposed his services upon them. One day he took it into his head to become a dramatic author, arguing with himself that after ensuring the success of so many works by others he could do the same for a work of his own. But though he now surpassed himself in the ingenuity of his manœuvres, the work he produced did not succeed. Thereupon he lost all credit. The authors and actors resolved to do without him. His sceptre fell, but only to be taken from time to time by others. Up to this time the claque, as before said, was the work of enterprising individuals who organised it on certain occasions, but not continuously as a permanent institution. Figaro, in Beaumarchais’s comedy, speaks of the play he had written, and goes on to say: “I really cannot understand how it was that I did not obtain the greatest success; for I had filled the pit with excellent workmen, whose hands were like wood.”

The organisation of the claque, as a permanent institution, dates from the time of Napoleon I., and seems to have had for its starting-point the famous rivalry between Mlle. Duchénois and Mlle. Georges. When the struggle between the two tragic actresses came to an end, the forces organised in their service declined to be disbanded. They elected their chiefs, and the leaders treated with managers and authors for regular support. People were still found who would applaud a favourite actor or actress from enthusiasm, duly stimulated by a gratuitous ticket. Thus at one time the whole atelier of David served as claque to an actress much admired by the painter and his pupils, who without support and encouragement might have been crushed, it was thought, by the growing talent and popularity of Mlle. Mars. The claque of David’s atelier was a formidable one, for the great artist had from sixty to eighty students attached to him. This was in 1810, a year or two after the publication of the “Historical and Critical Mirror of Old and New Paris” previously referred to.

Under the Restoration the claque was a regular institution. The quarrels of the Romanticists and Classicists lent it a considerable importance. Impartial in its tastes, it served, turn by turn, and with the same zeal, the “Antony” of the modern drama and the Greek heroines of ancient tragedy. Since 1830 its authority has been universally accepted. Several directors, after trying to dispense with it, have been obliged to conciliate it and accept its conditions – for when the directors have driven it from their house, it has always been brought back by the vanity of the comedians. One alone of the Paris theatres preserved itself from the claque. This was the now defunct Théâtre Italien; though people say of this house that if it had not a claque it had a clique.

With the exception of the last-named, all the theatres of Paris have for years past had organised claques, that of the Opéra being the best disciplined. The chiefs of the claques give themselves the title of “undertakers of dramatic successes.” They do not receive a subvention from the “directors,” but a certain number of places each night, which they sell for their own benefit. It is not from the tickets, however, that they derive the bulk of their gains. Some of them make twenty or thirty thousand francs a year; but they derive this from the vanity of the actors, who pay them proportionately to the degree of applause required.

The claque consists of the chief and a number of assistants, generally poor wretches with a passion for the theatre, some of whom are admitted free on condition of contributing as much applause as necessary, while others are admitted simply at a reduced price. The chief attends the rehearsals, and notes the scenes, passages, or phrases which seem most effective. Then he revises his notes by watching the effect of the first performance on the public. After that he knows each precise point at which to come in with his applause; and if the piece is played for a year, the laughter and tears occur at the same given moments. He employs great tact in choosing men, and even women, for his purpose, the fair sex being the best counterfeiters of convulsive emotion. When, therefore, a drama is produced at Paris, a number of lady weepers are distributed amongst the audience, many of them being the devoted wives of male members of the claque. So soon as the old man of the piece recovers his unfortunate daughter, and exclaims, “My darling! Saved!” the lady weepers plunge their faces into their handkerchiefs and sob like children. The thing becomes contagious. The whole female portion of the audience are now, perhaps, like Niobe, all tears, and the newspapers next day declare that the performance was a succès de larmes.

Doubtless this charlatanism has its comic side. But it is repulsive at the same time; for falsehood is the foundation of the system, and, as M. Eugène Despois says: “It is sad to see men almost exclusively occupied in lying reciprocally. People say that it is only life, that you must conform to it, and that it imposes on no one. ‘Who is deceived? Everyone agrees to the system,’ they argue. That is true. No one is duped; but of what use is all this comedy? After all, of the two parts, that played by the claqueurs, often with spirit, to dupe the public, and that played by the public who submit to this impudent mystification and daily pretend to be duped, the most shameful is that of the public.”

Of recent years the claque has been made the object of some very lively attacks by writers who understand the dignity of their profession. A certain number of dramatic authors, Émile Augier and Dumas the younger amongst others, have frequently endeavoured to dispense with its mercenary plaudits; but it must be owned that the vanity of a large proportion of the actors, and in particular of the actresses, has frustrated the reform. In the meantime, ere the theatre world has awakened to the dishonourable character of the claque system, the claqueurs grow fat, and in some cases possess their town and country residences. It is true that not everyone can be a chief of the claque; to conquer, or rather to purchase, that important post, a great deal of money is required. Auguste, formerly chief of the claque at the Opéra, paid 80,000 francs for his position, but in a few years he had made his fortune. “More than one well-established dancer paid him a pension,” says Dr. Véron. “The début of each artist brought him a gratuity proportionate to the artist’s pretensions. Towards the end of an engagement and the moment of its renewal more than one singer or actor, in order to deceive at once the public and the director, goes to the Auguste of his theatre and offers him a bag of gold to produce such a paroxysm of applause as shall result in a large increase of salary. Such are the traps laid for the director; and into these traps, shrewd as he may be, he sometimes inevitably falls.”

Dr. Véron, an experienced impresario, is far from denouncing the claque, which, according to him, has a mission. “All who expose themselves to be judged by the public, need,” he says, “for the animation of their courage, that fever of joy which applause produces in them.” That was also the opinion of Talma, who found the public too slow to take the initiative. “The claque,” says Elleviou, “is as necessary in the centre of the pit as the chandelier in the centre of a drawing-room.”

The question has often been raised as to whether not only the claque but even spontaneous applause should not be suppressed. The spectator, abandoned to the power of the illusion, is displeased to find himself disturbed by unexpected noise, which, tearing him from Athens or from Rome, reminds him that he is on the benches of a Paris playhouse.

Several chiefs of claques have become celebrities, or at least notorieties; with two gentlemen named Santon and Porcher among the number. One of these “knights of the chandelier,” as they are familiarly called, has published his reminiscences, entitled, “Memoirs of a Claqueur, containing the theory and practice of the art of obtaining success, by Robert (Castel), formerly chief of the Dramatic Insurance Company, Paris, 1829.”

Different opinions are entertained in theatrical circles as to the utility of the claque, some contending that it is indispensable, while others take a higher view, and hold that the work represented and the actors representing it may advantageously be allowed to stand upon their own merits. Meanwhile, apart from the claque maintained at all the Paris theatres by the management, there are often special claques which are paid by leading members of the company, jealous of one another’s reputation. This is looked upon by the company generally as unfair, and the practice is never avowed. Even in London, especially (if not exclusively) at the opera, a number of energetic men may sometimes be seen – and, above all, heard – working together with a view to the success of some particular “artist.” The claqueurs – at least, at the opera – are usually Italians, from the shops of the Italian wine merchants and dealers in macaroni, vermicelli, truffles, and olives in the neighbourhood of Soho. Wagner is known to have been absolutely opposed not only to the claque but to the most legitimate bursts of applause. The frame of mind in which to enjoy beautiful music should not, indeed, be broken in upon by disturbances from the outside. Not only in Germany, but wherever Wagner is played, the claque is, for the occasion, dispensed with. Even at the Grand Opéra of Paris there was no claque when Lohengrin was performed; and it may be that if a representation is witnessed in absolute silence from the beginning to the end of each act, the applause is more enthusiastic when at last the moment for plaudits arrives.

In opposition to what takes place at Wagnerian performances wherever given, it may be mentioned that at the dramatic theatres of Paris, as at the lyrical theatres of Italy (when Wagner is not being played), the leading performers are not only applauded, but walk forward and bow their acknowledgment of the applause at the end of any effective scene in which they may have pleased the public, or perhaps only the claque. This destroys all verisimilitude. The singer is applauded as Violetta or as Adrienne Lecouvreur, and acknowledges the applause in the character of Mme. Adelina Patti or of Mme. Sarah Bernhardt.

But whatever may be said against it, the claque is great and, in France at least, will prevail. Nor can it be denied that in some instances and on some individuals it imposes opinions which but for its authority would not be accepted. There is an old fable of a man who, standing in a market-place, was approached by a man leading a pig. “Do you want to buy this sheep?” asked the proprietor of the animal. “It is a pig,” was the reply. “Nothing of the kind; I can assure you your eyes deceive you,” returned the salesman. At that moment a third person came up, and, looking at the quadruped, said to its owner, “How much do you want for that sheep?” The man to whom it had first been offered stared with surprise, and supposed that the third person was out of his mind; but when a fourth, fifth, and sixth person had come up and likewise demanded the price of that “sheep,” he came to the conclusion that his own eyes must be at fault, and bought the animal as mutton.

The business of the claque is to pass off a theatrical pig as a theatrical sheep – and it sometimes succeeds.

CHAPTER XXXIX.

OBSOLETE PARIS SHOPS

The Old Wooden Stalls of Forty Years Ago – The “Lucky Fork” – The Cobblers’ Shops – The Old Cafés

THE quays on the left bank of the Seine were at one time remarkable for their shops; and the book-stalls of the Quai Voltaire are still celebrated. It was on one of the quays of the left bank that the old curiosity shop stood, so picturesquely described by Balzac, in which the hero of the “Peau de Chagrin,” who had entered the shop merely to pass the time until it should be dark enough for him to throw himself from the Pont Neuf without attracting too much attention, purchased his fatal talisman.

Thirty or forty years ago Paris contained thousands of antique little shops or covered stalls, of which now very few specimens remain. They were painted wooden structures, six feet high by three feet broad, picturesquely situated at the corners of squares or public monuments, by the side of churches or city houses, with plank roofs through which a stove-chimney protruded, and with the street pavement for their floor.

The extermination of these quaint establishments necessarily accompanied the general improvement of the city; they were an eyesore when the thoroughfares had become elegant. By degrees the keepers of these huts, who were once the gaiety and life of the streets, disappeared. They took refuge for the most part in overcrowded houses which had escaped the pickaxe of the architectural improver, though this removal was only a prelude to their final departure. These petty shopkeepers were often intellectually superior to the proprietors of the finest shops on the boulevard, for many a scholar who found that the art or science to which he had sacrificed his life proved ungrateful, would for the sake of his daily bread set up in one of these street huts as a “public writer,” there, as set forth in a previous chapter, writing love-letters for domestic servants or grooms who could not express the sentiments of their bosom with a pen. Schoolmasters without pupils, students who had been plucked at their examinations, and professors without chairs, formed a large proportion of this hut-inhabiting population.

Amongst these primitive establishments were a number of fried-potato shops, which were besieged by street urchins in quest of the traditional halfpennyworth of tritters. In the Rue de la Vieille-Estrapade flourished a shop well known under the sign or title of the “Lucky Fork.” Here might be beheld an enormous metal cauldron, in which constantly simmered a dark-coloured broth of somewhat too odoriferous a character. Floating in this gigantic vessel, tossed hither and thither by the bubbling of the hot liquid, were pieces of tripe, pork, and other even less inviting viands, which the customer had to make a stab at with a sharp fork of huge dimensions. Yet although the aspect of these establishments was not altogether appetising, cleanliness was by no means a quality in which they were deficient. For a halfpenny the consumers had the privilege of a stab with the fork. The patrons of these shops were numerous and varied: porters, workmen, students, tinkers, artists. The poet Berthauld, author of the “Fille du Peuple,” was famed for his skill with the weapon in question; Chartelet the painter and Fourier the philosopher frequently tried their hand with it, not to mention other votaries of the arts and sciences who, unknown at that time, were destined to become celebrated. It used to be a source of great amusement to watch the customers, whatever their trade or profession might be, as, with keen gaze, they awaited some unusually big morsel which was floating towards them, and then suddenly made a thrust at it like eel-spearers. The piece of meat, incessantly dancing and revolving as it was, frequently eluded the prongs of the fork, whereupon cries of irony would escape from the attentive crowd; but when, at the first stab – for a halfpenny, that is to say – one of the combatants had secured a bulky morsel, this victor paraded through the ranks of the spectators, who, as they made way for him, applauded vociferously. Many, however, of the vanquished went to bed on nothing but water and a crust of bread.

There were fruit-stalls, where apples, pears, and even peaches, were sold at prices which have quintupled since then; and huts kept by knife-grinders, who, at a later period, resumed their daily pilgrimage through those quarters of Paris where blunt instruments were most likely to be requiring a cheap edge. There was a bird-shop on the island of Saint Louis where the feathered stock was confided to the care of two enormous white cats, besides other like establishments, unprovided with cats, which were numerous enough in that space which is to-day occupied by the square of the Louvre. Then there were cobblers who, within their little pavement cabins, had no bills to deliver, no rent to pay, no reproaches to bear, no masters whose caprices must be humoured, since their toil from one hour to another produced immediate payment. The spirit of independence which was a characteristic of these artists in leather dated back, indeed, to ancient times. Simon of Athens, the friend of Socrates and the author of the thirty-three dialogues, in which a system of philosophy is set forth with great lucidity, received from Pericles an invitation to quit his shop and go to live with that magnate. “I would not sell my liberty for all the treasures in Greece,” was the reply.

The street cobblers of Paris have frequently given heroic instances of devotion and patriotism. During the massacre of St. Bartholomew they saved many Protestants from the edge of the sword. Their little shops were divided into two compartments, of which the upper one, approached by a small ladder, served as lumber-room for a mass of leather scraps and old shoes. It was here that more than one of the companions of Admiral Coligny found safety.