Magical practices have been denounced by more than one Church council; nor were incantations and witchcraft supposed by any means to be confined to the ignorant classes. Pharamond passed for the son of an incubus; and the mother of Clovis for a witch. Frédégonde accused Clovis, son of her husband Chilpéric and a former wife, of sorcery; and it was not until the reign of Charlemagne that any endeavour was made to destroy the popular belief in magic. After Charlemagne’s death witchcraft took a greater hold on the public mind than ever; and ridiculous historians wrote that Queen Berthe had given birth to a gosling and that Bertrade was a witch. Philip the Bold consulted a sorceress. The madness of Charles VI. and the influence exercised upon him by Valentine of Milan were ascribed to magic; and it was as a witch that the Maid of Orleans was burnt.
CHAPTER VII
THE BOULEVARDS
From the Bastille to the Madeleine – Boulevard Beaumarchais – Beaumarchais – The Marriage of Figaro– The Bastille – The Drama in Paris – Adrienne Lecouvreur – Vincennes – The Duc d’Enghien – Duelling – Louis XVI.
THE most important, the most interesting, the most absorbing thoroughfare on the right bank of the Seine, and, therefore, in Paris generally is that of the boulevards, in which the whole of the gay capital may be said to be concentrated. Numbers of Parisians pass almost the whole of their life on the Boulevard des Italiens; or between the Boulevard Montmartre to the east, and the Boulevard de la Madeleine to the west of what, to the fashionable Parisian, is the central boulevard. Nothing can be easier than to breakfast and dine on the boulevards; and it is along their length or in their immediate neighbourhood that not only the best restaurants, but the finest theatres are to be found. Stroll about the boulevards for a few hours – an occupation of which the true boulevardier seems never to get tired – and you will meet everyone you know in Paris.
If, moreover, the upper boulevards, those of the Madeleine, the Capucines, and the Italiens, represent fashionable Paris, the lower boulevards, from the Boulevard Montmartre to the Boulevard Beaumarchais, represent the Paris of commerce and of industry; so that the line of boulevards, as a whole, from the Madeleine to the Bastille, gives a fair epitome of the French capital.
The poorest of the boulevards are at the eastern end of the line, and the richest at the western; and the difference in character between the inhabitants of these opposite extremes is shown by a military regulation instituted under the Second Empire. Neither the district inhabited by the needy workmen of the east nor the western district, where dwelt the richest class of shop-keepers, was allowed to furnish the usual contingent of National Guards. The artisans were too turbulent to be entrusted with arms, while the tradespeople were equally unreliable, because from timidity they allowed their arms to be taken from them.
Beginning at what most visitors to Paris will consider the wrong end of the line of boulevards, we find that on the Boulevard Beaumarchais Paris has a very different physiognomy from that which she presents on the Boulevard de la Madeleine, which the visitor may reach by omnibus, though it is more interesting to travel in some hired vehicle which may now and then be stopped, and more interesting still to make the whole of the three-mile journey on foot.
At either end of the line of boulevards is a Place, or open space, which, for want of a better word, may be called a square: Place de la Bastille to the east, Place de la Madeleine to the west. The omnibuses which ply between the two extremities bear the inscription “Madeleine – Bastille”; and, beginning at the Bastille, the traveller passes eleven different boulevards, or, rather, one boulevard bearing in succession eleven different names: Beaumarchais, des Filles du Calvaire, du Temple, Saint-Martin, Saint-Denis, Bonne-Nouvelle, Poissonnière, Montmartre, des Italiens, des Capucines, and de la Madeleine.
Advancing from the Bastille to the Madeleine, we find the appearance of the shops constantly improving, until, from poor at one end, they become magnificent at the other. What the military authorities of Germany call “necessary luxuries” (such as coffee, tea, and sugar), as well as luxuries in a more absolute sense (such as costly articles of attire, sweetmeats, and champagne), are sold all along the line. But at the Bastille end one notices here and there a little sacrifice to the useful and the indispensable. Indeed, on the lower boulevards grocers’ shops are to be found, though nothing so commonplace offends the eye on the boulevards to which the name of “upper” is given.
In like manner, the importance of the theatres increases as you proceed from the Bastille westward. Nearly half the playhouses of Paris are on the boulevards: ten on the north side, and three on the south. Many other theatres, if not entered direct from the boulevards, are in their close vicinity. The theatre nearest the Madeleine is the new Opera House; that nearest the Place de la Bastille is the Théâtre Beaumarchais. The Boulevard Beaumarchais owes its name to the brilliant dramatist who, among other works, wrote the Barber of Seville and the Marriage of Figaro, still familiar to all Europe in their musical form. From 1760 to 1831 what is now called the Boulevard Beaumarchais was known as the Boulevard St. – Antoine. In the last-named year, however, under the government of Louis Philippe, it was determined to render homage to the author of the best comedies in the French language after those of Molière by naming a boulevard after him.
The Marriage of Figaro was played in public for the first time on April 27th, 1784. “The description of the first performance is,” says M. de Loménie, “in every history of the period”; for which insufficient reason M. de Loménie omits it in his own history of “Beaumarchais and his Times.” For at least two years before the Marriage of Figaro was played in public the work must have been well known in the aristocratic and literary circles of Paris. The brilliant comedy, which was not to be brought out until April, 1784, had been accepted at the Théâtre Français in October, 1781. “As soon as the actors,” writes Beaumarchais, “had received, by acclamation, my poor Marriage, which has since had so many opponents, I begged M. Lenoir (the Lieutenant of Police) to appoint a censor; at the same time asking him, as a special favour, that the piece might be examined by no one else: which he readily promised; assuring me that neither secretary nor clerk should touch the manuscript, and that the play should be read in his own cabinet. It was so read by M. Coqueley, advocate, and I begged M. Lenoir to notify what he retrenched, objected to, or approved. Six weeks afterwards I learnt in society that my piece had been read at all the soirées of Versailles, and I was in despair at this complaisance – perhaps forced – of the magistrate in regard to a work which still belonged to me; for such was certainly not the austere, discreet, and loyal course which belongs to the serious duty of a censor. Well or ill read – perhaps maliciously mutilated – the piece was pronounced detestable; and not knowing in what respect I had sinned (for according to custom nothing was specified), I stood before the inquisition obliged to guess my crimes, but aware, nevertheless, that I was already tacitly proscribed. As, however, this proscription by the court only irritated the curiosity of the town, I was condemned to readings without number. Whenever one party was discovered, another would immediately be formed.”
At the beginning of 1782 it was already a question who could obtain the privilege of hearing the play read by Beaumarchais – an admirable reciter – whether at his own house or in some brilliant salon. “Every day,” writes