Part Second
"Laissons les regrets et les pleurs
À la vieillesse;
Jeunes, il faut cueillir les fleurs
De la jeunesse!"—Baïf.
Sometimes we spent the Sunday morning in Paris, Barty and I—in picture‑galleries and museums and wax‑figure shows, churches and cemeteries, and the Hôtel Cluny and the Baths of Julian the Apostate—or the Jardin des Plantes, or the Morgue, or the knackers' yards at Montfaucon—or lovely slums. Then a swim at the Bains Deligny. Then lunch at some restaurant on the Quai Voltaire, or in the Quartier Latin. Then to some café on the Boulevards, drinking our demi‑tasse and our chasse‑café, and smoking our cigarettes like men, and picking our teeth like gentlemen of France.
Once after lunch at Vachette's with Berquin (who was seventeen) and Bonneville (the marquis who had got an English mother), we were sitting outside the Café des Variétés, in the midst of a crowd of consommateurs, and tasting to the full the joy of being alive, when a poor woman came up with a guitar, and tried to sing "Le petit mousse noir," a song Barty knew quite well—but she couldn't sing a bit, and nobody listened.
"Allons, Josselin, chante‑nous ça!" said Berquin.
And Bonneville jumped up, and took the woman's guitar from her, and forced it into Josselin's hands, while the crowd became much interested and began to applaud.
Thus encouraged, Barty, who never in all his life knew what it is to be shy, stood up and piped away like a bird; and when he had finished the story of the little black cabin‑boy who sings in the maintop halliards, the applause was so tremendous that he had to stand up on a chair and sing another, and yet another.
"Écoute‑moi bien, ma Fleurette!" and "Amis, la matinée est belle!" (from La Muette de Portici), while the pavement outside the Variétés was rendered quite impassable by the crowd that had gathered round to look and listen—and who all joined in the chorus:
"Conduis ta barque avec prudence,
Pêcheur! parle bas!
Jette tes filets en silence
Pêcheur! parle bas!
Et le roi des mers ne nous échappera pas!" (bis).
and the applause was deafening.
Meanwhile Bonneville and Berquin went round with the hat and gathered quite a considerable sum, in which there seemed to be almost as much silver as copper—and actually two five‑franc pieces and an English half‑sovereign! The poor woman wept with gratitude at coming into such a fortune, and insisted on kissing Barty's hand. Indeed it was a quite wonderful ovation, considering how unmistakably British was Barty's appearance, and how unpopular we were in France just then!
He had his new shiny black silk chimney‑pot hat on, and his Eton jacket, with the wide shirt collar. Berquin, in a tightly fitting double‑breasted brown cloth swallow‑tailed coat with brass buttons, yellow nankin bell‑mouthed trousers strapped over varnished boots, butter‑colored gloves, a blue satin stock, and a very tall hairy hat with a wide curly brim, looked such an
out‑and‑out young gentleman of France that we were all proud of being seen in his company—especially young de Bonneville, who was still in mourning for his father and wore a crape band round his arm, and a common cloth cap with a leather peak, and thick blucher boots; though he was quite sixteen, and already had a little black mustache like an eyebrow, and inhaled the smoke of his cigarette without coughing and quite naturally, and ordered the waiters about just as if he already wore the uniform of the École St.‑Cyr, for which he destined himself (and was not disappointed. He should be a marshal of France by now—perhaps he is).
Then we went to the Café Mulhouse on the Boulevard des Italiens (on the "Boul. des It.," as we called it, to be in the fashion)—that we might gaze at Señor Joaquin Eliezegui, the Spanish giant, who was eight feet high and a trifle over (or under—I forget which): he told us himself. Barty had a passion for gazing at very tall men; like Frederic the Great (or was it his Majesty's royal father?).
Then we went to the Boulevard Bonne‑Nouvelle, where, in a painted wooden shed, a most beautiful Circassian slave, miraculously rescued from some abominable seraglio in Constantinople, sold pen'orths of "galette du gymnase." On her raven hair she wore a silk turban all over sequins, silver and gold, with a yashmak that fell down behind, leaving her adorable face exposed: she had an amber vest of silk, embroidered with pearls as big as walnuts, and Turkish pantalettes—what her slippers were we couldn't see, but they must have been lovely, like all the rest of her. Barty had a passion for gazing at very beautiful female faces—like his father before him.
There was a regular queue of postulants to see this heavenly Eastern houri and buy her confection, which is very like Scotch butter‑cake, but not so digestible; and even more filling at the price. And three of us sat on a bench, while three times running Barty took his place in that procession—soldiers, sailors, workmen, chiffonniers, people of all sorts, women as many as men—all of them hungry for galette, but hungrier still for a good humanizing stare at a beautiful female face; and he made the slow and toilsome journey to the little wooden booth three times—and brought us each a pen'orth on each return journey; and the third time, Katidjah (such was her sweet Oriental name) leaned forward over her counter and kissed him on both cheeks, and whispered in his ear (in English—and with the accent of Stratford‑atte‑Bowe):
"You little duck! your name is Brown, I know!"
And he came away, his face pale with conflicting emotions, and told us!
How excited we were! Bonneville (who spoke English quite well) went for a pen'orth on his own account, and said: "My name's Brown too, Miss Katidjah!" But he didn't get a kiss.
(She soon after married a Mr. ———, of———, the well‑known———of———shire, in———land. She may be alive now.)
Then to the Palais Royal, to dine at the "Dîner Européen" with M. Berquin père, a famous engineer; and finally to stalls at the "Français" to see the two first acts of Le Cid; and this was rather an anticlimax—for we had too much "Cid" at the Institution F. Brossard already!
And then, at last, to the omnibus station in the Rue de Rivoli, whence the "Accélérées" (en correspondence avec les Constantines) started for Passy every ten minutes; and thus, up the gas‑lighted Champs‑Élysées, and by the Arc de Triomphe, to the Rond‑point de l'Avenue de St.‑Cloud; tired out, but happy—happy—happy comme on ne l'est plus!
Before the school broke up for the holidays there were very severe examinations—but no "distribution de prix"; we were above that kind of thing at Brossard's, just as we were above wearing a uniform or taking in day boarders.
Barty didn't come off very well in this competition; but he came off anyhow much better than I, who had failed to be "diligent and attentive"—too much Monte Cristo, I'm afraid.
At all events Barty got five marks for English History, because he remembered a good deal about Richard Cœur de Lion, and John, and Friar Tuck, and Robin Hood, and especially one Cedric the Saxon, a historical personage of whom the examiner (a decorated gentleman from the Collège de France) had never even heard!
And then (to the tune of "Au clair de la lune"):
"Vivent les vacances—
Denique tandèm; Et les pénitences— Habebunt finèm! Les pions intraitables, Vultu Barbarò, S'en iront aux diables, Gaudio nostrò."
N.B.—The