IT

T would be exceedingly difficult to make the British public understand the real importance of "first nights" in Paris, for they have grown into events of social import, and there is as yet in England no state of social decomposition such as can make these kind of assemblages almost necessary. The Opéra and the Théâtre Français are neutral ground, where hostile factions come together and each exercises the overseership of its enemy. Salon-life, which was the great feeder of Governments till 1830, ended in 1848. "Society itself was broken up by the Empire, and as the Bonaparte régime was never adopted by what constituted the higher civilisation of France, by what was wisest, most brilliant, and best-in other words, most distinctly French -the elements of society had to seek some place of congregation elsewhere than under this or that private roof. From 1852 till the present day, "Society" in Paris, instead of staying "at home" for the "world" to come to it, has gone abroad, not for the sake of any larger mingling with humanity, but chiefly for the sake of spite upon a larger scale.

Above all the audiences at "first nights" are feminine, and the sexe laid has relatively a very small share of activity or importance. In the two theatres above mentioned, the grandest of these funciones are held; and on one or two occasions even, impressions have been received, presentations permitted,

feuds envenomed, whence incidents of public importance have ensued.

On the "first" of L'Étrangère (in 1879), a delicatelooking, not handsome but graceful, woman in black was universally remarked for the intense attention with which she followed every word of the Duc de Sept Monts, and above all the celebrated speech of the savant who describes "Monsieur le Duc " as a "vibrion" or mere atom, which, when "it" dies, disappears with a whiff into thin air, leaving no trace of its existence behind. The lady in black who thus "watched" was the Duchesse de C, and it is on record that when, after the third act, Alexandre Dumas was presented to her by her desire, her first words were, "Mais, Monsieur! vous l'avez donc connu ?"-" Qui, Madame?" is reported as the answer, to which "Mais lui, mon mari, le Duc de C- " is said to have been the rejoinder.

There are many day entertainments at which the female portion of le monde Parisien can forgather; but that is not the same thing. For in the day-time there are only heads without shoulders; and, as Mme. de T-- once said, "A woman without her shoulders n'est qu'une femme à demie!"

Now, in the full glare of the gas you have them all within lorgnette-range, all in their full war-paint; undraped, unveiled, with bodices shorn of all sleeves, and

open at the back most disadvantageously ("proper," respectable backs are, as a rule, scraggy), and plenty of yellow hair and quantities of jewels. There they are of all kinds, and each makes out her enemy at a glance.

It is not now as it was even some sixteen years ago, when those who were undeniably "somebody" used to execute les autres with the withering phrase, "ça n'existe pas!" This form has ceased with crinolines, and bandeaux bouffants, and close bonnets, and sundry other external signs of what is called polite life. Not only is the material existence of the adversary (unwillingly) admitted, but it has become an object of study and reflection, and the still disdained, if they go to examine and imitate the still disdainful, are equally in turn subjected to the liveliest curiosity on the part of the latter. of the most eventful "first nights" of the last few years was that of Le Monde où l'on s'ennuie, because before the curtain rose nobody knew exactly where that particular "Monde" might be, where ennui was supposed not to reign.

One

As a matter of fact, the title was ill-chosen, as a few venerable remnants of the élite observed at once. The "Monde" in which the right to be bored exists, was far from the "Monde" shown to the French public that night, this being simply the most decidedly mezzo ceto, and possessing amply on the contrary the privilege of amusing itself if it only knew how. But into the genuine Elysian fields of the most exalted boredom comic playwrights do not enter in France, so your dramatic satirist must e'en take his models where he can. The true criticism of the piece was made on that very "première" by a young, lovely blonde woman, whose whole air pronounced her a type of what French grandes dames once were. After the end of the second act, turning to a man whose appearance was that of a diplomate, and addressing him in a somewhat sleepy, disappointed tone, "but," said she, "who are these people who are trying so hard not to be amused? I thought people were only bored in our set" (Je croyais qu'on ne s'ennuyait bien que chez nous.)

These words of the beautiful, intellectual, and sharp-witted Comtesse de L- (one of the last of the historical noblesse of her country) went before the piece was over from box to box, and remain to this day the true judgment upon the title of the popular play. But a little further on another scene was being played in a box nearer the stage. A very young man, a kind of demiélégant, was discussing the merits of the piece and trying to seem as if he appreciated them, only his praise seemed somewhat strained; he did protest too much," and when he left the

party he had come to visit, "What a little snob!" exclaimed the showily-dressed lady who had seemed bent upon "drawing out" her "departing guest" while he was present; "why, instead of seeming to ignore that it is his own mother who is made publicly ridiculous as Mme. de Lauron, why isn't he busy horsewhipping the author?"

"Que voulez-vous ?" sneered a Deputy known for his cynicism. "The author dines at his mother's house to

morrow."

During the whole of the most fashionable of "first nights," however, it is not the "premières loges" only that are the centres of attraction. If you want to see where the stronger sex comes in for its share of importance you must watch the stalles d'orchestre, and even the strapontins, for there you will see those for whom the actors (above all, the actresses) do their best. Foremost among all, lurching and shouldering his way in, and at last subsiding with a thud into his seat, is Sarcey: the critic, the head and chief of all dramatic criticism in France; the man who reigns supreme, and whom the entire population of the theatrical world would regard with fear and dread, were he not so good-natured and so just.

Yes, there is the reason of Sarcey's supremacy. He has the "gifts" of the great critic, and he obeys them, nor tries to override his natural masters. Sarcey has the sense of the public, of its instincts, of its feeling, to such a degree that he could not if he would express any other than the public mind. The public is incarnate in him, and he is incapable of sustaining a mere personal preference against what is the supreme judgment of the unbiassed crowd.

Witness his impartiality in the case of Sarah Bernhardt. She was his own invention; he found her out, and knew what the public feeling would be towards her, long before the real public had ever seen her; for she played first at the Odéon, miles away then, before M. Porel had transformed it into the important factor it has

now become in the dramatic life of the Parisians. Sarcey told what then lay in Sarah Bernhardt's power, and she appeared at the Théâtre Français. In Mlle. de Belleisle she was so overshadowed by Delaunay's new creation of the Duc de Richelieu, that all the then delicacy and spontaneousness of her play was but half appreciated. Soon after she made her real mark in Marie de Neuburg, the Queen in Victor Hugo's Ruy Blas. That was, indeed, a magnificent "première," though it was but a revival. was, in truth, a "first night"not alone for the representative of his Reine Marie.

It

No one who was present (it was the spring of 1878) can ever forget Sarcey on that night. He then saw the realisation of his

dream; it might not be-it was not exactly-high art; it was not Greek tragedy, but it was such a perfectly beautiful genre picture as has never been seen since. "Elle se joue elle-même!" was the word that went from mouth to mouth. "She is herself!" it was the

M. VITU.

universal thought. The languid, serpentine grace, the far off wandering look, the slumbrous, drawling, but so melodious voice, the voix d'or (which was yet undemeaned to any coarser metal), the enchanting restfulness and repose of the whole: it was in good truth a triumph for Sarcey, who alone had proclaimed what Sarah Bernhardt would prove to be if she were tried. And he showed in every whispered word, in every movement that night, as he showed in his feuilleton that followed in the Temps, what a personal delight and pride he took in his discovery, and in the treasure he had brought to the "house of Molière" and to the public.

Yet when, within the space of two years, it was but too clearly seen that the "Idol's" feet were of clay, that the religion of true art was wanting, and that the " eccentric" predominated over everything else, the very first to seize the danger was Sarcey; the first note of warning-long before the public felt the decadence-was raised by Sarcey, who ruthlessly pointed to the defects, above all to the want of conscientiousness, and the failure of respect to the public. As earnest as he had been in praise of the promise, so earnest was he in his blame of the non-fulfilment; and when, through a long series of ever-increasing faults, defective diction, false inflexions, glaring discrepancy between gesture and speech, when at last the actress, who might have risen almost to the height of Rachel herself, sank to that of a tragédienne du Boulevard, and became, as the severer sentence was formulated, an "article d'exportation," then Sarcey, in his justice, condemned, as much in sorrow as in indig nation, but condemned, and above all mourned over, the once beautiful voice that had, in the end, been destroyed by the gymnastic exercises, the screechings, and bodily contortions imposed by M. Sardou and other pantomimists in such parts as Fedora or Theodora.

But there is Sarcey still, the embodiment of dramatic criticism, because the sincere passion of what he does lives in him. He loves the drama, and loves it as it is in France, loves the répertoire, the plays of the grand siècle, and maintains that they are beloved of the public too;

in which experience would recently appear to bear him out. When Sarcey disappears he will not be replaced in a century.

Now Vitu, who is one of his kind (not his rival, for he has no "rivals "), knows Molière better even than Sarcey, but he will not make you know him, which is just what Sarcey does. You may trust Sarcey blindfold; read his compte rendu of anything he understands, and if, on the strength of what he has said, you go to see the performance, you will agree with every word he has uttered, for he transmits to you real living life. We must repeat, "what he understands," for he is too true to touch what does not come home to him. He does not understand Shakespeare, and is honest enough to say so simply. "Il me passe," he frankly admits; and in this present age, when all France is plunging headlong into Shakespearean studies, and desirous of seeming to understand and admire, this is a further proof of Sarcey's uncompromising truthfulness. As he sits on his strapontin, which is the particular seat he affects, you are not at a loss to recognise the chief; a little group of followers are round him (Tous Normaliens! as they ostentatiously affirm), and to a certain degree are familiar (the big, burly creature is so bon enfant), but now that poor Edmond About is gone, there is only one whom he treats as an equal, and that is Vitu.

But here there is nearly a generation to go back to ; there are a good fifteen years between Vitu and Sarcey. Vitu was a young man during the last years of Louis Philippe's reign, and acquired his real knowledge of the French drama of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and his intimacy with "la Maison de Molière," during the closing period of the really great "stars" of the company, that still counted in its ranks the inimitable Sanson and Regnier, Provost, Firmin, Monrose, Mlle. Plessy, and, planet among stars, la Rachel! Delaunay was but just beginning, Got was rising, Mlle. Mars was but lately dead, Mlle. Favart was not yet heard of. It was still the remainder of one of the most brilliant periods the theatre has ever known in France, and very different in its exquisite perfection from anything the last sixteen or eighteen years have seen, although the period of the Empire witnessed the reign of the Brohans, and of

æsthetic appreciation of dramatic art. Villemessant, who was at that time founding the Figaro, saw from the first what could be made of this new recruit, and monopolised him. Vitu is a safe guide, because he possesses a fund of information for which the majority of his confrères care but little. He has no "chic" in what he writes, no brilliancy, no life; but he knows enormously, is accurate, makes no mistakes, is familiar with tradition; and Sarcey respects Vitu for his knowledge, and for the ten years during which he saw, with his own eyes, the things and people of which Sarcey has only heard tell.

"Les comédiens," however, do not play for Vitu, and they do play for Sarcey; for so sure as any one of them has the wee-est little weak point, so surely does that one "good eye" of Sarcey's (the other is, alas! lost) discern it clearly, and point it out to the public for the good and the glory

all delicacy and all repose (without which no dramatic art exists), and there, where the shadow of Zola has fallen, can never rise up a Mars, a Rachel, a Delaunay, or a Got. Aurétien Scholl is of a different description altogether. He aims at being a manner of "gentilhommeplumitif," and can, when he chooses, assume all the ways of well-brought-up, well-bred men. He is, beyond compare, the most spirituel of the lot. Wit, real wit, the ready, brilliant esprit, whose sparkling flash never failed the social gatherings of Paris in bygone times, having utterly died out with the various struggles and anxieties of the last halfcentury, any one who is possessed of the genuine "gift" stands out prominently from amongst his companions, and is soon marked down for universal fame.

of art! There are two other fines lames of the critical tribe who never miss the "premières "—Albert Wolff and Aurétien Scholl, the latter belonging, besides that, to the fines lames of a more material kind, and ranking among the ablest swordsmen in Paris, where there are many such. La Pommeraye should also be noted; but he is "indulgent," and has therefore less influence in the theatrical world.

Wolff is by birth and talent a German-a Rhinelander; and, though his French is amusingly incorrect, he has in him the gift of "phantasy" that only Teutons of the modern school possess, and that lends to whatever they produce an inexpressible attraction. Wolff, though with no pretension to approach the Master, walks in the footsteps of Heine, and through his own very imperfect performance you still catch a trace of the great model; you perceive that he has himself felt the pity that underlies the hardness, the sweetness masked by irony, the deep and genuine Teutonic originality of the One, Inimitable, of the poet whose lyre had every chord, from the saddest to the most irresistibly comic. The sense that he has so appreciated Heine tells upon what would not otherwise be worthy of note, and distinguishes Wolff from his fellows whose French prose is otherwise so far superior.

In his way, Wolff is also somewhat of a playwright himself; but his genre, conceivably enough, is l'opérette, as giving more scope to pure fancy, or, it might be truer to say, fancifulness.

Such as they are, these men have considerably helped to make the French feuilleton what it is; and the French feuilleton has reacted powerfully upon the dramatic art of France and upon her actors and actresses. Their successors will have far less to say for themselves. Too much realism, as they are pleased to call it, has spoilt

The two last men who truly dispose of this dangerous, if much envied faculty, are at present Alexandre Dumas and Scholl. The former is undoubtedly the wittiest man in France, but it is a scathing fire, a dread plaything, which scorches those it touches. Dumas is an executioner who towards man and woman wields his sharp tongue as an axe. No one escapes its bright edge, and, as society is not stingy of the legitimate victims she furnishes, the Salon-Justiciary keeps his hand in, and his blow never fails; no cut ever needs to be made a second time. Dumas is, perhaps, the only man whose wit is as pungent, and as cruelly always to the point, whether in writing or speaking. He cannot open his lips (though he is anything but a bavard) without saying something you would wish to remember, and the fierce éclat of his most celebrated dialogues on the stage is more than equalled by the unceasing aperçus and reparties that in conversation dazzle the listener and invariably strike home.

Now Scholl is of a different mould-continues rather the tradition of Nestor Roqueplan, who was also, some twenty years ago, a founder of the feuilleton de théâtre, and magicien of dinner and supper tables. Roqueplan dated from the days of Jules Janin and Balzac, neither of whom was ever "witty," properly so speaking. But Roqueplan's passion for things spectacular carried him away into theatrical management, wherein he ruined himself and became renowned for the creation of the phrase "faire grand," whereby also he ruined the Grand Opéra. Scholl is of Nestor Roqueplan's school, far more witty in conversation than with his pen. But his wit is never ferocious, and does not hurt from "malice prepense." It is of a more playful sort, sharp but pleasant, and (what is not common in Frenchmen) goodhumoured; there is plenty of "give-and-take" in it.

Perhaps the grandest of all "first nights "-certainly the most complete of the last quarter of a centurywas not at the Théâtre Français, but at the Opéra (or