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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/32980-8.txt b/32980-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..49c1e3a --- /dev/null +++ b/32980-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6102 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Confessions of an Opera Singer, by Kathleen Howard + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Confessions of an Opera Singer + +Author: Kathleen Howard + +Release Date: June 26, 2010 [EBook #32980] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CONFESSIONS OF AN OPERA SINGER *** + + + + +Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was +produced from scanned images of public domain material at +The Internet Archive.) + + + + + + + + + +[Illustration: Photo of Kathleen Howard, Autographed] + + + + +CONFESSIONS OF +AN OPERA SINGER + +BY KATHLEEN HOWARD + +NEW YORK MCMXVIII + +ALFRED A. KNOPF + +COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY +KATHLEEN HOWARD BAIRD + +_Published September 1918_ + + +PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA + + _To + Marjorie_ + + + + +FOREWORD + + +So many fantastic tales have come to us of students' life abroad, of +their temptations, trials, finances, successes and failures, that I have +attempted to give here the true story of the preparation for an operatic +career, and its fruition. My road leads from New York to Paris, to +Germany and thence to London, and back to the Metropolitan Opera House. +My operatic experiences in Germany are inalienably associated with the +lives of the people, particularly with the German officer class, viewed +publicly and privately; in fact in the town where I was first engaged, +Metz, I found they were as vital a part of the Opera house life as the +singers themselves. Their arrogance tainted the town life as well, and +here I first became acquainted with the pitiful attempt at swagger and +brilliancy which often covered a state of grinding poverty, or the +thwarted natural domestic instincts which were ruthlessly sacrificed to +the "uniform"--the all-desirable entrée to society, for which no price +was too high to pay. I hope this book will be of interest not only to +those whose goal is the operatic or concert stage, but to those to whom +"human documents" appeal. It is a story of real people, real obstacles +overcome, and contains much intimate talk of back-stage life in opera +houses. + + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAPTER PAGE + + I THE WAY IT ALL HAPPENED 13 + + II A STRUGGLE AND A SOLUTION 21 + + III PARIS AT LAST 30 + + IV PENSION PERSONALITIES 39 + + V OPERATIC FRANCE VERSUS OPERATIC GERMANY 50 + + VI PREPARING RÔLES IN BERLIN 59 + + VII MY FIRST OPERATIC CONTRACT SIGNED 67 + + VIII MY ONE LONE IMPROPOSITION 76 + + IX THE MAKINGS OF A SMALL MUNICIPAL OPERA HOUSE 85 + + X MY DÉBUT AND BREAKING INTO HARNESS 100 + + XI SOME STAGE DELIGHTS 110 + + XII MISPLACED MOISTURE AND THE STORY OF A COURT-LADY 123 + + XIII HUMAN PASSIONS AND SMALLPOX 139 + + XIV DISCOURAGEMENTS THAT LED TO A COURT THEATRE 153 + + XV SALARIES AND A TENOR'S GENIUS 164 + + XVI THE ART OF MARIE MUELLE 172 + + XVII THE NON-MILITARY SIDE OF A GERMAN OFFICER'S LIFE 184 + + XVIII GEESE AND GUESTS 199 + + XIX RUSSIANS, COMMON AND PREFERRED 206 + + XX THE GRANDMOTHERS' BALLET 220 + + XXI STAGE FASHIONS AND THE GLORY OF COLOUR 230 + + XXII ROYAL HUMOUR 242 + + XXIII COVENT GARDEN AND--AMERICA 257 + + + + +LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + + +Kathleen Howard _Frontispiece_ + + I Carmen as I Used to Dress It 76 + + II Carmen as I Now Dress It 84 + + I Amneris as I Used to Dress It 126 + + II Amneris as I Now Dress It 134 + + I Dalila as I Used to Dress It 172 + + II Dalila as I Now Dress It 180 + + Caruso's Caricature of Kathleen Howard 260 + + + + +CHAPTER I + +THE WAY IT ALL HAPPENED + + +I was very young and I was engaged to be married. We had just lost our +money in rather dramatic fashion, and we were all doing what we could to +supply the sudden deficit. My sister began to prepare herself to be a +teacher, my brother left his boarding school and came home to go into a +friend's office, and I--well, I accepted the hand and heart of the young +man in our set with whom I had had most pleasure in dancing in winter +and sailing in summer. + +My heart didn't lose a beat and turn over when I saw him coming as did +those of the heroines in Marion Crawford's novels, but we were the best +friends in the world, and I thought that anything else must be a +literary exaggeration, put in to make the story more exciting; just as +the heroine's eyelashes were usually exaggerated to the abnormal length +of an inch to make her more beautiful, though none of the girls I knew +had them like that. + +He was a young business man, just starting as assistant to his father +whose business was an old established, comfortable sort of family +affair, big enough to supply, in time, an extra income for an +unambitious young couple like ourselves. Every one congratulated us +heartily, and I began to embroider towels and hem table napkins and to +dream about patterns of flat silver. + +The whole arrangement was satisfactory to the point of banality, and I +might be quite an old married woman by this time, but--I had a voice. + +Nine-tenths of me, at this age, were the normal, rational +characteristics of a well-brought up, bright, good looking girl. But the +last tenth was an unknown quantity, a great big powerful something which +I vaguely felt, even then, to be the master of all the other tenths, a +force which was capable of having its own way with the rest of me if I +should ever give it a chance. My voice, the agent of this vague power, +had developed rather late. It is true that our whole childhood had been +coloured by music, that we read notes before we could read letters, and +that music was our earliest and most natural mode of expression. + +My father's greatest joy in life was music, and he always played +imaginative musical games with us in the evenings. The earliest one I +remember was when we were tiny tots. He used to improvise on the small +organ we had and ask us questions which we had to answer, singing to +his accompaniment. I was Admiral Seymour and Marjorie was General +Wolsey. + +I remember his singing, + + "And how would you get your ships along, Admiral, + If your sails and oars were shot overboard?" + +I sang solemnly, + + "I'd shubble them along with shubbles." + +Afterwards when I began to sing from printed music with him I remember +saying one evening as he was playing hymns and unfamiliar English +ballads for me to sing, + +"Papa, please let me look at the music and follow the notes up and +down." + +I really began reading music at four years old. We played and sang all +our childhood. When Marjorie was seven and I was six we sang Even-song +at the village church, as the members of the regular choir were ill or +absent. Marjorie had a heavenly childish soprano and I a heavy +nondescript voice. But I always pleased my father by singing real +"second voice" and not just following the soprano in thirds. + +He used to give us a note, and we then had to run round our rather large +house humming it. It was the deepest disgrace we ever knew if we had +sharped or flatted when we got back to the starting point. He taught us +musical terms by making us dance to different rhythms he played, and +would call out "Allegro," "Vivace," "Adagio," "Molto allegro," "Legato," +and so forth, to which we had to change instantly. Whenever any one came +to the house, we played and sang for them, and though it might have been +rather awful for the visitors it was very good for us to get used to an +audience. + +He used to arrange fairy tales like "Bluebeard" in doggerel verses and +write accompaniments to them, and we then learned them by heart and +rehearsed them, and some grand night played them for all the neighbours. +I remember the way we showed Bluebeard's chamber where the heads of his +wives were kept. We hung a sheet on the wall and Marjorie and I stood in +front of it, with pale faces, closed eyes and open mouths, and our long +hair pinned up high above our heads on the sheet. Another sheet was then +stretched across us, just below our chins, and the effect was rather +ghastly in a dim light. I remember we sang at the last: + + "Oh, Bluebeard, oh, Bluebeard, + Frustrated, checkmated, + Dissipated, agitated, + Castigated, lacerated, + Bluebeard!" + +When school was over we always gave a dramatic performance; if the +weather was fine enough we held them in the big garden that was our +childhood's playground. We dressed behind a huge flowering-currant bush, +and I can remember a performance of an act of "Twelfth Night," in which +I, aged about seven, was _Malvolio_, Lal, my brother, _Maria_, and +Marjorie, _Olivia_. + +I had always been able to sing, but the sudden growth of my voice was a +surprise. One day, in school, we were asked to write a composition on +our favourite wish. All the other girls said they wished for curly hair, +for pretty dresses, for as much candy as they could eat, for any other +frivolous thing that came into their heads. But I took it seriously and +told my dearest wish in all the world--a great voice, a voice with which +I could make audiences cry or laugh at my will. And, strangely enough, +from that time my girlish voice began to grow stronger and stronger, +until I could proudly make more noise with it than any other girl in +school. Then it grew louder and higher, until it was impossible to +ignore such a big possession any longer, and the family decreed that I +must have singing lessons. + +I took lessons accordingly from an excellent local teacher, practised +scales and exercises and later studied the classic songs and arias as +seriously as I could, but it was so fatally easy to be interrupted. We +were all out of school for the first time and enjoying our freedom. It +was so much more chic to go down to Huyler's in the mornings, when the +girls only a year younger were hard at their lessons, than in the +afternoon when the whole girl world was at liberty. I would just begin a +morning's work when some one would call me on the telephone to go to the +dressmaker's with her, or help arrange the flowers for a dinner party. I +loved both flowers and dresses, and it was easy to think, "Oh! I'll +practise this afternoon!" and fly off to be gone all day. In the evening +there was my fiancé who had to tell me all the absorbing details of his +office, or there was a dance, or a theatre party, and I took everything +that came my way and enjoyed it all equally. But all the time my voice +was really first in my thoughts, and I longed to study seriously and +intensely, to arrange my whole life for it and its proper development. + +The family, it seemed to me, was more interested in my trousseau than in +anything else. They had scraped together five hundred dollars, and I was +to have it all, incredible as it sounded, to buy clothes with. +Subconsciously all day, and compellingly in bed at night, the thought of +what I could do for my voice with that five hundred dollars was with me. +I saw myself only as a singer, and knew that I could never be happy +unless I were allowed first to get my instrument in thorough working +order and then to use it. The phrases, "working out your own salvation," +"fulfilling your own destiny," "the necessity of self-development," and +all those other nicely turned expressions which most students have at +their tongues' end, were unknown to me. I just _felt_, inarticulately. +But my feeling was strong enough to carry me into action, the step which +phrasemakers, who find complete satisfaction in their phrases, often +omit. + +New York was my Mecca. I talked it all over with my fiancé, told him +what a year there would do for me, making it clear that I expected to +sing professionally after our marriage. He agreed to everything and +promised that I should do as I wished. His possible objection disposed +of, only the financial difficulty remained, looming large before me. +Deeply and more deeply I was convinced in my own mind that I might marry +in old clothes, but not with my voice untrained. I finally summoned +courage to propose to my family that I should use the precious five +hundred for a year's study in New York instead of a trousseau. +Miraculous to relate they agreed, and I was boundlessly happy and saw my +path golden ahead of me. + +We all spoke and thought of my future as that of a concert singer. My +intention of marrying seemed to make anything else out of the question. +Indeed, at that time, the Metropolitan in New York formed the only +oasis in the operatic desert of America. There were spasmodic attempts +at travelling companies in English, but no other sign of a permanent +institution throughout the length and breadth of the country. I must +confess, however, that the operatic bee buzzed considerably at times in +the less conspicuous portions of my bonnet. One or two musicians of +standing, who heard me sing, pronounced mine "an operatic voice," and +strange longings stirred inside me when I saw the Metropolitan singers +on the boards. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +A STRUGGLE AND A SOLUTION + + +That winter in New York was a revealing experience to me in many ways. +Numbers of things assumed different values in my estimation. One of the +first new things I learned was the comparative insignificance of $500 as +a provision for a year's expenses. I lived at one of those boarding +houses which are called both "reasonable" and respectable, but are +vastly inferior in both comfort and society to the European pension +which costs a good deal less. I had lessons in singing, diction and +French, all of which counted up to a great many dollars a week. My five +hundred began to shrink at an alarming rate, and I don't know what I +should have done if a friend had not advised me to try for a "church +position," that invaluable means of adding to the resources of a +student, which is possible only in America. Besides offering a splendid +chance of financial assistance, the church position system is an +infallible test of the money value of one's voice. How many girls have I +known in Europe embarking upon the expensive and dreadfully laborious +preparation for an operatic career, without possessing a single one of +the qualifications necessary to success, without even an adequate, to +say nothing of an unusual, voice! Their singing of "Because I love you!" +has been the admiration of their local circle, even less musical than +themselves, and this little success has been enough to start them on a +career, doomed to certain failure. If they had only tried for church +positions in a large city in America, had competed in the open market of +their own country, they would have been saved a heartbreak and much good +money besides. + +I won a $1000 position almost at once, over the heads of many older and +more experienced competitors, on the merits of my voice alone. The +salary was my financial salvation, but, besides this, my general +musicianship was much improved by the practice in sight-reading and +_ensemble_ singing. I grew used to facing an audience, and found a +chance to put into use what I learned in my singing lessons. Blessed be +the quartet choir of America, say I; an invaluable institution for the +musical sons and daughters of our country. + +The church in which I sang had many wealthy members, and the +dress-parade on Sundays used to be quite a sight. Our place, as choir, +was directly facing the congregation, in a little gallery, so that our +hats and dresses were subjected to very searching scrutiny. The +furnishing of suitable garments for such an exalted position became +quite a problem. The soprano was a well-known singer, who, in addition +to a good salary, had many concert and oratorio engagements; and her +furs and ostrich feathers were my despair. I would sit up half the night +to cover a last-year's straw hat with velvet. I made an endless +succession of smart blouses which, as we were hidden below the waist by +the railing, I wore with the same "utility" black broadcloth skirt. I +constructed the most original collars and jabots for them out of odds +and ends. + +I remember one was made of a packet of silver spangles sewn in rows +overlapping each other like fish scales. One of my engagement presents +had been a silver mesh bag, and when I wore it at my belt, and the +collar round my neck, the choir used to call me "Mrs. Lohengrin." As we +took off our outdoor wraps to sing, my smartness in the gallery was +assured, but the cleverest manager can't contrive at home a substitute +for furs, and the soprano had chinchilla! I was years younger than the +others and they were very sweet to me. + +Living at my boarding house was a young doctor, who also would have +liked to be nice to me. But my exaggerated conscientiousness would not +allow me to have anything to do with one man while I was engaged to +another, and I refused all his invitations to the theatre and to +Saturday afternoon excursions. My one indulgence was in standing-room +tickets for the Metropolitan. What a boon to girls in my situation would +be the inexpensive municipal opera and endowed theatres of Germany with +their system of _Schule Vorstellungen_ (students' performances) of +standard plays and operas at prices that put a comfortable seat within +the means of even the most humble purse! This was the lack the Century +Opera would have supplied. + +My church engagement was to come to an end May first. The thought of +turning my back on the start I had made depressed me fearfully. I had +given my word to marry and did not think of wavering. But the letters of +my fiancé and his rare visits to New York had not helped us to +understand each other better. Many hours I walked the floor longing for +advice, and wrestling with myself. I said to my sister, "I have my foot +on the first rung of the ladder and now I must take it off." It all +seems so simple now. Almost any other girl would have broken her +engagement without much thought. But I had not been brought up that way, +and so I had hours and days of misery. + +The one thought that comforted me was that I could go on at any rate as +well as it was possible in my own town, and though it would be much +harder to make a career from there, it _could_ be done with the +co-operation of my husband. It was hard for me to talk in those days, +but one day driving down Fifth Avenue in a hansom, a rare treat, I +remember my feelings were too much for me, and I burst through my +repression and told him how I _must_ develop that side of me, and he +said, "And I'll help you, little girl; you can count on me." I believed +him of course. But while I was dreadfully serious, he, as I learned +later, ranked my singing with the china-painting and fancy-work of his +relations, as a sort of harmless pastime, to occupy my leisure moments. +The truth was, of course, that, as often happens, he had entirely +mistaken my character, had made his ideal woman out of his head, given +her my outward appearance, and fallen in love with her. The real "me" +was a disconcerting stranger, of whom he caught only occasional +glimpses. + +About the first of May, I returned home. They were all at the station to +meet me; my fiancé had even broken into his office hours to be there +too. We had seen each other seldom during my absence from home, for New +York was a long way off, and he was saving his pennies religiously for +the great event. When we married, our income would be a tight fit in +any case, and I could not help rejoicing that my singing might add +considerably to it. There were no $1000 church positions in our town, +but one or two of the churches paid respectable salaries to their +quartets, and I hoped soon to begin to make a concert career. + +For a little while after my return I was very happy. Every one was so +nice to me and seemed to think I had done remarkable things already. Our +church asked me to sing a solo the Sunday when the bishop was expected, +and I held a sort of reception afterwards and heard many pleasant things +about my progress. After my hard work and self-denial, the rest, the +gentle flattery, and the comfort of home surroundings were very welcome. + +Only with my fiancé things were not so satisfactory. Something, I did +not know what, was the matter; but it all culminated one evening in his +saying that no married woman should follow a profession, that she should +find "occupation enough in her own home." This was really a great shock +to me, as he had promised me his support in my work so often. Imagine my +surprise after a three years' engagement, when he had his family tell me +just three weeks before the wedding that I was to give up all hope of +singing professionally after encouraging me in it during the entire +time. I knew by then that I could never be happy nor make him happy if +I gave up all thought of singing professionally. + +I asked him very quietly if those were his convictions, and, on his +affirmative answer, I took off his ring, returned it to him, and went +upstairs without one more word, feeling as if I had been awakened out of +a nightmare, and though still palpitating from the shock was +experiencing relief at finding it over. In my own room I stretched my +arms above my head and said, "_Free!_" A marvellous vista of freedom +opened to me after the months of strain. I could hardly bear to go to +sleep; it was so wonderful to plan how I could go ahead and study, +study. + +The next morning I saw my mistake in supposing the affair to be over, +for there ensued many trying days and floods of tears all round. Then +came the solemn and awkward returning of all the engagement cups and +saucers and knicknacks, to nearly our whole circle of acquaintance. My +family stood by me and performed this unattractive task, while I packed +up to return to New York. + +I had given up my choir, and now found it a difficult matter to get +another. All the churches had made their arrangements for the year and +the best I could hope for was occasional substituting in case one of the +altos was unable to sing. I made the round of the agents' offices. Some +heard me and were complimentary, some refused as their lists were full. +But when I mentioned the word "engagement," I was always met by the +rejoinder "No experience." I used to say to them, "But how can I ever +get experience if you won't give me a chance?" They would shrug and +answer that that wasn't their affair. + +It seemed a hopeless deadlock. No one would engage me without experience +and no one would give me an opportunity to become experienced. I knew +that the one way out of the difficulty was to go abroad and get +experience there. I have said that the idea of singing in opera had +always made a strong appeal to me, and I knew that I had some of the +qualifications necessary for the stage--a big voice, good +stage-appearance, and ability to act (we had always acted) as well as a +great capacity for hard work. But the essential qualification, without +which the others were all ineffective, was the financial support +necessary to get me there and to provide means of studying and of living +adequately while I prepared myself for opera. + +I despaired of obtaining this, but the way was suddenly opened for me in +what seemed a miraculous manner. Friends of mine in the church, Frank +Smith Jones and his wife, offered to finance me through my years of +preparation and for as long afterwards as I might need their aid. These +real friends were behind me for years, and I owe them more than I could +ever repay. They made it possible for me to have my sister with me, for +me, a rather delicate girl, an inestimable benefit. In the seventh +heaven of joy, I prepared to go to Paris to study with Jacques Bouhy, +recommended to me by my New York teacher. I packed my few clothes, some +songs, and a boundless enthusiasm, and set sail. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +PARIS AT LAST + + +I crossed on one of the steady big boats of the Atlantic Transport Line. +I remember only one passenger, a boy of even then such personal +magnetism that he stands out in my recollection as clearly as any one I +have ever met, though he was then only a young fellow and unknown to +fame. His name was Douglas Fairbanks and his ambition was to go on the +stage. He said as we neared England: "Well, some day we'll read, +'Conried of the Metropolitan Opera House presents Miss Kathleen Howard,' +and 'Charles Frohman presents Mr. Douglas Fairbanks.'" His prophecy, +which I recall even to the spot on the boat where he made it, and the +expression of his eyes which matched mine at that moment, has almost +been fulfilled. + +I reached Paris in the beginning of September with "my instrument" in +working order, with a smattering of French, a letter of credit for +$1000, and a large supply of courage. I found my voice adequate to all +my demands upon it, but the money just half enough (it was increased +the next year). As for my courage, I have had to go on renewing that +ever since, until it has become the largest factor in my success. Emma +Juch told me once that she always said it was not difficult to attain +success and make a career. Perhaps her success was made at a time when +the competition was less keen, but I at any rate could never agree with +her. + +I arrived in Paris early in the morning and went to a small hotel in the +rue Cambon. It quite thrilled me to ask the chambermaid for _eau chaude_ +instead of "hot water"; and I felt proud of knowing that the midday meal +was called _déjeuner à la fourchette_. I remember that meal to this +day--it began with radishes and butter, those inseparable companions in +France, went on to omelette, then cold meat and salad, with small +clingstone peaches and little white grapes for dessert. Red or white +wine was "_compris_," and the bread was a yard long, cut half through +into sections, and laid down the middle of the table. It was all +half-miraculous to me, and afterwards when I went out to stroll under +the arches of the rue de Rivoli I thought myself in fairyland. The +jewelry, lingerie and photograph shops delighted me, as they have +innumerable tourists, and the name "Redfern" over a doorway gave me a +thrill. The Place de la Concorde seemed one of the most beautiful places +I had ever seen, an opinion which I still hold, by the way, and I felt +like a queen when I called an open _fiacre_ and drove in state toward +the Arc de Triomphe, stopping to buy a big bunch of red roses for twenty +cents from a ragged man who ran shouting beside my carriage. In the +evening I went to the opera and wondered at the great stairway and at +the big auditorium, and still more at the poor performance I saw there +but which I accounted for by the fact that September is the dull season. + +That first day was all thrills. The next was spent in arranging hours +for lessons, and collecting pension addresses from all my acquaintances, +as I saw that it would be impossible to do my work in a hotel. I set +bravely out on my hunt for a dwelling place. Prices have increased +considerably since those days, for at that time it was possible to get +very good board and lodging on the left bank of the Seine for five +francs a day. My professor, Jacques Bouhy, however, lived near the Arc +de Triomphe, and I wished to be within walking distance. I toiled up and +down a great many stairs, and peeped into a great many rooms without +finding what I sought. I could not bear to wait a day to begin working, +and was just a bit discouraged, when I had the good fortune to meet two +girls from home, who gave me the address of the pension where they had +stayed. I rushed off at once to see it, and found a very nice house of +several floors, situated in a _cité_, a sort of garden behind the first +row of houses on the street, so that its windows faced a view of trees +and flowerbeds with circular gravel walks around them, instead of +cobblestones. + +The head of the pension was an old woman who looked like a Bourbon but +was really a bourgeoise. It was nearly noon when I arrived, but she was +still in a wonderful dressing gown of purple and yellow stripes, with +_chaussons_, cloth slippers, on her feet, and an elaborate coiffure of +dyed black hair above her yellow old face. She came to me in the salon, +a long narrow room with French windows framing tree-tops, the windows +and doors all hung with rose-red velvet which looked as if it had been +in place since the First Empire. There were sofas of rose, and chairs of +the same with black wooden rims, tables and mantel-pieces with thousands +of things on them, and an old-fashioned square piano in the corner. +Madame was most gracious, remembered the name of her former lodgers, +said they were _très gentilles_, turned a neat compliment to the +American nation, and showed me the rooms herself. + +I chose a back one of good size, nicely furnished and hung with a pretty +chintz. It had a _cabinet de toilette_, or large cupboard for washstand +and trunks, opening off it, and I was to have it with complete board, +for two hundred francs a month ($40). The price was really higher, but +my arrangement was for the winter. I was to pay extra for light and +heat. The room had an open fireplace with a _grille_ or fire-basket in +it, for which I could buy _boulets_, coal dust pressed into egg-shaped +balls, for three francs a sack. Later, I could have had a _salamandre_, +one of the excellent small stoves which fit into the fireplace, really +warm a room, and require filling only once in twenty-four hours. But I +wanted something to poke, and I had an idea that Paris winters were not +very formidable. As a matter of fact, anything more penetrating than +their damp sunless cold it is impossible to imagine. + +For light, there was a huge lamp for which I could buy _luciline_, a +kind of highly refined kerosene which has no odour and burns well. I +made my bath arrangements with Jean, Madame's old servant, who with his +wife, Eugénie, was the real head of the establishment. I had bought a +collapsible rubber tub, and Jean was to bring me a big can of hot water +every morning. I found that I had to tip occasionally or the water +became as cool as Jean's manners. Madame showed me her dining room, and +told me with pride that her cuisine was of an excellence renowned. I +went to fetch my trunks and hire a piano, glad that my long search was +over. The piano was a small upright, a tin pan for tone, as are all +Parisian pianos _en location_, and it was to cost me ten francs a month, +with eight francs for carting. They are more expensive now. When it was +installed, my Lares and Penates on top of it, and my music on a stool +beside it, I felt that my feet were firmly planted on the ladder leading +to success. + +Then I began to work. And how I did work that winter! I had two singing +lessons a week, and a session with the opera class lasting three hours +in which we went through the dramatic action of our rôles. I slaved at +my repertoire working three hours a week with a coach, and spending +hours and hours a day learning by heart at home. Of course I began with +the very biggest rôles--we all do. The personalities of _Amneris_, +_Carmen_, _Dalila_, _Azucena_ in turn, all in their French version of +course, occupied my mind waking and sleeping. + +Jacques Bouhy was always kind, grave and courteous with me. The thought +of his having created _Escamillo_ and his real knowledge of French +traditions thrilled me. He lent me his copy of "Samson et Dalila" from +which to copy the French words. It had an inscription from Saint-Saens +"À M. Bouhy, _grand prêtre et grand artiste_." He created the rôle of +the Grand Priest. + +The only time I ever saw him upset was one day after the Opera class. We +all thought him safely out riding as he always was on Mondays. My +letter, written at that time to my mother, says: + +"This morning in the opera class we had rather an unpleasant time. +Little N., with the beautiful tenor voice, has learned in one week the +first half of the _Samson_ duet for me. He has had to learn it from a +score which has only his voice part written in it. He is frightfully +down on his luck and with the gorgeous voice and speaking French can't +get anything to do, and has no money, not a cent to his name. We had +done that, some one else had sung, and having ten minutes left, Valdejo +told N. to sing again if he would. He was tired, but jumped up and began +the first part of "Faust." He kept forgetting it. Suddenly the door +opened and in walked Bouhy as white as a sheet. He commanded N. to stop +singing and to learn his things before coming again to the class. Said, +why did he sing like a baritone when he was a tenor, mocked him, told +him he was ashamed to have such sounds made _chez lui_, that he had been +a year on "Faust." What example was he to the others? Every one else had +always worked seriously. He stormed for five long minutes, N. standing +quite still, with his brown dog's eyes fixed on him--then he left the +room. It was frightfully uncomfortable for us too. I am sure I have +done just such rotten work so it may be my turn next. Of course Bouhy +was right. N. has been there a year and ought to know it; but he is just +tired out, and never sleeps he says. They say Bouhy is beginning to show +his age. This week he bounced his cook whom he has had for years." + +I had two French lessons a week, and should have had at least one +diction lesson besides, but for an invaluable course which I had taken +in New York with the Yersin sisters. These lessons were a nerve-racking +experience from which I used to emerge with my feathers all rubbed the +wrong way from the strain of trying to imitate the intangible +differences between the various French "e's." But I have always been +grateful for this rigid training, from the time when I first reached +Paris, and, though speaking very little French, could give an address to +a _cocher_ without having to repeat it, until now, when I can thank my +trained ear for a perfect accent in singing foreign languages. + +I think no one ever studied more unrelentingly than I, during that first +year of hot enthusiasm. I began early in the morning, and the only +reason that I did not burn the midnight oil was that I found it cost me +too much in kerosene and firing. I could keep warm in bed for nothing, +and _boulets_ were my pet economy. Coming from a country where a warm +room was taken for granted, and where the furnaces in hotels and +boarding houses might have been supplied by Elijah's ravens for all I +knew about it, I just couldn't bear to see my money burning away bit by +bit in a grate; and many a time I have put on my fur-lined coat rather +than add fuel to the dying heap of dreadfully expensive ashes in the +_grille_. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +PENSION PERSONALITIES + + +At first I had no companionship and very little recreation, beyond the +ever fresh wonder and delight of the Paris streets as I saw them in my +daily constitutional. One day I went with a girl friend to visit her +_atelier_. I wrote to my mother: + +"We spent a long time in the life-class room--nude, (not us but the +model). It was a mixed class. A large oblong room, filled with I should +think over a hundred students, mostly men. They sat in a circle facing +the model throne. The floor is not raised, but the effect of an +amphitheatre is produced by rush bottom stools of different heights. +They rest their pads or drawing portfolios on a railing in front of +them. The room is intolerably hot because of the model. What struck us +most was the intense silence and atmosphere of earnestness; no one +speaks and there is only the gentle rub-rub of the charcoal, crayon, or +pencil against the paper. The students look quickly up and down and +never move their glance except from their sketch to the model and back +again. She was a very pretty young girl and took graceful half-hour +poses. The one interruption was a quiet voice at the end of a half-hour, +'_C'est l'heure_'; and they stopped for a few minutes' rest. We went +into another room, where a picturesque old wretch with long black curls, +red velvet waist-coat, long blue cape, well thrown back, black, grimy +hands clasped around his knee, and clumsy, rusty boots stuck out in +front of him, was seated." + +Later one of these old models used to come to my brother. He had a card +on which was printed the list of poses he was prepared to take.--"The +twelve Apostles," "The Eternal Father" and "The God Jupiter." + +I found a little English tea-room about a mile away, and often went +there for tea and muffins which in those days were hardly procurable in +French places. The tea-habit is only about ten years old in France. The +people in the shop soon knew me by sight, which was just as well, as I +would begin going over the words of some part in my head and walk out +serenely, quite forgetting to pay for my tea. I still go there +occasionally when I am in Paris and remind them of that. I sometimes +went to the two operas and to the theatre, but not nearly often enough, +as I could spare neither time nor money, and the late hours made a +concentration on the next morning's work more difficult. The concert +world was a great disappointment to me. I think I longed for nothing so +much that year, as to hear great orchestral music well performed; but +the Lamoreux and Chevillard concerts did little to satisfy this craving, +and I was amazed at the roughness of the strings and the narrow scope of +the programs. Many of the great artists avoided Paris in their tours, +the reason given being lack of suitable concert halls. + +On the other hand, a whole new school of composition was opened to me +that winter by a fellow _pensionnaire_. Charles Loeffler and Henry +Hadley spent part of the winter in our pension, and Mr. Loeffler +introduced me to the French modernists. Later in the winter we often +talked over their works together. He used to stroll into my room about +tea time, saying he liked to watch me make tea for I had such attractive +fingers. He used to take me to the odd corners of his beloved Paris, +_cafés_ haunted by long-haired _Sorbonne_ students, and _cafés +chantants_, where the frank improprieties of the ditties were for me so +impenetrably disguised by the _argot_ in which they were written that I +did not understand a word of them. "When your French gets more +colloquial," he used to say, "I shan't be able to bring you here any +more. Oh! if you were only a man!" He always ended with this +exclamation, and I never knew why, for my woman-hood did not seem to +disturb him particularly. Perhaps he felt the want of a sort of Fidus' +Achates to confide in. He took me to two famous places, and this is my +description of them in a letter to my mother: + +"We went first to the famous 'Noctambules' in the Quartier Latin. It is +where the wittiest men of their _genre_ are to be found. They are many +of them decorated by the government. One hears witty topical songs, +_chansons d'amour_, and absurdities telling of the eels and fishes in +amorous conversation, such extravagances as the French love. There is no +vulgarity. Their diction is marvellous, and of course they sacrifice, +entirely, their tone to their words. All around the walls are posters +and drawings of famous artists and caricatures of Parisians. The +performers are called on in turn by the master of ceremonies, and take +their stand on a little platform in front of the piano half way up the +room. When they have finished, if they have been popular, we are all +called on to join in the _doublement_ for Monsieur so and so. This +consists of clapping to a certain rhythm, which is thumped on the piano: +1 2 3 4 5,--1 2 3 4 5,--1 2 3 4 5--1 2 3--and over again." + +In those days Charles Fallot was still at the "Noctambules" and used to +arise, very black and white and thin, and gaze at himself in the big +mirror opposite, while he gestured with his long, skinny arms and +thoroughly French hands, and delivered himself of his witty _double +entendre chansons_. Another night we went to a famous Montmartre place, +Boite à Fursy, but it was not at all the same thing, and we neither of +us liked it. + +Henry Hadley had the room above me, and often told me my hours of +playing "Carmen," etc., nearly maddened him. I always studied in bed or +at the piano, without singing, and rarely used my voice when committing +rôles to memory. Hadley often had Cyril Scott, the English composer, in +his rooms, and I used to listen with joy to Scott's imaginative playing. +It was like birds sweeping and swooping, all keys and intervals were +interwoven. He always said, one hand on his forehead, "I have no +understanding for limitations of harmony or rules of tempo." And indeed +why should one have? He liked nothing older than Debussy and was +unspeakably bored by Gluck or Beethoven and their ilk, though he loved +"Carmen." Hadley still retained a strong admiration for Wagner and +respect for the old school, though he much appreciated the moderns and +the modern orchestra. I first saw Mary Garden as _Mélisande_ with him. +We both sat rapt and spellbound to the end, transported by what was to +me a perfect revelation as to scoring for modern orchestra, the +intangible operatic form, and most of all the subtle imaginative acting +of Mary Garden. Her power of suggestion in those days was capable of +conveying any shade of thought or delicate mood to the spectator. That +performance has always been and will always be an inspiration to me. + +Hadley was always starting off on impossible journeys to Egypt and the +Orient, in search of "material." His talk was filled with the strangest +scraps of out-of-the-way information, like bright-coloured rags in a +dust heap. Bauer lived a door or two away, and I used to hear him +practising and then hear his concerts. A wordy war would rage at our end +of the table at dinner, while old Madame, from her seat of honour in the +centre, would cry, "_Mais français, parlez français, mes enfants!_ You +crush my ears with your English!" Of course, no attention was paid to +her. Joining passionately in the discussions, though not themselves of +the _métier,_ were two American girls, living on the top floor, who were +supposed to be writing a play together. One or another of the composers +was usually more or less in love with one or other of the girls, and +they took sides accordingly, for and against the recognized masters of +the past. The two were amusing, always doing something eccentric. + +At one time they had an incubator in their room, the gift of a passing +admirer, and we engaged passionately in raising chickens. The machine +was heated by a huge kerosene lamp, and they were always turning it too +high and having it fill the room with blacks and smoke, or letting it go +out altogether. However, two or three chicks, more strenuously +determined to live than the rest, managed to struggle out at length, and +their advent was heralded by the whole pension. We had marked our +initials on the eggs, one egg each, and when mine showed the first signs +of life, I held it in my hand till it was partly hatched. The little +pecks inside the shell were fascinating to feel in one's palm. As soon +as the chicks could walk, they were taken downstairs into the _cité_, +and their attempts to scratch gravel were hailed by the assembled +inhabitants of the garden in a rapture of several languages. One +Englishman wanted to make them little jackets, so he could take them for +walks in the _Bois_. + +Discussion was meat and drink to all these people. Their cry was +"Sensations, sensations! Let the artist experience everything in his own +person!" This doctrine sounded rather a menace to conduct, but talking +endlessly about sensations seemed to be equivalent in most cases to +experiencing them. Nevertheless, some of them indulged in desperate +orgies of black coffee and cigarettes as an invocation to their muse; +and one of the composers assured me that the great symphonic poem on +which he was at work, had been inspired by breaking a bottle of +Houbigant's _Idéal_ in a closed cab and driving for hours in the _Bois_, +inhaling the perfume. They loved to recount these Gargantuan excesses, +and were extravagant in praise of midnight oil, attic windows, and the +calm inspiration of early dawn after nights of frantic toil. They were +dreadfully sincere, and very amusing to watch, but it seemed to me that +there was a great deal of stage setting for very little play. They +tended the green shoot of their artistic development with such fantastic +care, that it was in danger of dying from too much consideration. +Personally, I was too busy, either for sensations or the analysis of +them, though I used to wonder what this Paris could be like into which +they journeyed and from which they returned full of tales of affairs and +lovely women and gorgeous houses. It all seemed most romantic and +interesting to me. + +The other end of the dinner table represented staid conventionality in +contrast to our anarchism. In the centre sat Madame and beside her her +life-long friend, the editor of one of the Paris newspapers. Some hinted +that he was something more than a friend, in spite of Madame's seventy +years. Opposite her, was Madame M----, once an American in the days of +long ago, but with no trace of it left except in her persistent accent. +She was reputed to possess one hundred dresses, and certainly the +variety of her costume was amazing; but as she was at least fifty-five +and had preserved every gown for the last thirty years, her annual dress +expenditure, after all, was probably not extravagant. Her old husband +was never allowed a word when she was present, so he revenged himself +for the privation by interfering with every game started after dinner in +the _salon_--bridge, poker, patience, no matter what it was, he always +insisted that the players were quite wrong and that he could show them +how it was done in the clubs. + +There was a young Russian girl with a pretty face and pretty clothes, +whose hands, however, betrayed her peasant origin. Her beautiful sister +was engaged at the Grand Opera, so she was an object of great interest +to me. There were some Swedes, and nondescript Americans, and a charming +French family, a mother and two daughters, bearers of an historic name, +who had come up from their _château_ in the South of France that the +girls might have masters in various "accomplishments," and were living +in the _pension_ from motives of economy. On Sundays their brother, a +young naval officer, used to dine with them. With his pale, aristocratic +face, and with little side-whiskers, the high stock of his uniform, his +strapped trousers and narrow, arched feet, he was like a John Leech +drawing come to life. Then there was a large Frenchwoman, Madame la +Marquise de Quelquechose, who lent the lustre of her title and her +ancestral jewels to our _bourgeois_ board. At least, she said her jewels +were heirlooms, but her ancestors must have had a prophetic taste in +jewelry, as I often saw replicas of her ornaments in the shops of the +rue de Rivoli. An old Englishwoman completed our list of permanencies. +In spite of twenty years' residence in Paris, she would still ask for +"oon petty poo de pang" in a high, drawling voice. There were transients +of many nationalities, but these were our regular inmates. + +An interesting man sometimes dined with us. Writing my mother about him +I say: + +"Last night Mr. H---- dined here and told us many yarns about Sarah +Bernhardt. He said once when he was in California he was asked to meet +her and they all went on a hunting picnic together. She dropped her robe +when she got to the island where they had _déjeuner_, undoing a wide, +heavy, Egyptian gold and precious-stone belt, and appeared attired in a +man's velvet hunting-suit. He says she adores to talk _cancan_, and +referred to the manager as 'that _cochon_.' After breakfast, she threw +the champagne bottles far into the lake and shot them to pieces at the +first shot. The only posey thing she did was when she undid her belt and +threw it far across the road, and when he asked her if that was the way +she treated such beautiful things, she said that the man who gave it to +her was domestic!... It is colder than charity here at present, at least +I feel it so in the house. I shall start my fire today for the first +time. Yesterday I bought a bunch of violets, and do you know why? To +keep myself from buying chestnuts, which are bad for the voice. You see, +if I spent my _sous_ for violets I could not afford more for chestnuts. +Thus prevented I myself." + + + + +CHAPTER V + +OPERATIC FRANCE VERSUS OPERATIC GERMANY + + +After a few months of strenuous endeavour on my part, I began to be a +little dissatisfied and restless. I saw clearly that in a year's time, +working at such pressure, I should have a sufficient repertoire to begin +my apprenticeship on the stage; but I did not see my way to a _début_ +quite so clearly. I talked with the other pupils, to get their ideas of +progression. They all said, "When I make my _début_ at the Opera," or +"the Comique." They were all sure of an opening at the top and +apparently would consider nothing less than leading rôles in a world +capital. That was not my idea at all. I did not care about a _début_. I +wanted to learn to act, to do my big parts over and over again before an +audience, to sing them into my voice, to learn to make voice, face, and +my whole body an articulate expression of all that the rôle had to say. + +I tried to find out how the singers of the two operas had made their +careers. Some, I learned, though doing leading work, still paid for +their performances by taking so and so many francs worth of seats every +time they sang. Some had gained a hearing by the influence of their +teachers. Some were there by "protection." The Russian girl's sister was +very beautiful, but she was not very gifted either vocally or +histrionically, and I wondered at her engagement, until I heard that she +was the _protégée_ of a certain rich man. The winners of the first prize +at the Conservatoire had a chance given them, and one or two had made +good to a certain extent, and still sang occasionally. But, I thought, +if the débutantes of the Conservatoire must be given an opportunity, +there can be very little room for other inexperienced singers, and +certainly none for foreigners. The "France for the French" spirit had +impressed me tremendously, as it must all foreigners in Paris. Generous +as the city is to them, she rightly gives her rewards to those of her +own race first. + +The opera class was another source of annoyance to me. The one idea was +"copy what I show you"--make a faithful imitation whether it expresses +what you feel or not; it doesn't matter what you feel so long as you +pour everything into the same moulds and turn out neat little shapes, +labelled "love," "hate," "despair," all ready for use, and all "true to +the traditions of the French school." The first lessons of all were in +standing and walking, and there began my sadness. The traditions +demanded that one's feet be set eternally at "ten minutes to two." Mine +would deviate from this rule, and I aided and abetted them in their +mutiny. My instinct was to sit down occasionally with my knees together, +instead of always draping one leg at the side of the chair. I often felt +like singing quite a long phrase with no gestures at all, instead of +keeping up a succession of undulating arm-movements. + +Our dramatic coach, a fiery individual, who chewed coffee-berries +persistently, struggled in vain to teach me to lay one hand on my heart +in the traditional manner, two middle fingers together, little one +crooked, thumb in. Sometimes mine looked like a starfish, and sometimes +like a fist, and both were taboo. Gestures had to melt into each other; +there were different ones for different emotions, and woe betide you if +you mixed them! There was a sort of test speech beginning, "_Moi, qui +vous parle._" The hand at "_moi_" had to be laid upon the chest in the +approved manner. I have forgotten the middle, but the end was, "_Et vous +jure, que je le ferai jamais!_" At _jure_ one elevated the right hand, +the first two fingers raised, and at _jamais_ the right arm described a +figure eight across the upper half of the body, with the gesture of +tearing away a long beard. We did this all winter and never reached +perfection, that is, an exact copy of Valdejo, our instructor. + +We had to practice the classic walk--slowly advancing, foot dragging, +stomach out, very lordly to see, one arm bent from the elbow with the +forearm and hand resting against the body--a most difficult thing. The +different versions were very comic, but the idea was excellent and I +used it later in "Orfeo." Certainly a pulled back tummy would not be in +character in a Greek tunic. + +Later, we had to act scenes from our operas, and there I got on better. +I used to get absorbed in the character to the extent of becoming +perfectly oblivious of my surroundings. I remember once, as _Dalila_, +throwing myself so hard upon the supposed couch of _Dalila_, that I +thumped my head on the marble mantel behind me. My watching class mates +burst into a snicker, and I into real tears of anger, not of pain. I had +entirely forgotten them when their giggles wrenched me back into the +present; but their great pride was never to forget themselves and always +to be ready to imitate the coach in cold blood. He, however, appreciated +that I had something in me, and used to thump me on the back, and call +me "Canaille!" when I did anything that pleased him--a curious +expression of approval. + +I am not denouncing the ordinary "opera class." This method of slavish +imitation doubtless has its usefulness for some people. The old order of +opera singer was often trained by such schooling. But Mary Garden had +opened my eyes to the new order of singing actors, and the old method +was no help to me. I longed for a real stage on which to try out my own +ideas, and find by experience whether they were right or wrong. I wanted +to gain that subtle quality, "authority," which is nearly as important +as voice itself, that routine which makes one forget the four long bones +of the body, and blends all its members into an instrument of +expression, homogeneous and harmonious. + +In my researches into the life-stories of French singers, I heard much +of "the French provinces" as a training school, and turned my attention +to accumulating all the information on that subject that I could gather. +I heard tales of southern audiences who cheered their singers to the +echo, waited in a mob to tear the horses from their carriages after a +performance, pelted them with flowers and expressed their approval in +other picturesque fashions. The reverse side of these tales is of +directly opposite character, when benches are torn up and flung over the +gallery by the "gods," disappointed at not hearing a favourite singer, +and the head of the unlucky substitute is the target for their missiles +till he makes good with a high note loud enough to pierce the din of +their protestation. If a wretched singer clears his throat loud enough +to be heard, he will be greeted at each entrance by a chorus of +throat-clearing from the gallery. If his acting of a part strikes them +as being pretentious or over-solemn, groans and cries of +"Shakespear-r-r-e" reward his efforts. To crack on a high note is the +certain signal for a riot of yelling and jeers, but the unhappy singer +must stick it out at any cost, for if he leaves the stage, they wait for +him outside and set upon him bodily. + +"If you've made the round of the Provinces," as Harry Weldon, who has +done so, once said to me, "you can sing in Hell!" + +Of course, not all provincial audiences are so "temperamental" as the +southerners, but, as far as I could learn, paid performances and +protection seemed to exist everywhere in greater or less degree. The +repertoire was limited and old-fashioned--the standard French operas, +"Faust," "Mignon," "Carmen," "Hamlet," were performed, with "Traviata," +"Trovatore," "Aida," "The Barber," some Meyerbeer, and many of the +lighter works, like "La Fille du Regiment." Among the more modern works +were "Werther" and "Manon" of Massenet, with "Bohème" and "Butterfly" +and perhaps "Louise." "Lohengrin" and "Tannhäuser" were sometimes given, +but the big Wagner dramas, the classics of Mozart, Weber and Gluck, and +the moderns like Debussy, Dukas, Strauss, Humperdinck, seemed +neglected. Over all there hung a general lack of method, musical +thoroughness and discipline. I must confess that I judge largely by +hear-say, as the only provincial French opera house of which I have any +personal knowledge is that of Nancy. So it may be that I do "The +Provinces" an injustice. Of course, both Monte Carlo and Nice offer many +novelties. But then Monte Carlo is not a provincial French opera at all. + +On the other hand, the stories I heard of the great operatic machinery +of Germany began to attract me irresistibly. The organized system of +opera, the great chain of opera houses, the discipline of their rigid +schooling, the concentration and deep musical sincerity of their +musicians, the simplicity of German life, all seemed to offer what I was +looking for. The dramatic quality of my voice would have more scope in +their more varied repertoire, while surely in their hundred-odd opera +houses I might find a place to work out my ideas in peace. + +Every one thought me crazy. My teachers tried their hardest to dissuade +me, promising me a great career in France. But I felt a call to Germany +where I hoped to find the right conditions for my own development which +seemed lacking in France. The great barrier was the language--the +difficulty of singing in it, to say nothing of learning it, for I did +not know one word. Jean de Reszke said to me later, speaking of German +as a language for singing: "_Avec cette langue, vous n'arriverez +jamais._" (With that language, you will never succeed.) However, I have +said that I had a good deal of courage in those days, and I determined +to go to Berlin to try my luck. + +Not that I was tired of Paris. It is still my favourite city offering a +wonderful opportunity for broadening culture to those who can get into +touch with its art life. I owe it a great debt for deepening my artistic +perception, and developing that sense of true proportion which keeps one +from exaggeration on the one hand and pedantry on the other. But I +should not recommend Paris as the best school for the ordinary American +student of singing, who has no opportunity to penetrate into real French +life. There is no lack of sincerity in the real French institutions, the +Conservatoire, the schools of art, the Sorbonne--there are found +concentration, competition, and keenness enough. But the foreign student +of singing does not ordinarily come into contact with these +institutions. In the Paris vocal studios, as I know them, there is a +dissipation instead of a conservation of energy. The students expect to +win the crown without running the race, and money and influence play too +great a rôle. They (vocal students, I mean) tend to exaggerate their +little emotions into _grandes passions_, and hold the most +disproportionate views of their own importance. I do not mean to say +that I agree with a certain singer who brought back harrowing tales of +immorality among American students in Europe. Amongst all the hundreds +of vocal students I have known, I never met one case of flagrant +misbehaviour. In general the girls live quietly and strive according to +their lights, though there is not one in twenty with resolution enough +to concentrate on the hard work necessary for a great career. The +temptation is to fritter away both time and money on the things that +don't matter. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +PREPARING RÔLES IN BERLIN + + +The first of September, without a word of German, I set out for Berlin. +My mother had come over during the preceding Spring, to make her home in +Paris with my sculptor brother Cecil and my sister. From this time on I +went to them for the summers, and my sister joined me when I went to +Metz, and has never left me since. It made it harder to leave both +family and Paris behind and go into an unknown land, but I felt it to be +the best way. + +Lilli Lehmann's studio was my objective point. I found her address in a +musical journal, and armed with that, and the address of an inexpensive +_pension_, I took the train. Arrived in Berlin, I took a _Droschke_, +directing the driver to my pension by showing him the street and number +on a piece of paper. Somewhere between that _Droschke_ and my room, my +travelling clock got lost, and what a time I had to recover it! The +apple-cheeked maid knew of the existence of no other language beside +her own. In vain I made a pendulum of my finger and tirelessly repeated +"tick, tick"--no gleam of intelligence dawned in her Prussian blue eyes. + +The first few days brought a series of disappointments. The Lehmann idea +had to be abandoned. She was out of town and recommended me by letter to +a certain Herr----, to whom she was sending every one who applied to +her. I found him a dear old man indeed, but one who had nothing to say +to me on the subject of voice production which I had not heard already. +However, I decided to begin the study of German repertoire with him, +painstakingly re-learning the operas I already knew in French, and +adding the new ones required for a German engagement. Later I found a +good _répétiteur_, who knew the operas thoroughly, quite sufficient and +much cheaper, as he charged only four marks ($1.00) an hour. I studied +the words of my rôles with Herr----'s wife, who had been an actress and +a good one, and who laid the foundation of what I am proud to say is now +a perfect German accent. These lessons were five marks an hour and were +quite worth it. I would learn a rôle by heart, sentence by sentence, +looking up every word in the dictionary and writing in the translation +over the German, spending hours in fruitless search for a past +participle which did not look as if it belonged to its infinitive, the +only part of the verb, of course, to be given in the dictionary! Then, +sentence by sentence, I would go over it with Frau----, repeating each +word after her, sometimes twenty times! We also used those splendid +books, known I found afterwards to every German actor, in which +paragraphs of words with the same vowel sound or combination of vowel +and consonants are given to be repeated over and over again. Besides +this drudgery, I had German lessons for four months (at three marks or +seventy-five cents) for which I had to translate and write exercises. +All the labyrinths of the declension of articles, nouns and adjectives +in three genders and plurals, lay before me to be explored. The datives +and accusatives haunted my dreams by night, and by day I was reduced to +the sign language. + +I had left my first pension, and crushing down the temptation to live in +one of the big, gay German-American pensions, where justice is tempered +with mercy, so to speak, I moved myself and my piano into a real German +one, where I was the only alien. It was one floor of a large house in a +quiet side street--the top floor, and no elevator! I climbed +eighty-seven steps by actual count every time I came home from a lesson. +I had a huge room, heated by steam, with board for four marks a day. The +meals were _echt Deutsch_. Breakfast was set ready on the dining-room +table at some unearthly hour, and the guests went in and helped +themselves when they chose. The coffee and hot milk were kept warm over +little alcohol flames, and there were delicious Berlin rolls and the +best of unsalted butter. Dinner was at two, and was good in its plain +way. We had some North German dishes which one had to learn to enjoy, +like olives. Hot chocolate soup I grew quite fond of, but beer soup, +sorrel soup, and cabbage soup with cherries in it were never exactly +intimates of mine. One dish of baked ham with dumplings and hot plum jam +sounds strange, but improves on acquaintance; _Pumpernickel_, and +_Schmierkaese_ are better than their names, and _Kartoffelpuffen mit +Preisselbeeren_ (potato cakes with cranberries) are delicious. We had +good plain puddings and black coffee for dessert every day, and quite +wonderful roast Pomeranian goose and _Eistorte_ with whipped cream on +Sundays. Supper was at eight, and the menu was certainly a model for the +simple life. Bread and butter with slices of sausage and cold ham, +sometimes big dishes of roast chestnuts instead of cold meat, or +potatoes in their jackets, or some of the endless variety of +North-German cheeses--to drink, tea or beer, and that was all. + +My fellow pensionnaires were nearly all teachers, or students preparing +to be teachers. They all spoke German and nothing but German, and, at +first, I used to think my mind would drown in the overwhelming floods of +it that assailed my ears. Gradually it came to sound like individual +words and phrases, and soon I dared occasionally to launch a small +conversational barque upon it, avoiding the disastrous rocks of gender +as skilfully as possible, though often at first, by the time that my +genders and cases were all arranged for a sentence, the subject had +changed, and I could not use it. We had a Fräulein Lanz, Fräulein Franz, +and Fräulein Kranz, four or five other Fräuleins and no males at all. + +Another American student of singing came to live there, and in the +evening we used to go to the opera or to concerts together. Everything +begins early in Berlin, and those who had tickets for some entertainment +missed the eight o'clock supper. So plates of _belegte Broedchen_ (rolls +with cold meat) would be set out for them on the dining-table, and all +the others would be sitting there with their needle-work, and would +demand "_Nun, wie war es?_" when we came in. On Saturdays the evening +paper announced the program at the opera for the week, and we could +hardly wait to look at it. The cheaper seats are in great demand. +Students wait for hours, sometimes from earliest dawn, outside the box +office on Sunday mornings when the sale for the week begins. We had an +arrangement with the keeper of a little fruit and vegetable shop, to +save ourselves the wait. We would decide what we wished to see and go +over to his shop on Saturday evening to order the seats from him. He +then went down early enough to secure the front row in the top gallery +for us at two marks fifty, and we paid him twelve cents for his trouble. +Sixty-two cents is quite a high price in comparison to those of the rest +of the Opera House, for the orchestra chairs cost only eight marks. The +top gallery is vast, and the back rows are much cheaper, but the +authorities show their sense in keeping up the price of the front rows +and I don't think there is ever an empty seat there. To concerts we were +often admitted free, on saying that we were students, unless the artist +was a great favourite, and in that case we could buy standing room, or +seats in the gallery for one mark. We always went and came home in the +street cars, paying the two cent fare with a one cent tip to the +conductor, and dressing in our ordinary street clothes, with scarves +over our hair. I used to go alone sometimes, and was never spoken to or +molested in any way. No one looked at you twice, unless you looked at +him three times. + +On Sundays I would take a day off, and, in true German fashion, make an +expedition; in bad weather to some museum or picture gallery, in Autumn +or Spring to some out-of-door restaurant. Sometimes I was too tired to +go further than the _Tiergarten_. Then I would stroll gently across it +and have coffee and cakes at the _Zelt_, or big open-air refreshment +gardens where the band plays. They are the resort of _hoi polloi_ of +Berlin in countless family groups: the father rather fat with hirsute +adornments, the mother also rather massive, and their plump children, +all drinking beer out of tall glasses and mugs, or coffee in inch-thick +white cups, and eating wedges of highly decorated _Torte_, with or +without the addition of heaped-up whipped cream. + +If I felt more strenuous, I would take a car out to the Grunewald, a +villa-colony suburb, with roads winding through pine woods. I would sit +under the trees and invite my soul. As I sat there, some girl or boy's +school would come trooping by, singing a _Volkslied_ of interminable +verses, in four parts, having tramped all day for the pure joy of motion +in the open air. Then I would have coffee and a triangle of cherry pie, +and what cherry pie! at the _Hundekehle_, an immense restaurant on the +border of a small lake, accommodating I don't know how many fat +Prussians at once with refreshments. Every German town has some such +resort, where inexpensive creature comforts are the reward of a long +walk. Such an expedition of the whole family is their greatest treat, +and one in which they have the sense to indulge as often as possible. +Even on week day afternoons the housewives find time for a stroll, a +reviving cup of coffee, and a little gossip, though of course that is +not the same thing as going _en masse_ with Hans and the Kinder. Of +course, this was long before the war. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +MY FIRST OPERATIC CONTRACT SIGNED + + +By the first of December I had broken the back of the German +declensions, understood a good part of an ordinary conversation, and had +painfully acquired three or four rôles in German. The gadfly of my +ambition began to torment me again, and I determined to look for a +"job." + +Students often ask me "How did you get your first engagement?" This is +how. I went to see the best agent in Berlin, Herr Harder, a man of the +highest reputation for fair dealing, who was the recognized head of his +profession. Opinion as to the agent's powers of usefulness is divided +among singers. Some maintain that they have made all their good +engagements independently, others tell you that you are safe only in the +hands of a reputable agent. I have closed contracts in both ways. The +agent is not omnipotent. It is his business to watch the operatic field +and notify you when there is a vacancy that he thinks would suit you. He +is apt to know first where such vacancies are likely to occur. Directors +who are looking for singers sometimes go straight to their favourite +agent. Then he, the agent, sends you word that Herr Direktor So and So +will be at his Bureau on such a day to hear singers. When you respond, +you may find yourself the only contralto among many other voices, or you +may find yourself one of six or seven all wanting the same engagement. +The agent keeps contract blanks in his office, and when he hears of a +vacancy in an opera house, he fills in a blank with your name, the name +of the theatre, and tentatively the salary he thinks they will pay, and +sends it to you. You sign it if it suits you, and return it to the +agent. This is really nothing more than a notification that there is, or +will be, such a vacancy, and is not worth the paper it is written on. +American girls, who do not understand this, will tell you that they have +"been offered Berlin, or Vienna, or Munich," when they have merely +received one of these _Agenten-Verträge_. A contract is worth nothing as +such, until it is countersigned by the director of the opera house, and +yourself as singer. Even then, it is not valid until you have sung as +many "trial performances" at the opera house as the contract calls for, +and for which you may have to wait six months. + +I told Herr Harder what I wanted--a chance to do big rôles somewhere, +salary no particular object, as I should look upon the experience as the +completion of my training. I sang for him, left with him my repertoire +and photographs, and he promised to let me know of the first opportunity +that presented itself. In a short time, he sent for me to come and see +the Director of the Theater des Westens, a Berlin theatre which at that +time was the home of a sort of popular opera. I sang for the manager, +and he was very complimentary. He offered to engage me at once, but he +added, curiously enough, that I was too good for him! They gave only the +older operas like "Trovatore," on which the copyright had expired, and +of these only the ones which the Hofoper did not give, so that I should +have no chance to sing my big parts. At the same time, he said he would +very much like to have me. The offer did not suit my plans, and I +decided to refuse it. I went on with my work until just before +Christmas, when Herr Harder made me a second proposal. This was the +position of first contralto in the garrison town of Metz in +Alsace-Lorraine. The opera was a municipal one, that is it was +subsidized by the town, they played a season of seven months, and gave a +large repertoire including some of the Ring dramas. I was to go down +there, sing for the management, and if they liked me, begin my +engagement the following September, giving me time to make additions to +my German repertoire. As I was a beginner of course I could not give the +usual guest performances. + +_Vorsingen_ is a trying ordeal. The great theatres have regular days for +hearing aspirants, but this was a small theatre. The appointment is +usually made on the stage, sometimes during, sometimes just after a +rehearsal. Groups of the singers regularly engaged in the opera house +stand in the wings, and you feel a nameless hostility emanating from all +of them, especially from the one whom you are going to try to supplant. +The theatre is like a cavern, and the acoustic is of course totally +unknown to you. Two or three pale spots down in the orchestra chairs +indicate the whereabouts of the director and perhaps the stage manager +and first Kapellmeister who have come to hear you. The overhead +"rehearsal lights" are very unbecoming and you are quite conscious of +it. If you are to sing with orchestra, the conductor presents you to the +players, "_Meine Herren, Fräulein----._" You bow, and your insides slip +a few inches lower. My first _Vorsingen_ was with the piano. It stood at +one side of the stage, and a whipper-snapper of a third Kapellmeister +dashed more or less accurately into the prelude of the second aria from +"Samson et Dalila." + +Then came a momentous interview in the Director's office. I had sung +such good German, thanks to Frau----, that he had no idea that I +understood only about three words in five of what he said. For form's +sake he kept saying, "_Sie verstehen mich, Fräulein?_" and when I +answered "_Ja_," he was satisfied. His wife, who thought she spoke +English, was present, and tried to say a great deal, but my German +proved the more serviceable of the two. I gathered that I was offered a +two season contract, to sing the leading contralto parts, at the +princely salary of 150 marks a month! (about $35). There was no +_Spielgelt_. Salaries are usually divided into so much per month down, +and so much per performance, the number of performances per month +guaranteed; that is, one is paid for a certain number whether one sings +them or not, and any performances over and above this number are paid +extra. If a performance is lost by one's own fault, through illness for +example, the _Spielgelt_ for that performance is forfeited. Three days +absence from the cast through illness, even though one may be scheduled +to sing only once during those days, is counted as one _Spielgelt_. + +Illness is, in fact, almost a crime. In addition to losing your money, +you have to have witnesses to prove that you are really ill, for theatre +directors in Germany are a suspicious lot and take nothing for granted. +If you wake on the morning of a performance with laryngitis, that dread +enemy of the voice, or if you fall downstairs on your way to the theatre +and sprain your ankle, you must notify the theatre before a certain +hour in the day, perhaps ten or twelve, or four o'clock, that you cannot +sing that night. Your word for it alone won't do. Every theatre has +special doctors on its list, and you must call in one of these, whether +he is your regular physician or not. He makes an examination and gives +you a signed statement that you are unable to appear, adding, if the +disorder be serious, how many days it will be in his opinion, before you +can return to work. It often happens that the man most experienced in +treating your illness, the best throat specialist in town, for example, +is not on the books as "Theater-Arzt," and then if you wish to be +treated by him, you sometimes have trouble with the theatre doctor. In +the theatre in which I was first engaged, I had a disagreeable +experience of this kind. I was ill with bronchitis, and sent word to the +theatre the day before, that I should not be able to sing _Marta_, in +"Faust," on the night scheduled for it. I had already committed the +deadly crime of illness once before that season, and this time my +defection was particularly annoying to the management because they had +to get a guest for "Faust" anyway, and they would be forced to send +posthaste for another to sing the _Nurse_. Their irritation with me was +equalled, if not surpassed, by that of the regular theatre doctor, whose +professional honour had been outraged the last time by my insistence +upon the services of a very clever throat specialist who lived in the +town, and whose aid I had had the bad taste to prefer to his own. +Between them, I was the corn between the upper and nether millstone. +Next day the theatre sent word that they would accept nothing but a +certificate from their own doctor, and the doctor shortly after appeared +at my bedside. I could hardly speak out loud, but managed to whisper a +request that he would write me an "_Attest_" for three days. To my +surprise he began to hem and haw, and finally stammered out: "There is +really no reason in my opinion, why you shouldn't sing this evening!" I +was so furious I saw red. I sat up in bed, and whispered savagely: + +"You say I can sing tonight! Very well, get out of my room, and I'll go +to the theatre and sing this evening, with my voice in this condition, +and _you_ will be responsible for the consequences!" He got up, twisting +his hat in his hands, and stammering something. I simply fixed my eyes +on him, and fairly glared him out of the room. Then I dressed like a +hurricane and rushed to the director's office. + +"I have come to sing _Marta_," I announced hoarsely. + +"Oh! _liebes Fräulein_----" began the director, positively scared by my +pale face and furious eyes, "_Of course_ we don't want you to sing when +you are so hoarse. Doctor---- was quite mistaken; please go home and +take care of yourself. We'll get a guest for the _Nurse_ at once!" + +"Very well," I said, "I will go home if you say so; but remember +Doctor---- says I can sing, and I am ready to do so on his +responsibility." + +I went back after my illness to see the director, who to my surprise +began to attack me violently about my absence. He stormed, and thumped +the desk, and would listen to nothing I said. I tried to tell him he had +no right to speak to me in that way, as I had really been ill, and had +always done my duty when well. He raved back that I had _not_ done my +duty, and it seemed to me so futile to argue, that I walked out without +answering and left him raving. I went home and stayed there for five +days, and at the end of that time the director sent his secretary "to +explain" and ask me to return to my duty. It was an awkward interview +for him, poor man, so I let him off easily, graciously accepted the +somewhat disguised apology, and, as I was quite recovered and eager to +sing again, signified my willingness to appear the following night. + +To return to my first contract.--There was a formidable list of rôles +which I must agree to have ready, and the director also insisted on my +studying with a certain well-known woman teacher in Berlin! I conveyed +to him as well as I could, that I would settle all this with my agent, +as I had no intention of agreeing to all of it, and was afraid to trust +my German to say so diplomatically. He added, "Of course you are too +good for us, Fräulein." This was the second time I had been told I was +too good for an engagement. Every one seemed to think I ought to aim at +a secondary position in one of the big opera houses, rather than a +leading one in a smaller place. The prospect of singing pages or +confidants in a capital city, with perhaps one good rôle in a season, +did not meet my needs at all; but no one seemed to sympathize with my +ideas. I wanted to make a career in Germany, as if I were a German +singer, having my own recognized place in the opera house in which I was +engaged, singing the big rôles by right, without intriguing or fighting +for them. + +On returning to Berlin, I wrote to Herr Harder that I would learn a +certain specified number of rôles in addition to those I already knew, +making about twelve in all, and ignored the singing-teacher proposition +altogether as I had formed the intention of going to coach with Jean de +Reszke. On these terms the contract was returned to me signed by the +director, and I was engaged. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +MY ONE LONE IMPROPOSITION + + +"When I make my début" was the phrase that I had heard so often on the +lips of my American fellow students. Each one had chosen her opera +house, and decided in which rôle she would dazzle a clamouring public. +Sometimes one more modest would choose Monte Carlo in preference to +Paris, or if she intended to make a career in Germany, she might +hesitate between the rival merits of Dresden and Berlin. But that the +theatre should be one of the half-dozen leading ones in the world, and +the rôle her favourite, were foregone conclusions before she left +America. + +In this respect, I quite shattered the tradition of the prima donna, for +I sang my first part in a small provincial German opera house, at +twenty-four hours' notice, and it was one of those which I have least +pleasure in singing. I remember that a well-known American writer, +living in Paris, said patronizingly to my mother à propos of my first +appearance, "Let us hope that she will make a real début later, for +this can hardly be called one, can it?" "Well, after all," answered +my mother, "who knows where most of the great singers of today made +their débuts?" + +[Illustration: I CARMEN AS I USED TO DRESS IT] + +Contemporary fiction is full of opera singing heroines who jump into +fame in a single night, like Minerva springing full armed from the head +of Jupiter. Well, perhaps some of them do so--but I have never met a +singer, even of the highest international reputation, who has not had +some dark checkers of disappointment in his career. All his clouds may +have had silver linings, but sometimes the silver gets mighty tarnished +before he succeeds in struggling through the cloud, and sometimes +another singer gets through first and steals the silver outright. I +cannot say that I have ever been in great danger morally on the stage, +but my courage, my nerve, has been sometimes severely threatened, and I +have needed to summon the most dogged determination to keep it from +failing altogether. I feel sure that all successful singers share my +experience in greater or less degree, especially those who have been +trained in foreign countries. Not all of them, by any means, have been +through as severe a school as mine; few American singers at any rate, +have made a career in a foreign country exactly as if they had been a +native of it. Many have been engaged for special rôles in one of the +larger opera houses, and after several years of experience, have sung +but a few parts, all of which have been those most suited to them. I +have sung, on the contrary, the entire repertoire of a typical German +opera house, where operas are regularly given of which the Metropolitan +audience has never even heard. + +In my first season, I sang in all fifteen different rôles in the first +seven months of my career. I have appeared in eighty-five, ranging from +the Wagner music dramas to the "Merry Widow" and singing many of the +rôles in three different languages. It has been "the strenuous life" in +its severest form, but I do not regret any of it, nor feel that my +effort has been wasted, for I know that I understand my _métier_, +comprehensively and in detail, and nothing can take away the +satisfaction of that. + +The beginning of the season found my sister and myself in the town of +Metz, as according to contract we had arrived six days before the +opening. The weather was hot and dusty, and the town seemed deserted, +for the regiments which gave it life and colour was still away at the +Autumn manoeuvres. We felt very forlorn at first, strangers in a +strange land with a vengeance, and without the least idea of what the +immediate future might hold for us. My German had improved considerably +since my interview with the director, but my sister did not know one +word. Luckily for her there was almost as much French spoken in the +town as German. There were many shops of absolutely French character, +where she was treated with great consideration as coming from Paris. +Even the officials of the town, the post office employés, custom +officers, and others with whom she came in contact, though rather deaf +in their French ear, would make shift to understand her if necessary, +adding an extra touch of rigidity to their already sufficiently severe +manner, in order to nip any "French familiarity" in the bud. + +We went to the hotel that had been recommended to us, as the principal +one in the town was in the process of reconstruction and swarmed with +plasterers and carpenters. It was rather a dreadful place, with enormous +dark rooms, dingily furnished with heavy old-fashioned furniture; but it +was very near the theatre and as we meant to find lodgings later, we +tried not to be depressed by its gloominess. + +Of course, the first thing we did was to visit the theatre. To reach it +one crossed a bridge over the river, picturesquely bordered with old +overhanging houses, then a cobblestone "Platz," and there, rather shabby +but still quite imposing, it stood. On the way I read my name for the +first time on a German poster, with a distinct thrill. I knew my way to +the stage-entrance, and through it to the Direktor's Bureau, where +several shocks awaited me. I learned that the man who had engaged me +had been superseded by a new one, who had not yet arrived. Matters were +in charge of the stage manager, a huge, towering creature, with a great +bass voice, who was a rather remarkable actor. He had come down in the +world, having begun life as a cavalry officer, and he had strange gleams +of the gentleman about him, even then. He was, by the way, the one man +in the profession who ever made me a questionable offer. He grew to +admire me very much as time went on, and one day, after I had been there +some time, he asked me to sign a further contract with the theatre. + +"You'll never get anything very much better," he said, "as you are a +foreigner. We'll make a good contract with you, and perhaps, later--who +knows?--you may have a 'protection salary.'" + +He paused to see the effect of his proposal, and was met with absolute +non-comprehension on my part, as I really did not understand, at the +time, the German words he was using. He dropped his proposal there and +then, and the affair had no unpleasant consequences for me, as he never +referred to it again. And that is the single instance of that sort which +I have encountered. Nevertheless, I might possibly have had further +trouble with him, for my appearance really seemed to appeal to him very +much, later in the winter. Just before Christmas, however, he died, +almost overnight, as we were in the midst of rushing a production of +"Trompeter von Säkkingen." He had informed me on Friday night that I +should have to sing the _Countess_ on the following Tuesday. I did not +know a word of it, and was on the way on Saturday morning to get the +score, when I heard that he was dangerously ill--and by Sunday morning +he was dead. Poor man! he had some good qualities and real talents, but +it turned out that he was a great scoundrel and had been robbing the +direction left and right, under the pretence of assisting the new +director. + +This new director, who had never even heard my voice, had been a +well-known Wagnerian singer in his day and intended to take some of the +principal baritone rôles in his new position, to the intense disgust of +the regular _Heldenbariton_. All the outstanding contracts had been +taken over in his name. This sudden change of management, during +vacation time, made a little trouble for me as it happened. None of the +present staff had heard me sing. They knew only that I was a foreigner +without experience, heard that my conversational German was not yet +perfect (a much rarer accomplishment than a perfect accent in singing), +and therefore doubted my ability to do the work of the first contralto. +So they had engaged a native, which meant that it was "up to me" to +prove myself capable at the first opportunity or lose the chance of +doing first rôles or perhaps be dismissed altogether. + +Our hotel was impossible for a long stay, and, of course, after my +Berlin experience, my first idea was a good German pension. We went to +the _Verkehrsverein_--the Information Bureau which is a feature of all +German towns, and asked for a pension address. The man in charge shook +his head. There was only one such place, he said, and he feared that it +would not suit us, but we might go and see. We went accordingly, and +found a nice-enough looking house in the newest quarter, quite the other +side of the town from the theatre. The inside of the house, however, +told its own story--concrete floors, whitewashed walls with garish +religious prints on them, and deal furniture with red and white table +covers much in evidence. The bedrooms were cell-like and garnished with +mottoes, while a Bible and candlestick by each bedside were the only +other decorations. + +"What is this institution?" we asked. + +"It is the German Young Ladies Evangelical Home, for Protestants only," +we were told. + +We thanked the Matron, and decided that we were neither German, +Evangelical nor young enough for such a home, even though we might be +ladies and Protestants. + +Disappointed in our hope of finding a pension, we returned to our +friend of the Information Bureau, this time to ask for addresses of +furnished rooms with a decent landlady to attend to them for us. He +shook his head once more--it was very difficult in a garrison town, he +said, to be certain of the character of a house which had furnished +rooms to let. + +"But where do the artists of the theatres usually live?" we asked. + +"Oh! they either take furnished rooms, or bring their own furniture," he +answered, "or live in the smaller hotels. But then they are Germans and +used to judging in such cases. There is, however, an English lady living +here who knows the town thoroughly, and you had better go to her and get +her to find rooms for you." + +As we felt that we could not possibly ask a totally unknown Englishwoman +to find lodgings for us, my sister set out on the hunt alone. As a +foreigner speaking no German, and a woman looking for rooms all by +herself, she was received in a very curious manner by most of the +landladies she visited, and evidently looked upon with strong suspicion. +We were getting desperate, as the time of my début was coming nearer and +nearer and we were still unsettled. Finally we resolved to throw +ourselves upon the mercy of the unknown Englishwoman after all, and +wrote her a note begging her assistance in finding two furnished rooms +near the theatre, with a _Hausfrau_ who would look after them and serve +our breakfast. We had to find a furnished apartment as we were not like +some of my colleagues who possess their own furniture and pass their +lives in a sort of singing journey through the country, always +surrounded by their own household goods. + +[Illustration: CARMEN AS I NOW DRESS IT] + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +THE MAKINGS OF A SMALL MUNICIPAL OPERA HOUSE + + +Early the next morning, before we were up, our English friend kindly +came to see us, and with her help we soon discovered just what we were +looking for, in an eminently respectable house, where the _Hausfrau_ was +the wife of a policeman, so that we were under the shadow of the majesty +of the law. + +A young doctor had the rooms, but she assured us that he was moving +immediately, and that we might send our trunks the following day. We +duly arrived the next afternoon with an avalanche of baggage and found +that the poor young man had had no intention of leaving before the end +of the month and had even invited guests for that very evening! Floods +of German ensued between him and the _Hausfrau_, while we sat +philosophically on our trunks in the hall and waited. Presently she +emerged, rather heated of countenance, to say that it was all arranged, +and to begin moving our things into the bedroom. The doctor called us +into the sitting-room, waived aside our explanations and thanks for his +gallantry, and shutting all the doors mysteriously, proceeded to the +only revenge in his power--to defame the character and impugn the +honesty of our future hostess. + +"Keep things locked, I warn you, keep them locked!" he repeated +earnestly, all the while cramming books, bottles and garments +promiscuously into a trunk. + +We made allowances for his need of reprisal, and took his warning with a +grain of salt; and as a matter of fact our landlady never touched +anything of ours except what she doubtless considered her proper +"commission" levied upon our coal and kerosene. She was quite +satisfactory on the whole, except that she _would_ quarrel very noisily +with her policeman from time to time, or rather he with her. When we +remonstrated and said that we could not stand it and that she shouldn't, +she answered that she would be only too glad to get out of her bargain, +but that she had put her money into this marriage and therefore had to +stay in it! + +Her small boy was named Karl, but she always called him "Schweinsche'." +She had a few wisps of greyish drab hair wound round a sort of +steering-wheel of celluloid in the back. On Christmas my sister hunted +for hours for a present for her, and finally returned with a +magnificent set of rhinestone-set haircombs. I have always wondered what +the poor woman did with them, as her hair could not have covered an +eighth of their prongs. + +The reason for the summary dismissal of her former tenant was, of +course, the extra money that she made out of our being foreigners who +did not know the tariff, and the fact that there were two of us to be +served. We paid sixty marks, fifteen dollars, a month for the rooms, +service and breakfast of coffee and rolls, and little as this seems, I +don't suppose the doctor had paid a penny over forty. Our colleagues +thought us spendthrifts and gullible foreigners, as they paid about +thirty marks and got their own breakfast. + +My sister had two chafing dishes on which she cooked our supper, but the +two o'clock dinner was a problem. I was too tired after the strenuous +morning rehearsals beginning at ten o'clock, and the strain of trying to +follow all the directions I received in German, to go to the Hotels or +restaurants for dinner, as most of my colleagues did. Our landlady +suggested that she should have it fetched from the officers' mess of the +crack cavalry regiment, whose barracks were near by. She said this was a +usual arrangement. We bought a sort of tier of enamelled dishes, fitting +into each other and carried in a kind of wickerwork handle. One +contained soup, the next meat, the third vegetable, while bread or +dessert reposed in the top. We can testify that even crack regiments are +not unduly pampered in the Fatherland, for anything plainer, or more +unappetizing than these dinners, I have never tried to eat. Perhaps they +gained something when served hot in the officers' _Casino_, but we found +it almost impossible to down them, eaten out of our enamel-ware dishes. +After a time, when the newness of everything in the theatre had worn off +a little, and I began "to feel my feet," we arranged to dine at the +hotel where many of the colleagues met daily. This was a far better +plan, as, in addition to a really hot meal, we had a splendid +opportunity to improve our German. I was naturally making rapid progress +in it, but my sister still had to confine herself to the shops where +they understood French. One day when I came home from rehearsal, she +told me that our _Hausfrau_ had repeated to her a long piece of gossip +in German. Seeing by my sister's face that she had not understood, the +woman said, "Oh, you don't understand, Fräulein. Well, I'll say it all +over again in French." Then she proceeded to repeat it again, very +loudly and slowly--in German! + +Of course it is rather dreadful to be called just "Fräulein" by your +landlady in Germany, but the social standing of the singers and players +in a provincial theatre is usually not high enough to warrant anything +else. A position in an opera house in a capital city, or in a +Hoftheater, confers social importance enough upon its holder to entitle +her to the prefix _gnädiges_ (gracious) before the ignominious +_Fräulein_, which in society is properly used to designate only a +governess, a companion, or a saleswoman in a shop. + +Titles and forms of address are a ticklish subject in the Fatherland, at +any time. It is hard to comprehend the mazes of male progression from +the simple "Rat," through the subsequent variations of Hofrat (court +councillor), Geheimer Hofrat (privy court councillor), Geheimrat (privy +councillor), Wirklicher Geheimrat (really truly privy councillor), to +the lofty dignity of Excellenz. + +Old-fashioned ladies used to employ the feminized version of their +husband's titles, and I once knew an old dame who insisted upon being +addressed as "_Frau Oberlandgerichtsräthin_." The bourgeoisie used to +copy the aristocracy in this respect, and at the afternoon +Kaffeeklatsch, Frau Hofcondittor Meyer would inquire about the health of +Herr Strassenbahnsinspektor Braun, from his wife the Frau +Strassenbahnsinspektorin (street car inspectoress). Modern life is too +crowded perhaps for such lengthy addresses, but Frau Meyer and Herr +Braun are certainly less picturesque cognomens. Among the artistocracy +the proper titles and forms of address have many pitfalls for the +foreigner, though I used to dodge them fairly successfully by addressing +every woman older than myself as "_Gnädige Frau_" irrespective of her +"handle," and the men by no title at all, except in the case of a prince +not of royal blood, who has to be called by the mouth-filling courtesy +title of _Durchlaucht_. + +Of course in letter-writing this way round is not always possible, and +here the complications are simply terrifying. The salutation of a lady +without any title at all ranges all the way from "Wertes Fräulein" +(Worthy Miss), almost an insult to a person of any gentility, to the +punctilious "Hochvereherte und gnädige Frau" (Highly honoured and +gracious lady) of high society. Even the envelope provides a subtle form +of insult or of flattery. In Germany one is simply born, well-born, +highly well-born, or high born as the case may be. If you are rightly +entitled to the third, how irritating to be publicly branded on the +outside of a letter as only well-born. On the other hand, if you really +belong among the merely born, what a delicate attention to be +acknowledged "_Hochwohlgeborene_" for all the world, including the +_Portier's Frau_ to see! Shops in writing to you (as long as your credit +is good) love to employ the latter on the envelope, repeat it in the +body of the letter which always begins "Highly honoured and gracious +Miss" and sign themselves "Mit Vorzüglicher Hochachtung"--"with +magnificent respect." Friends, of course, call you just Fräulein +So-and-so, as we should say "Miss Brown," except if they are young men, +when they usually stick to the "gracious Miss." You must never inquire +for the members of a person's family without the Mr., Mrs., or Miss +being added: "How is your Frau Mother, Herr Father, or Fräulein Sister?" +There is a curious phrase for parents--"How are your _Herren_ Parents?" +being the strictly correct form of question. + +Yes! Etiquette is very complicated in Germany and requires a great deal +of study from the "Out-lander." + +To return to the theatre--we expected that my sister would have the run +of my dressing-room, and that she might be present at the rehearsals. We +found on the contrary that the most rigorous rules were enforced to +forbid entrance to the theatre to any one not a regular member of the +staff. No one else was allowed to pass the porter's lodge. There were +regular dressers provided by the theatre, and my sister was present only +once or twice at rehearsals during my two seasons in Metz and then only +by special request. + +The rehearsals for the next day were posted at the stage door. They were +not printed or typed, but written in German script, with chalk on the +blackboard. They would be placed there at six o'clock every evening, and +my sister used to go over to find out for me what they were. She could +not read German script at all, neither could I, very well; so she used +to take paper and pencil and laboriously draw everything on the board, +chorus calls and all, for fear of missing something. Then, letter by +letter, we would puzzle it out, and find out the hours of my rehearsals, +as if they had been written in cipher. She was always present at my +performances. + +I had to write, "I beg in the most polite manner for a seat for my +sister for this evening's performance," and drop it into a special box +before half past eleven in the morning. Then in the evening, if there +were a vacant place in the orchestra chairs, she would have it. On +Sundays the house was often _ausverkauft_, sold out, so we generally +bought a seat if I were singing on that night, so as to be on the safe +side. The prices ranged from four marks for box seats, to five cents in +the gallery. The orchestra chairs cost three marks (75 cents), but +nearly every one had an _Abonnement_, or sort of season ticket, which +made them much cheaper. The rates for officers were very low indeed. The +chief cavalry regiments had the boxes between them, and the less +important lieutenants of the infantry or the despised engineers had +seats in the first balcony. Years ago, in the old unregenerate days, +these boxes full of young cavalrymen furnished almost more entertainment +than the stage. The boxes had curtains to be drawn at will, and the +young rascals would order champagne served to them there, and drink +toasts loudly to their favourite singers in the midst of their +performances. Some of the frail fair ones of the town would visit them +behind the drawn curtains, and there were high times generally. This has +all come to an end, gone the road of other equally charming old customs, +and I saw very little misbehaviour among the lieutenants, except +sometimes when the provocation was really too strong for them. One +evening a very solemn young White Dragoon, over six feet tall, coming in +in the half darkness after the curtain was up, missed his chair and +plumped down, sabre and all, on the floor of the box instead, to the joy +of his comrades; and once in a Christmas pantomime, they all forgot +their military dignity at the spectacle of a very fat young chorus girl, +whom bad judgment on the part of the ballet mistress had costumed most +realistically for the part of a white rabbit. + +Sunday is usually chosen for the first night, as a larger proportion of +the inhabitants is at liberty on that day. At our theatre, performances +of opera were given on Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday nights, with +plays or _Possen mit Gesang_ (farces with singing) on alternate nights. +The bill changed every night, but each standard opera was repeated three +or four times in the season. New operettas like the "Merry Widow" were +also produced, and, if successful, ran eight or ten times during the +seven months of the season. There was a company of singers consisting of +a "high dramatic" soprano, a "young dramatic," a coloratura, and an +"opera soubrette," all sopranos. There was a leading contralto, a second +contralto to do the very small parts, who was usually a volunteer +without pay, and a "comic old woman," who also took part in the plays. +There was sometimes another volunteer soprano to do pages and the like. +Then there was the "heroic tenor," who is a sort of King and is treated +by the management with some of the ceremony used toward royalty, and the +lyric tenor, quite humble in comparison, and a tenor-buffo for "funny +parts," with sometimes a special operetta tenor when the theatre was +prospering. There were two baritones, "heroic" and "lyric," a "serious" +and a "comic" bass, and one or two other men of more or less anomalous +position who "fill in" and act in the plays. The only singers who never +did anything but sing, were the two "dramatic" sopranos, the first +contralto, and the heroic tenor and baritone. There was a company of +actors besides and all of these, no matter what their standing, were +expected to appear in such operas as "Tannhäuser" in the singing +contest, in the church scene of "Lohengrin," and as _Flora's_ guests in +"Traviata," to help "dress the stage." + +It is not the least of one's troubles as a beginner to stand on the +stage as _Ortrud_, perhaps, and see these supercilious real actresses +come filing out dressed as court beauties, cynically watching your +attempt at acting. + +Actors have their proper range of parts, called _Fach_ in Germany, and +special designations like the singers. The chief of them are the +_Jugendlicher Held_ or Young Hero, corresponding to the Heroic Tenor, +and his partner the _Erste Heldin_. Nearly as important, however, are +the _Erster Liebhaber_, or Young Lover, and the _Jugendliche Liebhaberin +und Erste Salondame_--Young Lovehaveress and First Drawingroom Lady. +There are the _Helden Vater_ and _Heldin Mutter_, the _Intrigant_ or +Villain, and the _Bon Vivant_ (pronounced Bong Vivong) who is a sort of +general good fellow and occasional hero. The _Erster Komiker_ is always +a popular figure with the public and has his subordinate funnyman, +usually much younger. There is a soubrette to do the saucy maid parts, +a _Naive_, what we should call Ingenue, and a _Komische Alte_, or funny +old woman; several "drawingroom ladies" and "gentlemen" and minor +"_Chargen Spieler_" or character actors. The small parts are usually +filled by chorus men and women, and the opera soubrette or the operetta +tenor, have to double and do the cheeky maids or giggly school girls and +giddy young officers in the plays. Many of the minor actors were, or +were assumed to be, sufficiently musical to take small parts in operas +requiring a large cast, appearing as _Telramund's_ four nobles, and as +_Meister_ in the first act of "Meistersingers" or as competitors in the +_Preissingen_ in "Tannhäuser." The opera gains very much by having these +experienced actors in the small rôles. + +Our chorus was composed of about thirty members, and the orchestra of +from forty to fifty, reinforced in the brass and wind instruments from +the local military bands. Three Kapellmeisters held sway over them: the +First Kapellmeister an autocrat with arbitrary power who directed the +important operas, the second who lead the old stagers like "Martha" and +"Trovatore" and the operettas, and the third who was usually a volunteer +learning his profession, and who acted as répétiteur for the soloists +and directed pantomimes, the songs in the farces, and "Haensel und +Gretel" once a year if he was good. He was always on duty during +performances to direct any music behind the scenes. In good theatres +there are several of these young men, as in "Rheingold" for example each +Rhine daughter ought to have one to herself, and there is a special +répétiteur for the chorus or chorus master besides. + +Our ballet was composed of a solo dancer and about sixteen coryphées, +directed by a _Balletmeisterin_ who also shared the leading parts with +the solo dancer. One of the girls,--Irene, was a big handsome creature +who usually danced the boy's parts. She had a little girl of about six, +who had apparently no father. During the second year I was told one day: +"This is Irene's wedding day; will you say something to her?" It +appeared she and her clown husband had been devoted to each other for +years, but had neglected the ceremony as they neither of them could earn +enough alone to support the two. The clown ("August," of course) could +not find an engagement in the theatre and so they had just waited. He +had just returned from a long world tour and now they were to be +married. Every one was delighted. + +Last but not least, came the supers, called in Germany _Statisten_, who +held spears in "Aida" and returned victorious in "Faust." They were +drawn from the infantry regiments and received thirty pfennigs (7-1/2c) +a night. They arrived with their _Unteroffizier_ an hour before they +were wanted and were turned into a big room to be made into warriors, +captives, or happy peasantry. The result was sometimes amusing. In +"Aida" they used to put on their pink cotton tights over their +underwear, so that one saw the dark outline of socks and the garters +gleaming through, and they all kept on their elastic-sided military +boots, with the tabs to pull them on by, sticking out before and behind. +Fortunately the audience had but a brief glimpse of them before they +were ranked in a conglomerate mass at the back of the stage. Sometimes +on our walks we would meet these men on sentry duty, or in batches with +their _Unteroffizier_, who would call out, "_Au-gen rechts!"_ (Eyes +right!) and give us the officers' salute with mighty grins of +recognition. + +The principals of the opera are usually talented young singers on the +way up, or older singers of some reputation on the way down, with +perhaps a sprinkling of those who have obtained their engagements by +influence. The contracts are usually for from two to three years, and +are not very often renewed. The talented ones go on to better +engagements, and it is "better business" for the theatre to have a +change of principals. Great favourites remain longer unless they get +something better. Many of those who were engaged with me in Metz have +made careers. Two were at the Charlottenburg Opera House in Berlin at +the outbreak of the war, and one in Hamburg, both in leading positions. +One was a stage-manager at the Volksoper in Vienna, and one teacher in a +conservatory. + + + + +CHAPTER X + +MY DÉBUT AND BREAKING INTO HARNESS + + +I had to sing _Azucena_, my first part on any stage, without rehearsal. +The reason for this dawned upon me afterwards. Though I sang German well +by this time, my conversational powers still left something to be +desired. I have explained that the present director had never heard my +voice; no one knew of what I was capable, and they quite expected that I +would prove incompetent, and had engaged a native born contralto to +provide for this contingency. + +When I heard one evening, that I should have to sing _Azucena_ on the +next, I confess that something rather like panic assailed me for a few +minutes. The stage manager called me onto the stage, and spent half an +hour in showing me the entrances and exits, and giving me the merest +outline of the positions. That is all the preparation I had for my +so-called début. The other members of the cast had sung the opera +together many times the year before, which made the performance +possible. The lyric tenor was a decent enough colleague, though an +absolute peasant in behaviour, with an extraordinary high voice which +was rapidly degenerating from misuse. The baritone was of the tried and +true type, and a great favourite, and the soprano was easy to get on +with. They were all nice enough to me, if somewhat uninterested and +indifferent, for I had had as yet so little to do with them that we +hardly knew each other. They thought me a rich dilettante at that time I +fancy. I was so horribly nervous all that day that I fainted whenever I +tried to stand up, and when I began to sing my sister did not recognize +my voice. However, I was very well received indeed, all the criticisms +the next day were favourable, and there was no question after that as to +who should sing the leading rôles. + +It was fortunate for me that I succeeded in pulling myself together +sufficiently to make a success, as at that time the old system of +_Kündigung_ was still in force. I have said that a contract was not +valid until the singer had successfully completed the number of guest +performances stated therein. I had not been called upon for these +_Gastspiele_ because I was a beginner, but they are almost invariably +included in the contract. Now-a-days your engagement is settled after +you have successfully made these trial appearances, and you then remain +in that engagement for a full season; and the management must let you +know before February first (sometimes January first) whether you are to +be re-engaged or not. This is in order to give the singer time to make +arrangements for the coming season. When I was engaged in Metz the +management of a theatre had the right to dismiss any singer after three +weeks, whether he had made his guest appearances beforehand or not, if +he had failed in that time to make good with the public. He was also +liable to dismissal after his first appearance, if he proved quite +impossible. This was what they were expecting in my case. The +arrangement was most unfair to the poor singer, leaving him stranded +(with practically no chance of work that year) after he had moved all +his possessions and thought himself established for the season. The big +artists' society, the _Genossenschaft_, which is the only protective +institution for singers in Germany, has at last succeeded in abolishing +this unjust condition of affairs. There was a flagrant case of this kind +in the theatre during the first three weeks of my engagement. The "high +dramatic" soprano had finished the first three weeks of her engagement, +during which she had had to learn two new parts, providing costumes, at +her own expense, for a rôle which she had not expected to have to sing. +She had had a fair success and thought herself secure. In the meantime, +the management had had no idea of keeping her on permanently, but had +merely engaged her to fill in the time, while they were waiting for +another singer, who was filling an out-of-season engagement elsewhere, +and could not report for three weeks. When she was free, they told the +first one that she had not pleased sufficiently and dismissed her. The +good theatres did not take advantage of this privilege of course, even +while it still existed. + +My second rôle was a very small one, one of the court ladies of "Les +Huguenots." A native first contralto would probably not have been asked +to do such a small part, but there being no regular part for my voice in +the opera, I think they were glad to use my good stage appearance, and +of course, as a beginner I made no protest, being glad of every chance +to become more used to the stage. The part was sprung upon me suddenly, +and I had no dress for it. The second contralto also had a court lady to +do, and the good creature offered to lend me a gorgeous Elizabethan +dress of white satin and silver (which, she told me, she also intended +to wear as _Amneris_!) and she would "go in black." I was touched, but I +could not deprive her of her splendour, so we arranged something out of +the pointed pink bodice of one of my other gowns, and the long white +skirt of a summer dress, with a ladder arrangement of pink velvet bands +sewn on up the front. + +I remember as I made my entrance, looking up suddenly and seeing the +sinister eyes of Carlhof the stage manager, fixed on me from the wings. +He proceeded to mock my walk, which was no doubt very American, and not +that of a court lady at all. I never forgot the mental jolt it gave me +and the sudden realization that every rôle should have a different walk. + +The range of parts that one is called upon to perform is astonishing. +Formerly the limits of a _Fach_ (line of parts) were more rigidly +observed than at present, when the personality of a singer in relation +to a rôle is more often taken into consideration. Still, if a rôle +definitely belongs to the _Fach_ of a certain singer, he is supposed to +have first right to it. Difficulties arise in apportioning the parts in +very modern operas, whose composers seem no longer disposed to write +definitely for a coloratura soprano or a serious bass, but mix up the +voice range and styles of singing indiscriminately in one part. My +second real part was _Fricka_ in "Walkuere," in which I had a great +success vocally, but unfortunately looked a great deal younger than the +portly _Brünnhilde_ and far more like her daughter than her stepmother. +Then came the _Third Lady_ in "Magic Flute," the _Third Grace_ in +"Tannhäuser," _Martha_ in "Faust," _Orlofsky_ in "Fledermaus," _Frau +Reich_ in the "Merry Wives of Windsor," the _Gräfin_ in "Trompeter von +Säkkingen," _Pamela_ in "Fra Diavolo," _Witch_ in "Haensel und Gretel"; +and finally "Carmen." All these before Christmas of my first year. I did +not have one of them on my repertoire when I arrived in Metz, except +_Fricka_ and _Carmen_, and the latter in French. + +The three graces in "Tannhäuser" were done by the beauties of the +theatre, two premières danseuses and myself! We were to dress in white +Greek draperies with jewels, and of course, as we were to be seductive, +pink roses. I wore my beautiful _Bergcrystal_ necklace, made for me in +Paris. The ladies could not contain their jealousy and said of course, +"aufgedonnert" (thundered out) like that I naturally would stand out +from them. Annoyed at their pettiness I removed the diamonds and flowers +and all ornaments. They then said of course to go without any ornaments +was palpably the best way of all to make myself conspicuous. So I let it +go at that. + +I well remember the _Third Lady_, for there are spoken passages in this +opera, and I had to speak German for the first time before an audience +of critically listening natives, and Mozartian German at that! _Pamela_ +nearly gave me nervous prostration. They were determined that I should +do it because she had to speak German with an English accent, so they +said it was made for me. As a matter of fact, after the months I had +spent in carefully eradicating my English accent it was difficult +suddenly to exaggerate it to order. I had to learn, rehearse and play +the entire part in five days, and I thought I should go mad. I had never +seen the wretched thing, so the baritone who played my husband kindly +came over to help me with the business. Otherwise my sister and I hardly +left the piano to eat and sleep. The dialect part of the libretto was in +an ancient manuscript copy, torn, marked and dog's-eared, and written in +an almost illegible German script. I could not take time enough to +puzzle it out, so my sister spent hours poring over it, deciphering the +German letters literally one by one by aid of a key, and writing it +again in Latin script. I had no clothes for it, as it was not on my +repertoire and it plays in 1820, but they costumed it for me in modern +dress, so again my summer wardrobe was called into service. + +I learned it so quickly that the colleagues called me "Die +Notenfresserin" or note-eater, but the strain was awful. I remember when +I was studying _Pamela_ the Kapellmeister told me at least ten times, +how the contralto who played the _Pamela_ in his father's theatre and +who was also an English-speaking woman, had so caught his father's fancy +in that rôle, that from then on he had a tremendous affair with her. +This he repeated to me again and again, but I never seemed to take the +hint. + +As _Erda_ in "Siegfried" I had a most trying experience. The director +had been, as I have said, a well-known Bayreuth singer, and he thought +no one could sing Wagner but himself. Unfortunately he had a strong +tendency to "look upon the wine," and when he had a part to sing +nervousness attacked him to such an extent that he began drinking in +self-defence to enable him to stand the strain. Perhaps his beverages +were more potent than usual, but that night he was decidedly +irresponsible. He struggled through the _Wanderer's_ first scene, and +conscious that he was doing it badly, he sent out for a bottle of +champagne as a bracer. The consequence was that in our scene in the +third act, he was utterly incapacitated. He sang all kinds of things not +in the text, bits from _Hunding_ in "Walkuere," from _Daland_ in +"Hollaender," from "Fidelio." He rolled about the stage and lurched in +my direction with his spear pointed at me, shouting _Pogner's_ advice to +_Eva_ while I was singing _Erda's_ responses. It seemed to go on for +ages, but at last _Siegfried_, waiting for his cue in the wings, +realized that he must save the scene, entered and escorted his befuddled +relation from the stage. I had made up with a creamy white grease paint +and no red. My sister said, "Why did you make up with rouge and not +have the pallor we agreed upon?" My cheeks were so scarlet from +mortification that no grease paint would have paled them. + +The audience took it splendidly, I must confess, and refrained from any +expression of disapproval or joy--though it _must_ have been funny! The +next day there were announcements in all the papers that he had had a +temporary lapse of memory owing to grief over the sudden death of his +mother, who, as the stage manager cynically informed us, had reached out +a hand from the grave to save her son, she having been dead for ten +years! The director went to Berlin and stayed there for weeks. We +afterwards learned that it was a plot, deliberately planned and put +through by Carlhof to gain the direction of the theatre. I can see him +now stalking around, six foot four, chewing his rag of a dyed moustache, +his face pale and his eyes glittering with anxiety as to the success of +his plan to encourage the director to drink. The director once told me +the hours between the last meal and the time to go to one's dressing +room to begin making up are the dangerous ones. He said, "First one +takes a glass of wine to steady one's shaking nerves; later a glass is +not enough so it becomes a bottle, then two bottles and so on till +control is lost." It is easy for any singer to understand, and the best +remedy is to omit that first glass. + +"Carmen" was the second opera which I had to do without rehearsal. The +soprano had failed in it and it was promised to me to keep if I could do +it _ohne probe_ (without rehearsal). I sang it for the first time, +quaking with nerves, on Christmas Day, and my nick-name after that was +"Die schoene Carmen." After Christmas we produced the "Merry Widow" +which was new then, and I was cast for the _Dutiful Wife_. There was +plenty of variety in my work. I would sing _Carmen_ on Sunday, +_Orlofsky_ in "Fledermaus" on Tuesday, speaking German with a Russian +accent, _Pamela_ on Thursday night with an English accent, and _Frau +Reich_ on Friday night with no accent at all! I dressed _Frau Reich_ in +a gown of the time of Henry V while the rest of the cast "went +Shakespearean." We were far too busy for dress rehearsals of an old +opera, and I supposed of course that it would be costumed in the real +period of the play. When I appeared on the stage, they all demanded "And +what, pray, are _you_ supposed to represent?" "I am playing +Shakespeare's _Frau Reich_," I answered with dignity--"and I am the only +person on the stage who is properly dressed." But you have to know your +colleagues well before you can make an answer like that successfully, +without their hating you for it. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +SOME STAGE DELIGHTS + + +We had also what is known as _Abstecher_, on off nights. That is, +performances in a neighbouring and still smaller town about once a +month. We would travel altogether, taking our costumes and make-up with +us, principals second class and chorus third. Our fare was paid, and the +generous management allowed us two marks apiece (50c) extra for +expenses! As we left at five P.M. returning at one or two in the +morning, this allowance was not excessive for food alone, but the +thrifty took black bread and sausage with them, and expended only +fifteen pfennigs (3-1/2c) for beer. Our _Abstecher_ was a village with a +cavalry barracks, a railroad station, and not much else. The theatre was +built over a sort of warehouse and stable combined, and we fell over +bales and packing cases at the entrance. The dressing rooms were tiny +boxes, with a shelf, one gas light in a wire globe, and a red-hot stove +in each room, and no window. We dressed three in a room. The stage was +so small that once, as _Nancy_, I played a whole scene with the tail of +my train caught in the door by which I had entered, and never knew it! +We were always given a rapturous welcome. Sometimes one of the +principals would miss the train and be forced to come on by a later one, +and then the sequence of scenes in the opera would be changed quite +regardless of the plot, for we would play all the scenes, in which he +did not appear, first, and do his afterwards. After the opening chorus, +the soprano would go on for her aria, and while she was singing it, we +would decide what to give next. "I'll do my aria!" "Oh no! Not the two +arias together!" "Let's have the duet from the third act, and then the +soprano and tenor can just come in casually and we'll do the big +quartet, and then you can do your aria!" We would see the audience +hunting in a confused sort of way through their libretto, with +expressions rather like Bill the Lizard. This happened once in the +"Merry Wives," which is confusing at best. + +After the performance there was no place in which to wait but the café +of the station. I was looked upon as recklessly extravagant because I +would order a _Wiener Schnitzel mit Salat_ for sixty pfennigs (15¢) and +when I took two cents' worth of butter too, they would raise their +eyebrows and murmur, "_Diese Amerikaner!_" Sometimes the Director came +with us, and then the principals would be invited to his table and +treated to (German) champagne. But we were always glad when he stayed at +home, because we were much freer over our beer. There are always one or +two members of the company who are extremely amusing, and their antics, +imitations and reminiscences make the time fly. There was one little +chap, the son of a Rabbi, who lived on nothing a day and found himself, +and was an extraordinary mimic. His imitations of a director engaging +singers, the shy one, the bold one, the beginner; and his marvellous +take-off of the members of the company kept us in roars of laughter. He +could imitate anything--a horse, a worn-out piano--and is now one of the +most successful "entertainers" in Berlin. The ones in whose compartment +he travelled on the train thought themselves lucky and often arrived so +hoarse from laughing that they could hardly sing. + +All this experience is invaluable for the beginner, his +self-consciousness melts like snow in July, and it gives him, as nothing +else can, that poise and authority on the stage which are almost as +important as the voice itself. But the work, especially for a foreigner, +is killing. It is not so much the performances themselves, great as the +strain of these actually is, but the constant, never-ceasing learning by +heart, and the drag of continuous rehearsing. The "room rehearsals" of +the music alone, take place, in a theatre of this kind, in one of the +dressing rooms where there is a piano. The room is almost always small +and very close, and there are eight or ten people packed into it, all +singing hard and exhausting the little air there is. The stage +rehearsals with the almost invariable and inevitable shouting and +excitement are very trying to the nerves, especially when one is making +two or three débuts a week, that is, singing a new part for the first +time almost every other night as I did, at the beginning of my career. +The better the theatre, of course, the greater the smoothness and lack +of confusion at stage rehearsals. The singers and orchestra men are more +experienced, and more competent, and the manners of the Kapellmeister +improve in ratio to the importance of the opera house. A little extra +excitement is permissible when a new production is being put on, but at +the rehearsals of repetitions undue exhibitions of "temperament" on +either side are discouraged, and the powers that be have to mind their +manners and stick to the conventional forms of address. The +_Heldentenor_ may sometimes have to allow his artistic nature to get the +better of him for a moment, but no one else may claim such license. + +The stage during rehearsals is like a workshop--a certain amount of +noise and confusion is necessitated by the labour going on in it, but +no one has time to spare from his share of the job in hand, and the +discipline in a good theatre is remarkable. The native German is +trained, of course, both to give and take orders well, the result of the +whole system of government, both of the family and of the nation. Stage +etiquette and the relationship between principals and chorus, _erste und +zweite Kräfte_ (principals of first and second rank) singers and the +management, grows more conventional and regulated according to the class +of the theatre. Those in authority may exact perfect obedience, but they +must ask for it properly; and while an individual is entitled to proper +consideration, he must never forget that he is but a unit of the whole. + +The dressing-room arrangements in Metz were rather primitive. The +theatre was 100 years old, for one thing, and no one had ever had the +money to install new conveniences. In a good German theatre, the +dressing rooms are rarely used for rehearsing, and the principals dress +alone, at least when they have a big rôle to sing. In Metz I shared my +room with several other women and had only a corner of it which I could +call my own. Long shelves with lockers under them ran down two sides of +the room, with lights over them at intervals, and under every light a +singer "made up." There was a long glass at one end of the room, but we +had to provide individual mirrors for ourselves. There was no running +water, only a couple of jugs and basins stood in one corner of the +shelf. Good routined dressers were provided by the theatre. Mine was an +Alsatian who loved to speak French with me, but whom I discouraged as I +wanted all the practise I could get in German. She used to call me +"Fräulein Miss"--pronouncing the latter like the German word _miess_ +which means mediocre, but she meant to be particularly respectful. I +have always found that it pays a hundred fold to make friends of the +dressers, stage-doorkeeper, property-man, carpenter, head scene-shifter, +fireman and all the other workers whose co-operation is necessary for a +good _ensemble_. It is usually quite easy to be on good terms with them, +and they have unlimited opportunities for making things go smoothly for +you, or the reverse. + +Women's costumes are not kept in the theatre; as they are the personal +property of the singer they must be kept at home, and be sent over to +the theatre on the morning of a performance. A _Korbträger_ (basket +carrier) is usually provided to whom you give from 75 cents to $1.00 a +month, and who performs this service for you--but many singers send +their maids. With the usual discrimination against our sex, men's +costumes are provided in opera houses of all grades. In the largest +theatres the women's are furnished also, and you even have to have +special permission to wear your own. + +The scenery and costumes in Metz were often surprisingly good when one +considered that so few "sets" must do such varied things. Our property +man was an inventive genius at making something out of nothing. He +prided himself upon certain realistic details. If the piece called for +coffee, the real article, though of some dreadful variety unknown to +contemporary culinary science, was provided, and really poured into the +cups. If a meal were to be served on the stage, some sort of real food +was there for the actors to eat, even if it were only slices of bread +served elaborately as the most _recherché_ French supper, though usually +it was ladyfingers. Eating scenes are usually confined to the drama, +though there are some operas in which a meal "comes before" as the +Germans say. In the "Merry Wives of Windsor" for example, the scene +containing _Anna's_ letter aria opens with the company at supper in +_Frau Reich's_ home. The wives are explaining their tricks and plotting +_Falstaff's_ final discomfiture in spoken dialogue. One night when I was +singing _Frau Reich_ in Metz there was a particularly attractive dish of +real apples on the stage supper table. The _Herr Reich_ was the serious +bass, a thrifty individual who couldn't bear to let a penny's worth of +anything escape him. As his guests rose to go he picked up the dish of +apples and pressed it upon them. + +"Here," he improvised, "take these home to the children. Oh! You have no +children--well, take them anyway--the children will come later." + +His hospitable wishes were received with bewilderment by the audience, +but as he made his exit with his guests and immediately began to eat the +apples, he bore his scolding from the _régisseur_ very philosophically. +On some stages where the provisions are more elaborate, the actors in +certain plays make a regular practise of eating their suppers on the +stage. In "Divorçons" for example or in the "Anatol Cyclus" of +Schnitzler. + +Our property man in Metz, with the historic Shakespearean name of +Mondenschein, (Moonshine) was an ardent lover of drapery. An +artistocratic interior, to his mind, must be entirely filled with as +many different materials as possible, all hanging in folds. He had three +pairs of near-silk portières, bright pink, dull green, and pale yellow, +and the combinations that he made with those six curtains were endless. +Garlands of roses, too, were a great resource of his--draped round a +couch with a fur rug upon it, and a red light over all, they transformed +the scene into the bower of a Messalina. In a white light festooned +upon a mantel-piece, or above a doorway, they could be depended upon to +supply the appropriate setting of the _Erste Naive's_ most appealing +scene. The young lovehaveress and first salon lady, had to receive them, +wired together into a bunch, with the same delightful surprise, and put +them into the same Japanese jar without any water in it, in play after +play. But the property man always squandered a perfectly new, uncreased +piece of paper for every performance with which to make a cornucopia for +them, in the approved German style. He was quite a specialist in such +matters as the colour of telegrams in different countries, and in the +manner of folding newspapers, points which are sometimes neglected in +many better theatres. Of course his talents in this direction had a +better chance in the dramatic than in the operatic productions. + +It is a curious thing to note in this connection, how archaic the +arrangement of such details remains in operatic performances even on the +best stages. How in "Carmen" for example, the singers must pretend to +drink to _Escamillo_ out of perfectly dry tin cups, instead of using +real wine and glasses, as a quite second-rate dramatic company would do. +How _Butterfly_ and _Suzuki_ are never given real tea to serve to the +_Consul_ or _Yamadori_. Or how the girls in "Thais" bring up their +water-jars out of the well with the outsides quite dry. + +Of course in theatres of the Metz class matters of costuming are +simplified, and historical accuracy is not one of the aims. For example, +everything before Christ is done in fur rugs and winged helmets for the +men, and flannel nightgowns and long hair for the women. Any period up +to the thirteenth century is costumed in mantles and gowns of furniture +brocade, after that it is _Alt-deutsch_ (old German), or _Spanisch_ +(Shakespearean--mostly black velvet and jet or white satin and silver), +until it turns safely into _Rococo_, which means white wigs. After that +it is all _Modern_, and even the chorus has to supply its own modern +clothes. The men principals have their historical costumes, with the +exception of wigs, tights, and shoes, supplied to them, but the women +must have their own. The collection of men's clothes in an old theatre +is sometimes quite remarkable, some of the suits of a hundred years ago +being actually of the period. + +They retain the smells of the period also, many of them; for in a +theatre like that of Metz I don't believe the men's clothes were ever +cleaned. Things which have been worn several times a week for seven +months a year during the past hundred years, accumulate a richness and +variety of odours which must be sniffed to be appreciated--a very +ancient and fish-like smell indeed. I often wished at Metz that I had no +use of my nose, and I have wished it many times since. As _Amneris_, to +force your way for the entrance in the triumph scene, through an +Egyptian populace composed of German Infantrymen, is a squeamish +business at best; but when they are attired in clothes that haven't been +washed for years, it is a feat before which any one may quail, +especially if he belongs to the number of unfortunates, unluckily far +from rare among singers, whose stomach nerves are affected in any case +when they have a big part before them. + +Washing was not any too popular in Metz even among the principals. I +have dressed with leading women whose arms showed streaks of white where +the water had run down as they washed their hands, stopping +conscientiously at the wrists. Their make-up would be removed with the +same dirty rag night after night during the whole season; and their +personal garments under more or less smart outer raiment, had often done +overlong service. I must hasten to say, however, that this state of +affairs was the exception rather than the rule, and that in better +theatres, the women principals were always scrupulously cleanly. + +Over ornamentation or fineness in undergarments is usually looked upon +as rather questionable, among the solid middle classes in Germany. My +mother had made me a dainty supply of be-ribboned linen, and I was told +after I had been in Metz for some time, that at first, the Alsatian +woman who dressed me reported me to be "_beaucoup trop soignée de ne pas +avoir un amant_." However, she changed her mind later on, and put it +down to American extravagance--always a safe play. Some of the men were +much more careless than the women. Our operetta tenor played the whole +season in the same shirt, powdering the bosom freshly each evening with +a yellowish powder which he used for his face. + +At Carnival time, some of the Schauspieler remained for three days in +the clothes in which they had played on Saturday night, never going to +bed, or even removing their make-up till the fun came to an end early +Wednesday morning. + +Many of the older members dyed their hair, as it had begun to turn grey. +Of course they did not have it done by competent people, or nearly often +enough, and the shades of rusty brown, green, or purple it assumed were +quite startling. Our first Kapellmeister used to dye his hair a rich +black. He was a good-looking man and very vain. He was also portly and +easily became over-heated. Of course when this happened, the +perspiration running down his neck was dyed black too, and he would be +intensely worried for fear we should see it. We knew his sensitiveness, +and took delight in sitting directly behind him at the piano, though he +would urge, beg, and finally command us to sit beside him. He was +kindhearted in his way, and I remember one instance of this. The stage +manager, in a vile humour, had come storming into the midst of a room +rehearsal one day, with some trivial complaint against me, and had +succeeded in making me cry, not a difficult matter at that time as I was +always in a state of nerve strain owing to continuous over-fatigue. The +Kapellmeister did his best to comfort me, telling me not to mind, +praising my work, and finally pressing upon me his huge, brand new silk +handkerchief--a real sacrifice, as he had probably intended to use it +for days! His fingertips used to split in the cold weather from much +piano pounding and I won his heart by prescribing collodion for them. He +continually praised my sight reading and quickness in learning and it +was he who gave me the nick-name of "Notenfresserin." + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +MISPLACED MOISTURE AND THE STORY OF A COURT-LADY + + +The Bohemian, Hungarian and Croatian singers nearly always add to one's +joy in work by eating garlic. The "high dramatic" soprano in my next +engagement was from Croatia. The first time I went to Prague to sing, on +alighting from the train I sniffed a strangely familiar odour. The +impression of familiarity grew stronger and stronger as I drove to the +hotel--but I couldn't place it. At last it came to me--the whole town +smelled like our soprano! I have often wished, while on the stage, for +temporary atrophy of the senses. In addition to the fustiness of much +worn clothes and infrequent bathing, you really have all kinds of +horrors to endure. + +Some terrible creatures with a passion for distinct enunciation and with +unfortunate dental formation, spray you copiously when uttering words +like _Mutter_ or _Freude_. This always seems to happen in some +impassioned scene when you simply can't get away from them, and have +absolutely no defence. Others have painfully hot and wet, or painfully +cold and wet hands with which they persistently paw you. I remember one +lyric tenor who was my bugbear because he had hands like a fresh, cold +fish. The soprano and I had a scene with him in one opera, in which she +had to say, "_Die Hand, so weich, so warm_" (the hand, so soft, so +warm), speaking of his clammy member. I dared her one night, to say +instead, "_Die Hand, so feucht, so kalt_" (The hand, so moist, so cold), +and when it came to the point, sure enough she did so, her voice so +shaky with suppressed laughter, that it came out in a tremulous +pianissimo. We both had to turn away from the front in silent +convulsions, but not a soul in the house was the wiser. + +This is a horrible subject and I might enlarge upon it endlessly, +recalling for example, the pleasures of being folded in the embrace of a +large, warm, damp tenor smelling at best of onions; or still worse the +large drops which rain upon you during the most touching love scene from +his manly brow, while you, though shuddering with disgust, daren't try +to dodge them, or even change the wistfully adoring expression of your +countenance. It may be honest sweat, but it is a demned moist unpleasant +kind of honesty in my opinion. Goritz told me that he once, as +_Kurwenal_, in the last act of "Tristan," dripped on a prostrate +_Tristan's_ eye so long that the poor tenor was blind for days after. +This is German efficiency! + +Some of the colleagues at Metz were a great contrast to others in their +scrupulous care of their personal appearance. The lyric baritone, a +youngster from the Rhineland making his début in opera, attracted me at +the very first rehearsal by his groomed look and beautifully manicured +finger-nails. He came from quite ordinary people, and had been brought +up to be a "Tapizierer," curtain hanger, upholsterer, etc. He had never +met any Americans before and we grew to like him very much, and used to +let him go for walks with us, and come to us for tea. He was always +wanting to _tapizieren_ for us and criticizing the hang of the curtains, +etc., in our rooms. We taught him to play Canfield, more to keep him +from talking than for any other reason, for my sister and I used to play +patience for hours, so that we should not be tempted to talk when I was +resting my voice in the brief intervals between rehearsals and +performances. We used to play with pretty little German patience cards +in a pocket size, and he was simply infatuated with the game. He showed +all his friends how to play, and dozens of packs of these cards were +imported from Frankfort where they are made. + +The craze spread rapidly; all the officers began to play in their +Casinos, and the principals in the theatre were always being roared at +for keeping the stage waiting during rehearsals, when they missed their +cues by being absorbed in the game of Canfield. It became the great +resource of those who had small parts in the first act of an opera, and +then had to wait in costume and make-up until the very end like the +_Meister_ in "Meistersinger," or _Mary_ in "Fliegender Holländer" who +has a seemingly interminable wait after her one scene at the beginning +of the second act, until at the very last of the third she has to rush +in for the single phrase "_Senta, Senta, wass willst du tun?_" + +In return for our tea, the little baritone would tell us amusing tales +of his experiences in a cavalry regiment while doing his military +service. His high spirits and his beautiful voice made him popular with +officers and men, but he was quite unamenable to discipline, and had +spent something like ninety days in prison during his first year, for +such offences as refusing to stop singing on the march, or for cheeking +an officer. He used to call us his goddesses, and speak to us as +"Fräuleinchen." Our rooms, through him, were the starting place of new +culinary ideas in Metz. We taught him to make and like such American +delicacies as salted almonds, chocolate fudge, and hot chocolate +sauce for ice cream, an unheard of combination. We tried to make him +like fruit salad with mayonnaise; but the mixture of sweet with oil and +vinegar was too much for his burgher palate, and he used to quote to us +the Bavarian proverb, "_Was der Bauer net kennt frisst er net._" (What +the peasant doesn't know he doesn't eat.) + +[Illustration: AMNERIS AS I USED TO DRESS IT] + +The country round Metz is rarely beautiful, in its half-French, +half-German character. It retains its typical French poplars, planted in +long lines, which turn pure gold in autumn. A placid river, the Moselle, +runs between hills covered with orchards and vineyards, with picturesque +villages of grey stone and red tiling, piled steeply up their sides. The +meadows in the fall are filled with lavender crocuses--the kind that +Meredith's Diana got up at four A.M. to gather. Every village has of +course its "Gasthaus," some still absolutely French in the arrangement +of their marble topped tables, mirrors, and red upholstered benches +running round three sides of the room. We have drunk coffee in autumn, +and _Maibowle_ in spring in every one of them, I think. I dare say many +of them are still using the same card board circles under their +customers' beer-glasses which we marked with our initials. Can you flip +them from the edge of the table into your own hand? + +The town of Metz itself is interesting enough, and we explored it +thoroughly. It is very ancient ground indeed, and there are Roman walls +still to be seen, with characteristically beautiful brick-work; old +chapels, a Gothic cathedral, and the remains of the mediaeval wall and +moat which once surrounded the town, with great arched fortified gates +at its east and west entrances. + +On returning once from a long walk with the little baritone we entered +by the eastern gate, and as he was doing a small part that evening, and +it was getting unpleasantly near the hour of the performance, we took a +short cut through an unfamiliar part of the town. We soon found +ourselves in a narrow street of respectable enough looking houses, but +as we passed, out of nearly every window on both sides, a female head +was thrust, all in varying degrees of frowsiness, and remarks and +comments in half unintelligible dialect were yelled at us with shrieks +of hideous laughter. Our little escort grew purple with confusion, +walking faster and faster, and when we reached an open square he broke +into the most fervent apologies for unwittingly leading us into such a +street. It was a curious and unpleasant little experience and reminded +me of certain quarters in oriental cities of which I had heard tales. We +named it "the street of queer women" and avoided the eastern gateway in +our walks thereafter. + +Later in the season another colleague sometimes joined our tea parties +and walking expeditions. This was an immensely talented youth, attached +to the theatre in an anomalous position of third Kapellmeister, in +reality a volunteer without pay, hoping to pick up an occasional chance +to gain experience in conducting an orchestra. He was a Frenchman of +excellent family who had studied in one of the great conservatories and +thought he spoke the German language. Such German I have never heard +before or since. His French inability to aspirate an "h," a pronounced +stutter, and the most nonchalant disregard of gender, formed a +combination which was enough to upset the gravity of a German customs +house official himself! It was his business among other things, to +"_einstudieren_" the new members of the chorus in any opera which they +did not know, but of course his version of their language rendered any +authority he might have had over them quite ineffectual, and his +position was anything but enviable. At the same time he was a really +magnificent pianist, a composer of promise, and a thorough musician; but +if ever a creature was out of his element he was that creature as +Kapellmeister in Metz. And yet what is a young fellow in his position to +do? The desire to conduct, the longing to interpret the great masters +through the medium of an orchestra, possessed him to the point of +obsession; but where to find an orchestra to conduct was a problem. The +barrier "no experience" was erected across his path as it had been +across mine, though he must serve an apprenticeship somewhere. + +The musical life of Germany attracted him for the same reasons as it had +attracted me, and so he endured a veritable martyrdom in the pursuance +of his dream. He was a pupil of Nikisch and told us Nikisch had told him +he made half his career with his cuffs. Whoever has watched him shoot +them gently out as he begins to conduct will know what he meant. + +Our rooms were a sort of haven for this boy, I think, where he could +talk of the things that absorbed him in a language that was his servant +instead of his master. In return he would play so gorgeously for us, +that our little upright piano rocked under the strain. He could suggest +a whole orchestra in his playing. Strauss' "Salome" was brand new then +and he revelled in it, and adopted the motif of _Jochanaan_ as a signal +which he and the baritone would whistle under our windows. Sometimes he +would get lost at the piano and play for hours, till our supper time was +past, and our good friend Emma Seebold, the "_Hoch Dramatische_," would +rush in and urge us to hurry and get ready for some mythical dinner to +which we were invited. This was always successful, owing to Seebold's +talent. + +We grew very fond of her and often spent our evenings together. She had +a lovely voice and would put her head back on her chair sometimes in the +evening and sing us languorous Austrian peasant songs with her +fascinating Viennese accent. Her passion was remnants, and she would +send home boxes of scraps of passementerie and odds and ends of silk +trimmings which she would sew all over her costumes. The richness she +saw in it was pathetic. Bargain gloves were also irresistible, and she +had green ones and purple ones, spotted and mildewed ones, and loved +them all because they were cheap. + +The pianist and the baritone often met at our rooms and got on +surprisingly well considering their utter lack of points of contact and +the natural contempt that they felt for each other. The Frenchman was +certainly mildly crazy. He believed that his astral body, or psychic +envelope, or something was visible as an aura of light around his hand, +and he would hold it up and look at it and say, "_Ah, oui, elle est +là--je vais bien aujourd'hui_," or shake his head and say, "_Non, pas là +aujourd'hui--je ne suis rien!_" He was good looking, bearing a strong +resemblance to the portraits of Oscar Wilde. He dressed well, and his +washing bills--amounting as we were told, with bated breath, to ten and +fifteen marks a week--were the scandal of the theatre! Since those days +he has gone back to his piano, though he persevered in the theatre long +enough to obtain a second Kapellmeister position in a good opera house. +I have met him casually all over Europe, and he is one of the very few +of the old _Kollegen_ from Metz whom I have ever seen again. + +These three were the only ones that season whom we cared about, though +we were friendly enough with all of them after Christmas, and as I have +said, we dined at the hotel with a group of them every day. They were +all types in their way. First the director--a survival of the old +school, with rather long dyed hair and enormous dyed moustache, always +in _Gehrock_ (frock coat) with a large tie in which reposed a royal +monogram in pearls and diamonds presented to him by the Hereditary Grand +Duke of Glumphenbergen-Schlimmerheim or something, during his career as +_Heldenbariton_. In the street he wore a soft black felt hat which would +have done for the _Wanderer_ in "Siegfried," and of course a fur-lined +coat whenever the weather gave the least excuse for one. Champagne was +his universal panacea--his very present help in trouble. If he had a +disagreement with a singer for any cause and wished to make it right +again, he would always send a bottle of _Sekt_ if it were a woman, or +present the money to buy one if it were a man. He had been a famous +singer in his day, and known others far more so, and his reminiscences +could be interesting enough. His stories of Bayreuth under the old +régime, were really interesting, with the prescribed position of every +finger, every gesture studied to an inch, every tone closed, opened, +coloured according to strictest rule, every syllable enunciated with +minutest care, and the effect of all this schooling on the singer--the +strained and broken nerves, the wrecked voices that were the result of +it. Diction--_Aussprache_--was naturally enough his hobby, but his ideas +were absurdly exaggerated and caused much more or less hidden amusement +among the _Personal_. He insisted, for example, upon so much "t" in a +phrase like Mignon's "_Dahin, dahin, moecht ich mit dir_," that it +sounded like "_Moecht tich mit tier_." Anything of that sort among +colleagues is looked upon as a tremendous joke, especially when it is on +the director. + +One result of his former glory was that famous people came to this +theatre to _gastieren_ and it also seemed to us as if every former +singer or actor in Germany of any pretension to fame, who had a son or +daughter to launch in either profession, sent them to our director for a +début. This was looked upon by us as a bore; but the famous guests were +rather amusing, because when they had gone, the director used to relate +all kinds of derogatory stories about them. Possart---- Ritter, Ernst +von---- was perhaps the most renowned. He came to recite Manfred at a +special performance with our soloists and chorus. The director told us +how, during the most impassioned speeches of Goethe or Shakespeare his +eye would be on the upper gallery, counting empty places, and how after +the performance when the box office sheet showed an _ausverkauftes Haus_ +he would demand, "What about those three empty seats in the second row +of the top gallery, at the left?" + +He told a similar tale of a famous Austrian guest-artist, the leading +Teutonic exponent of his day of the negative side in the never-ending +argument of stage technique "to feel or not to feel." He had mechanical +as well as histrionic genius, and his dramatic art had become so +mechanical too, towards the end of his career, that he could utilize +such places in his great parts as Hamlet's soliloquy for thinking out +scientific puzzles, although his power over the emotions of his audience +never lost its effect. + +[Illustration: AMNERIS AS I NOW DRESS IT] + +The director's own story was a real romance. While still on the upward +side of the hill of fame, he had met and loved the wife of a nobleman, +the scion of an ancient house. She had been maid-of-honour at the most +exclusive court in Europe, the confidante of the royal family, and +was said to know the true story of many of the mysterious incidents in +court history. In fact she was supposed to have been married off +hurriedly to her much older husband to get her away from the royal +circle of whose secrets she knew altogether too many. The infatuation of +the singer for the lady was mutual, and in course of time a boy was born +to them, who reached the age of six years before the noble husband +consented to divorce his wife, or rather, I think, his lawyers consented +for him, as by that time dissipation had quite softened whatever brain +he may have had to begin with. This mental condition of his gave her the +care of their children, and in Metz their youngest son, their daughter a +girl of about twenty, and the director's little boy all lived together. +At holiday times another of her sons, a most charming young fellow, a +lieutenant in a crack cavalry regiment, used to visit them too. She +invited my sister and me to meet him, and the whole family often +attended the opera together. He liked me in several rôles and used to +send me wonderful flowers. I still have a huge green bowl which he sent +me filled with violets, in return for the photograph for which he had +begged. He was an example of the most elegant type of young officer, the +aristocrat of _Uradlige Familie_, fair, with delicate features; his six +feet of slimness, with long slender limbs and very little body, clothed +in his glove-fitting uniform. He had the fashionable three creases +across the front of his smart Hussar jacket where his tummy should have +been. His poor little story turned into tragedy. He contracted +consumption and did not tell his people, but used their influence to get +himself transferred to German West Africa, on the plea of wanting to see +service. Arrived there, he quietly shot himself one evening as the +easiest way out of a life that promised him nothing but misery. A sort +of malignant fate seemed to pursue the children of that first marriage, +for the charming young daughter also came to a sudden and most tragic +end, as I shall tell later on. + +The director's wife was very nice to us. She often invited us to visit +her although we did so but seldom. Her rooms were filled with relics of +her former life--portraits of herself as lady-in-waiting to the Empress +of Austria, in court dress, portraits of her Empress, old photographs of +groups on terraces and at castle gates, almost every person in them a +"personage." She herself still wore her hair as her Empress had done, in +a coronet of narrow braids set round her head. She said that they were +sewn together with the same coloured silk as the hair every morning +after being braided, to make them stand up. With us she always played +the _grande dame_, apparently quite without effort, but there were +stories about her which seemed to show that she could be something very +different. + +She certainly could talk most interestingly of her former grandeur. One +of her tales was of a lady of the court who owned the smallest dog that +any one had ever seen. It was so tiny that she used to carry it, when in +evening dress, in the front of her décolletage. One night at dinner as +she leaned forward to eat her soup, the dog fell into the plate. There +was vermicelli in the soup, and before she could fish it out of this +entanglement, the poor little thing was drowned! Another time the Frau +Direktor showed us a photograph of a very slim and shapely young dragoon +in full regalia, cloak and all, holding a letter up to hide his face. As +there was evidently a story we begged her to tell it to us. She said +that there had been a certain young married Countess of the court, who +was known as a great prude and was always boasting of her exaggerated +wifely devotion. Her airs became, said the Frau Direktor, quite +insufferable, and so she herself resolved to put such armour-plate +virtue to the test. At Carnival time, therefore, she dressed herself as +a young officer for a ball at which the _Hofgesellschaft_ was to be +present, and a very dashing figure she made, according to the picture. +In this disguise she then proceeded to give the Countess the rush of her +life. The gallant pursued the virtuous Countess all the evening, and +was rewarded by being asked to escort her ladyship to her home. In the +carriage the "Lieutenant's" attentions became still more pressing, when +to his secret dismay, the fair creature suddenly melted entirely, cast +herself into his arms, and swore she adored him. Arrived at her house, +the "Lieutenant" beat a hasty retreat vowing all sorts of things for +their next meeting, which naturally never took place. But the vanished +Lieutenant did not resemble the gentlemen of Virginia who kiss and never +tell, for the Countess' share in the story leaked out, and her +reputation for unassailable devotion was irreparably damaged, to the +great satisfaction of all her acquaintance. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +HUMAN PASSIONS AND SMALLPOX + + +At the beginning of the season, the director's family was still in the +country, where they remained until the opera had been running for some +time. We met his wife and daughter for the first time at a luncheon +given by him at the hotel where we had arranged to take our two o'clock +dinner, after trying all sorts of unsuccessful ways of dining in +private. The stage manager of the drama, the first and second +Kapellmeister, the "Bureau Chef," the Heldentenor, Heldenbariton, High +Dramatic, Coloratura, my sister and myself were all invited. Just as we +were seating ourselves, the _Schauspiel Regisseur_, Herr S----, noticed +that there were thirteen at table. He turned as white as a sheet, jumped +up, and scarcely stopping to apologize, hurriedly left the room, nor +could he be prevailed upon to return, although the director followed him +into the hall to remonstrate. He protested that one of our number was +certain to die within the year as it was, and he wished to insure its +not being himself by refusing to sit down at all. Curiously enough, his +prophecy came true, for the Director's young step-daughter died very +suddenly soon after. + +Herr S---- was a most unpleasant person, as I discovered later, and I +was always thankful that my identification with the _Opern-Personal_ +kept me out of his way. He had a sort of spurious veneer and +ingratiating manner, which was at variance with his hard, square, +passion-scarred countenance. He pretended an enormous admiration for the +American woman, and that very day before luncheon, he showed me with +great pride a small American-made patent-leather shoe, which he took out +of the tail pocket of his frock-coat, telling me with a leer that it +belonged to a girl of _my_ country, where the women had the most +beautiful feet in the world, and that it was his talisman and never left +him! He bore a bad name among the women players in the company. One of +the little actresses, a girl of good family, in her first season, used +to tell me unpleasant tales of him in her rapid, ungrammatical French, +whenever I met her; and she always referred to him as "That beast!" + +Our Heldentenor of that season was an uninteresting personage, a quite +elderly man of enormous routine and mediocre equipment, who had sung in +all sorts of opera houses and was on the last lap of a long career. He +was said to be nearly sixty, and was quite bald, but he managed to make +a surprisingly youthful appearance on the stage. He had been at it so +long that he could make an attempt at acting almost anything--even +youth. His sprightly legs in "Fra Diavolo" were quite adolescent. He +kept himself discreetly to himself, and was never seen in the cafés, nor +on the streets with his colleagues. + +His greatest joy was a tiny dog, whose tricks he delighted to show off +to every one. The little thing would whine for a soprano, growl for a +bass, howl for a tenor, bark when told "The Direktor's coming," and sit +up and beg at the word _Gage_ (salary,) in a very amusing way, and his +master was intensely proud of his accomplishments. + +The lyric tenor of the first season was a peasant from Swabia, with a +droll accent and a lovely voice which he forced in a most agonizing +manner. He would shake all over when he sang a high note, and yet his +natural voice ranged easily to high D sharp--I have even heard him sing +an E. His dialect and his ignorance made him the butt of the company, +but he was very goodnatured and took it all in good part. He used to +say: "Yes, I know--my wife is a French woman and she tells me to say +_Mignon_, but I'm a peasant--I say _Mischnong_." She was years older +than he and of better class. She had helped him to the little study that +he had had, and out of gratitude he had married her, but they were said +to disagree very consistently. + +The Heldenbariton was quite a nice fellow, big and burly with a good +voice; he was a great favourite with the public, whom he had pleased by +marrying, out of the chorus, a townswoman who adored him. + +The second Kapellmeister was a vague, weak creature, henpecked by his +vain little wife who was never happy unless she was the centre of some +one's admiration. She was inordinately proud of her small feet, and our +little friend the lyric baritone used to make her furious, by insisting +that mine were smaller! Her dream was to go on the stage too, if only to +sing pages in "Lohengrin" and "Tannhäuser," and later her hope was +realized, I heard, when several of them went off together in April to a +"Monatsoper" on the _Russische Grenze_ (Russian Frontier). The +coloratura soprano was a Dutch woman, speaking German with more accent +than I did. She was very fair, very fat, and very lazy, and she had a +capacity for food that I have seen equalled but never surpassed. She +dined with us daily, and woe to the person who had to serve himself from +a dish that had been passed to her! Eat until you could hold no more was +a part of the creed of all my colleagues. Anything short of absolute +repletion, and the meal was considered a failure. "_Sind Sie satt?_" +They would ask each other gravely--"_Ich bin nicht satt!_" Meaning +literally, "Are you full?" "_I_ am _not_ full." And this was a grave +cause of resentment against the hotel management. I must say that most +of them reached this desirable consummation long before the coloratura +soprano, for she continued placidly as long as there was any food in +sight. She would even finish anything left on another's plate, and our +table always looked as if a horde of locusts had visited it. + +Those colleagues of my first engagement are stamped upon my +memory--representing as they did so much that was new to me,--a new +nationality, a new profession, and in many cases a new social class. +Take them all together they were a pretty decent lot considering their +antecedents and surroundings. As a general rule, I think the actors are +apt to be of a somewhat higher social class than the singers, as a +remarkable voice occurs when and where it will, while a vocation for the +acting stage presupposes a certain amount of education and refinement of +surroundings, although there have been, of course, some notable +exceptions. + +They wanted us to meet the officers of the different smart regiments. +The Red Dragoons in particular were supposed to be all-powerful in +deciding the success or failure of a singer, and the colleagues kindly +thought we ought all to have the advantage of this. One or two of the +women of course had affairs with them, and as Marjorie and I did not +care to meet the officers in just that society, we were sometimes hard +put to it to find a good excuse. Once my sister went to bed, though +perfectly well, for several days, to avoid a particularly pressing +invitation. Later we met these officers through letters from our +relatives, and liked some of them tremendously. Even their affairs were +the outcome of the system, and did no particular harm to any one. + +The opera soubrette had one of years' standing with a tall ungainly +White Dragoon. He was a harmless idiot, and she a smart German-Polish +Jewess, a nice little thing. We each had a "Benefiz" before leaving the +Metz engagement, when we were showered with flowers and gifts from our +friends and admirers, also sharing in the box-office receipts. R----, +the soubrette, told us the day after hers, still breathless from rage, +that "_Er_"--she never called him anything but "He"--had sent her an +umbrella, bound in the middle of a huge sheaf of roses. He had not +passed it over the footlights, so that every one might see its +splendour, but had left it at her rooms. When he called on her expecting +soft thanks, she berated him soundly, and succeeded in so enraging his +usually placid self that he threw his big sabre through the window, +sending it crashing into the court below. + +One handsome Red Dragoon, a notorious connoisseur of music and women, +and believed absolutely irresistible, always sat in a box at our right +from the stage. His one reputable passion was music. He had at that time +an affair with a Dutch woman, who had been handsome and distinguée--she +was pitifully his slave. Going to the theatre one evening we saw her +approaching from one direction in the big court in front of the theatre, +as he approached from another. She smiled infatuatedly at him but he +passed her without a look--perhaps his idea of a tribute to my sister +and me. I felt sorry for her as the joy left her face. + +Several years after, while touring in Holland, in a charming little +place where we went to pass a free afternoon, we saw this same woman. +She had found the strength to shake off her German master, had married a +countryman and looked prosperous and happy. + +Neither Marjorie nor I ever received an offensive word or look from an +officer. They used sometimes to send me postcards after a _Carmen_ or +_Amneris_ night, closely scribbled over with signatures and greetings +and phrases of admiration, all highly respectful. It always pleased me +very much to receive these cards. + +The _Genossenschaft_ members of most theatres organize a _fête_ every +year for the benefit of their society, and that spring we had a fancy +dress ball. A lady is chosen at these balls by popular vote to be Rose +Queen. I was chosen that time and had to parade around the room on the +arm of a portly Major, who often sent me flowers and books of his own +poems. I wore my _Carmen_ dress of black satin, with gold flowers, and +my scarlet Spanish shawl. There was much cheap champagne drunk to the +popular toast of "General Quenousamong." This was originally "_Que nous +aimons_" (To those we love), and the "general" meant that every one was +to join in. The French touch was considered elegant, just as _Couzank_ +was the polite word for cousin, and _Satank_ for satin. Balls of this +kind are highly popular and a great contrast to the usually simple lives +of these small-town people. + +One form of simplicity I never adopted was the quite general one of +eating their evening supper, consisting usually of a bit of sausage, and +black bread and butter, out of bits of paper casually put down amongst +the objects on the table in their bedrooms. When you had finished, you +simply rolled up and threw away the greasy papers and the thing was +over. + +Sometimes a meal may be captured free. One of our "comics" in Metz had +to fish at the back of the stage in an operetta. He was always furnished +with a salt herring by the property man, which he would suspend solemnly +out of sight of the audience for a while, then slowly draw up, and +proceed to eat. A clean picked spine was all that remained by the end of +the act, and he had had his supper. + +Often the performances supplied me with welcome comic relief behind the +scenes. I learned for instance, that the text of the Anvil chorus sung +round me, as I lay on the canvas rock couch of _Azucena_, in +"Trovatore," was: "_Ich habe Dir schon laengst gesagt, die Wurst sie +schmeckt nach Seife_"--"I told you long ago, the sausage tastes of +soap." Also the soldiers in "Faust" made their rollicking return from +the wars to the words: "_He--ring und Apfel--Kartoffelnsalat._" "Herring +and apple--potato salad." _Siegmund_ grows woefully vulgar, and the +opening bars of his love song to his sister always say now to me: +"_Winter Struempfe riechen im Monat Mai._" + +Once in "Tiefland" the old man in the first act was presented with a +large lump of Limburger cheese, which he had to sniff and hold +gratefully for a long time, while his rejoicing colleagues slapped their +knees with glee in the wings. Sometimes the humour was replaced by other +less agreeable emotions. For my _Benefiz_, the last year of my +engagement, I was to sing _Carmen_. I wanted a popular guest tenor from +a neighbouring _Hoftheater_ to be my _José_, and he finally agreed to +come. He would not come in time for rehearsal and I did not see him +until I turn my head in the first recitative and see him making his +sword chain. From then on, he directed me in lordly tones throughout the +first act. I had often sung _Carmen_ in Metz and the audience knew most +of my business and expected it; also as I had prepared the rôle in Paris +and spent months of study on it I did not see why all of my business +should be changed on my own festive night. Therefore in our short talk +before the second act, I told him my positions as nicely as I could, he +saying to everything, "_Aber warum? Warum?_" (But why, why?). I stood +this as long as I could and told him all the warums, till finally I said +"Because I want to!" At this he lost his temper and left the stage. I +was surprised, but supposed he was nervous. From then on, things went +from bad to worse. Everything _Carmen_ said to _José_, he thought Howard +was saying to him. I tried to whisper that I meant nothing by it--that +that was the way I played it, but he grew blacker and blacker. Finally +in the last act I struck him with my fan, my usual business to make +_José_ let _Carmen_ pass. He rushed at me and caught my wrists and +shouted, "_Was faellt Ihnen denn ein_" ("What's the matter with you?") +I was frightfully upset and nearly crying by then, but had to go on. At +the last as I lay on the floor and he stood over me, he deliberately +threw his heavy dagger in my face, and I, a corpse, had to move my head +to avoid being hurt. He rushed to his dressing room and cried and +shouted for a half hour before his wife dared to go in and calm him. I +believe it was all jealousy. He had been most popular in the town, and +could not bear to share a performance with any one. The next day I could +hardly hobble; all my bones seemed wrenched; but every one was most +sympathetic and kind. + +The bells in Metz were most numerous and depressing. The cathedral near +us chimed all day an out-of-tune singsong, which the natives said was, +"_Ich bin todt und komm' nicht wieder!_" ("I am dead and shall not come +again!") + +The depression of the first year culminated in a smallpox epidemic, +which broke out shortly before the theatre closed. Marjorie dreamed of +it just before it happened, and that I died of it, which, of course, +haunted her all through the outbreak. It was frightfully mismanaged by +the authorities. The suspects were called for by policemen and carried +from the houses to an open wagon, (this in February and March,) and +driven to the hospitals. The _Kaserne_ or barracks where cases +occurred, were isolated; but in our daily walks we passed them with +shudders. We were both so tired and had had so many shocks and +eye-openers as to what life really is, that this last nightmare +completely obsessed and unnerved us. Our policeman neighbour carried +suspects, and of course his uniform was never even fumigated and we knew +it. + +The dear little daughter of the director's wife was taken away from home +one night, in spite of her parents' remonstrances. She was ill of +rheumatic fever, and the authorities heard of it, pronounced it +smallpox, and took her away in the open carriage. She died in a few +days, and no one ever knew whether it was smallpox or not. Her mother +never quite got over it; the child was so sweet and young. + +The wagon used to stand in the street before a suspect house, with +children playing around it. The police seemed to run the whole thing, +and would carry bedding out of the houses and leave it to be burned in +the street. We were told that the very poor used to steal this bedding +at night. Of course we were vaccinated, but it did not take. The last +performances of the season were abandoned, as every one was afraid of +crowded places, and I left for Berlin on business. While there my throat +became frightfully sore, and of course I thought, "Aha! I have it!" And +of course I didn't have it. I returned worn out to Paris and rested +there. + +About this time I went first to Jean de Reszke. His beautiful house, +near the _Bois_, with its little theatre, was the scene of much +nervousness and struggles to become _prime donne_. The master opened my +eyes to the beauties of style. His Wagner, better than the best +Wagnerian singer I have ever heard, his French style, the wonderfully +Italian and yet manly interpretations he gave the Puccini and Verdi +rôles, were all a marvellous inspiration to me. With a pupil he +considered intelligent he would take no end of trouble, and a "_Bien_" +from him was a jewel above price. The tales de Reszke pupils sometimes +tell me of the wonderful things he told them and predicted for them have +always amused me, because in all the time I have been in his studio I +have never heard anything like it. + +I was so infatuated by my work with him, and so humbled at the vista of +endless effort it opened before me, before his ideas could be carried +out in every tone one sang, that I asked him one day if I should not +spend the next winter in his studio, and leave the stage for a year. He +thought it over seriously, and advised me to go on with the stage work, +for the routine I was getting was as valuable a teacher as he was. It +would have been a great privilege to have spent an entire year with him, +and if I could have afforded it, I should have done so. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +DISCOURAGEMENTS THAT LEAD TO A COURT THEATRE + + +The second year of my first engagement was drawing to a close, and I was +much exercised over the next step. I wanted to try for one of the +_Hoftheaters_, not the very largest and most famous, but a place with a +good orchestra and carefully prepared productions. There seemed to be no +vacancy in just such a theatre, and my agent offered me a contract for a +great _Stadttheater_, probably the first municipal opera house in +Germany. Their contralto, who was a great favourite, had a contract for +a big Royal Opera, and they felt sure she would be engaged. With some +misgivings, I signed the _Vertrag_, and then began the long dickering to +arrange the guest performances which should decide my fate. They finally +asked me to sing _Azucena_ at an afternoon performance. It had taken so +long to find a date which suited us both, that a good deal of time had +elapsed between the signing of the contract and their letter. I, of +course, refused to sing an afternoon performance, and it was finally +arranged that I should sing _Carmen_ on a certain date. There is a sort +of unwritten law that they shall choose one part, and you another, but +it is not always observed. This difficulty over the rôle should have +warned me that there was something wrong. Such a disagreement is a +pretty good indication that your contract will not be made _perfekt_. + +I travelled all night, and arrived to find a rehearsal on the same day +as the performance. It was what is called an _Arrangier Probe fuer den +Gast_, rehearsal without orchestra, of the scenes in which the "Guest" +takes part. All the colleagues were nice to me, but I saw the contralto +watching from the wings, and she gave me a dagger glare; so I thought +that there was "something rotten in the state of Denmark," as she was +supposed to be leaving voluntarily. I sang well that night, and had a +real success with the audience, and with my colleagues. They all said to +me, "Oh, you are certainly engaged after a hit like that." But I felt a +premonition which increased to a certainty when I heard that the +Director had not troubled to watch my performance, but had left the +theatre in the middle of the first act. + +I left the next morning, and in a day I received a letter from the +Director saying that I had not had quite enough experience to sing their +repertoire. I learned some time afterwards that their contralto had +sung one of her guest-performances before I went there, had failed to +make a sufficient impression, and had decided to remain where she was. +This had been settled between her and the Direction before I sang at +all; still they had let me sing with no prospect of an engagement, and +allowed it to appear to be my fault that I was not engaged. Legally, of +course, they were quite within their rights, as I could have sued them +if they had not given me a chance to sing the _Gastspiel_ called for in +my contract. But any singer, in such circumstances, would infinitely +prefer to be told the facts. Later, I once begged a director to tell me +if it were really worth while to _gastieren_ in his opera house. He +said, certainly, they were not considering any one else and really +wanted to hear me. I sang there with one of the biggest personal +successes I have ever made, the _Bürgermeister_ and all the Committee +(it was a municipal theatre managed by a Committee with the Mayor at the +head) came on the stage to congratulate me, and I had to take nine +curtain calls alone after the last act. I was not engaged, however, and +found out that they had already decided to engage a contralto who had +sung one _Gastspiel_ before me and the other directly afterwards. This +sort of thing happens even to the most experienced native-born singer. +One tenor in D. sang a guest performance _auf Engagement_, and learned +that he was the seventh who had tried for that position in the same +part, and they kept on their original one after all! Of course, these +performances are paid, but the fact that one has sung without being +engaged becomes known everywhere through the weekly theatrical paper, +which gives the repertoire and singers in each opera, of all the +reputable opera houses in Germany. But the fact that the management +never intended to engage you is not generally known. If you have bad +luck like this three or four times, it injures your standing as an +artist. The _Genossenschaft_ or stage society is trying to make each +theatre confine itself to issuing only one contract at a time to fill +any vacancy they may have, which will largely prevent this evil. + +A second disappointment followed right on the heels of the first one. I +had a second string to my bow, as there was a vacancy in a very good +_Stadttheater_ for which I was anxious to try. I opened negotiations +with them through my agent, and after the usual delay arranged the +_Gastspiels_. Their contralto was also leaving voluntarily. I was to +sing the two _Erdas_ and _Ulrica_ in the "Masked Ball." When I got +there, I found this changed to the _Erdas_ and _Fricka_, which I had not +sung for a year. Then they demanded _Frau Reich_ in "Merry Wives" +without a rehearsal instead of the "Siegfried" _Erda_. I was very +unhappy, for I knew from this that things were going badly, and that +they had no intention of engaging me, no matter how or what I sang. The +Direction wrote me that, in spite of my great talents, my voice was not +quite large enough for their house. The truth was that their contralto, +who was a Jewess and therefore of the same religion as most of the +committee, had been offered an increase of salary to remain, and had +accepted. The Direction themselves felt badly over the way they had +treated me, and the _Intendant_ telephoned to a _Hoftheater_, not far +off, where he knew there was going to be a vacancy, to recommend me to +their Director in the highest terms. + +This was Darmstadt, the capital of a small principality, famous for its +opera house, which had existed for a hundred years. It is a town of +about 100,000 inhabitants, and the residence of the reigning Grand Duke, +Ernst Ludwig. His mother had been the Princess Alice of England, +daughter of Queen Victoria. He and his second wife, Eleanore, lived with +their two little sons at the palace Princess Alice's money had built for +them. It was really not a palace at all, but a large, roomy, comfortable +house. His beautiful sister, Alexandra, married the Czar of Russia; +another sister married the Kaiser's brother, Prince Henry of Prussia. + +The opera house, called _Hoftheater_, stood high in the second class. In +the first class are Berlin, Vienna, Dresden and Münich, with possibly +Hamburg. Then come Cologne, Frankfurt and Leipsic, and the _Hoftheaters_ +Hanover, Stuttgart, Mannheim, Wiesbaden, Darmstadt, etc. In the third +class are the smaller _Hoftheaters_ like Coburg, and the _Stadttheaters_ +like Mainz. In the fourth, are the smallest _Stadttheaters_, and last of +all come the little towns which have _Monatsoper_, or a one month season +of opera in the year, after the seven month theatres are closed. The +first class houses are open all the year, with a four or six weeks' +vacation for the singers at different times, so that they shall not all +be away together. The next class has a nine months' season, but in the +_Hoftheaters_ the salary is paid in monthly instalments for twelve +months in the year. + +I took the train for the town, not caring much whether they wanted me or +not. Perhaps that was the right attitude, for after hearing one song +with piano accompaniment, the _Intendant_ offered me a five-year +contract. I asked them to make it three; the town seemed so small and +quiet that I did not like the sound of five years in it. The salary was +the highest they had ever paid a contralto. The Director said at once, +"How much did they offer you in----?" and agreed to pay me only 500 +marks a year less. I arranged to _gastieren_ very soon in _Carmen_, +with _Nancy_ and one other part to follow. I sang only the _Carmen_ on +trial, however, as the Grand Duke, who had come in especially from his +country place to hear me, engaged me personally after the first act. I +had a wonderful and rare chance to "be grand" when the Director told me +this. He asked me if I would be willing to sing my other _Gastspiel_ of +_Nancy_. I replied loftily that I really could not do so, as I must +return to Paris. + +Six days before the opening of the season, according to contract, I +arrived with my sister in the town which was to be my home for the next +three years. It is surrounded by forests and looked very pretty; but oh! +so quiet! The _Hoftheater_ stands in a park, and is a classic-looking +structure seating 1,400 persons. It has been there for a hundred years, +and runs by clockwork. A building behind it, more than half as large as +the theatre itself, contains the ballet school and scene-painting lofts +and a complete dressmaking and tailoring establishment, with the +wardrobe mistress and master at the head, where all costumes are made. +They are also kept here, and the collection is a very complete one, with +endless sets of uniforms, armour and historical costumes of all kinds. +Men's dress is supplied; women who have a salary of more than 3600 marks +($900) are supposed to supply their own, but if you are nice to the +wardrobe mistress she will usually contrive to find what you want, +though you must get permission from the Direction to wear it. Excellent +dressers are provided for the principals, and a hair-dresser to put on +your wig. There is a small charge if it requires dressing. The theatre +pays these people, but you are supposed to tip them on New Year's Day, +also the stage doorkeeper, the man who brings you the scores of your +parts, and any one else you like, though only the first four expect it; +and 10 marks ($2.50) is a liberal tip. You are expected to keep your +costumes at home, and send them over in a basket-trunk on the morning of +the performance for your dresser to unpack, press and hang up. You pay a +man $1.00 a month to do this, though many singers send their servant. + +There are four Kapellmeisters, the first one who rejoiced in the title +of _Hofrat_ (Court councillor), the second, and third, and a fourth for +the chorus. Felix Weingartner is now first conductor there. The +orchestra consists of sixty musicians, and is really good. They have +played together so long, that they can play almost anything, and they +excel in Mozart, whom, with Wagner, they adore, while they look with +condescension upon the works of Puccini. The scenery of this particular +opera house used to be famous. They were the first to have moons which +really rose about as slowly as the real one, and they are still unique +in possessing a wonderful clock-work sun, which contracts as it rises. +The _Ring_ dramas, with their complicated settings, are given without a +single hitch; the "Magic Flute" is presented with some nineteen scenes, +all dark changes; and this is one of the four theatres in the world +where Goethe's "Faust" is given entire, on four consecutive evenings. +The artist, Kempin, who is responsible for all new scenery, is a man of +considerable reputation, outside the town as well as in it, as a +painter. He does excellent things when he is allowed a free hand, as he +inclines very strongly toward modern _styliziert_ (conventionalized) +scenery _à la Reinhardt_. His production of "La Belle Hélène" was worth +seeing, and his "_Gretchen's_ room" in "Faust" is one of the most +charming stage settings I have ever seen. + +There is a large, thoroughly trained chorus, each with a repertoire of +over fifty operas, whose members are paid, as a rule, about 125 marks a +month ($26), everything but modern dress supplied. None receives more, +except those who fill small "speaking parts." In a ballet of forty the +dancers receive from 75 to 80 marks apiece with all costumes furnished. +Knowing these figures, as I do, it is hard for me to credit those I once +saw quoted in a music journal from a German book on the subject. The +author stated that the ballet girls in Hanover receive only 10 marks +($2.50) a month. Hanover, being a larger city and affiliated with Berlin +pays better salaries than this opera house of which I am writing. He +also said that the "leading lady" in Eisenach had only 15 marks a month! +As I, as a beginner and foreigner, in Metz, received $35 a month, I +cannot but think that he had forgotten to add the cipher and meant 150 +marks! The costume expenses that he spoke of, are certainly a great tax +upon the German _actresses_ in smaller theatres; but I think I have +shown how greatly the wardrobe of a _singer_ in such a theatre may be +simplified, especially by a thrifty German woman, up to all the dodges +of different pairs of sleeves for the same gown. After all, costume +expenses are as high or as low as one makes them. None of our American +girls thinks of becoming an actress on the European stage, so these +costume expenses need not trouble her personally, and the majority of +German actresses manage to live on their earnings. The principals in my +theatre received from $900 to $3500 a year, which last named sum is paid +to the _Heldentenor_, and on which he is rich. The rent of a good flat +is 700-800 marks a year ($180-$200). I paid 1100 marks ($275) for mine +because it was situated on the best street, near the palace. It +contained four rooms, with kitchen, bath, maid's room and two balconies. +A good general servant receives 25 marks a month ($6.24). Her wages and +everything about her are regulated by police inspection. The _Polizei_, +in fact, regulates the whole town, even the closing of the theatre, +which can only be shut in case of destruction by fire, serious epidemic +or martial law. + +The same system of alternating plays with opera obtains in all but the +very largest German cities. We had some splendid actors in our cast, +some of whom are now in leading positions in the greatest theatres. The +repertoire, for a town of 100,000 people, is extraordinary. The German +classics, Goethe and Schiller, alternate with Shakespeare; the modern +poetic dramas, the plays of Hebbel, Grillpartzer, the sparkling comedies +of Schnitzler are interchanged with translations of Ibsen, Bernard Shaw, +Pinero, etc. Sudermann and Hauptmann may follow the latest French salon +comedy, or a new farce; and the good old ones that everybody knows like +"Kyritz Pyritz," and "Charley's Aunt" are not allowed to die. Then there +are peasant plays in dialect and fairy plays for the children at +Christmas. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +SALARIES AND A TENOR'S GENIUS + + +If you make a hit with the audience your residence in the town is made +very pleasant. Even the conductors and motormen of the street cars used +to greet me as they passed and all the policemen were my friends. I had +letters to some of the people in the town through relations, and took as +much part as I had time for in the really charming, if slightly narrow, +social life of the place. The centre of everything was, of course, the +Court. The Grand Duke took a great interest in the theatre, and used to +watch the productions notebook in hand. Any detail which did not please +him was immediately noted and sent then and there to the stage manager +to be changed. We had some special privileges as we were classed as +_Beamten_ or official servants of the government. One was the right to +wine from the ducal cellars at cost price, or duty free. Another was a +10 per cent. discount at all the shops. + +Extra money is often to be picked up by a _Gastspiel aushilfsweise_, +that is, an emergency call from a neighbouring theatre. Our opera +soubrette once received a hurry call to another _Hofoper_ one hour's +journey away. The train would have made her too late, so she took an +automobile and her costume with her, and drove at breakneck speed +through the woods to the town. She was to sing _Cherubino_ in "Figaro" +and, as she dressed in the auto to save time, the surprise of the +chauffeur may be imagined when, instead of a brunette girl, a blond boy +emerged from his car! + +I made my first appearance as a regular member of the company as +_Dalila_. The only comment afterwards of the first Kapellmeister, who +directed the performance, was, "Why did you make the eighth note in such +and such a phrase a sixteenth?" I repeat this, in order to give an idea +of the standard of thoroughness with which the musical part of the opera +was prepared. When we were rehearsing _Dalila_ on the stage, I, having +studied the rôle in Paris and being imbued with the spirit of the French +performers, occasionally gave that swing from the hips on a particularly +luscious phrase, using as faithfully as I could remember it de Reszke's +masterly interpretation and flow of line. The _Hofrat_ rapped on his +desk, and half patronizingly, half contemptuously, with a pitying smile, +bade me not indulge in _franzoesische Manniere_--French mannerisms. As +many room rehearsals were held as were necessary before the singers +could sing their parts, giving every note its exact value. A singer +might make mistakes during the performance, but the _Hofrat_ always +mentioned it afterwards. My _Samson_ was, of course, the _Heldentenor_, +and he was a character; a tall, good-looking man, with an immense, +ill-used voice, but a wonderful actor. He had a great success with the +ladies, and his adventures, matrimonial and otherwise, were the +principal source of gossip of the town. His lady-love at this time was a +certain Baroness, whom he afterwards married. Their great amusement was +rushing about the country together in a white automobile filled with +flowers. She used to hang fascinated over the edge of her box, high +above the stage, watching his every look and gesture, her large bust on +the edge of the box. When he left the stage she would sink back in her +chair, really exhausted, and rub her eyes with her hand. He was the only +person who was allowed to disturb the orderly rehearsals. Every one was +afraid of him when he lost his temper and raged up and down the stage, +shouting what he would do to his enemy when he caught him. One day, I +remember, he was furious with the _Intendant_ because birthday honours +had been distributed by the Grand Duke, in the form of decorations, and +he had received none. He made sure that it was the _Intendant's_ spite +against him, but it was in reality, of course, his notorious way of +living that prevented his being decorated. He shouted that he would "buy +himself two cents' worth of soft soap and grease his back with it and +make the _Intendant_ climb up it!" Then that he would get him in the +woods and run his auto over him, and run it back and forth, and back and +forth, until there was nothing left but apple sauce! Finally the +Direction could stand him no longer, great actor as he was, and his +contract was broken on the pretext of his having been absent from the +town without leave. You are supposed not to go further than a certain +stated distance from the theatre without due notification and +permission. He left the place with his Baroness, and his return to it +was characteristic. The first time that Zeppelin's airship passed over +the town, he was in it, hanging out of the car, shouting and throwing +down postcards! + +As _Siegfried_ in "Goetterdaemmerung," he left an ineffaceable +impression on me. I have never seen it equalled by any tenor. When he +gazes at _Brünnhilde's_ ring, and his memory fails to recall just what +it means to him, his puzzled look of baffled memory, the ray of +understanding that almost pierced his forgetfulness, all were suggested +in so tremendous a way that one saw inside his brain,--and all this +utterly without exaggerated mannerisms. + +I seemed to find favour in his sight, and during the _Dalila_ rehearsals +he made hot love to me. In the performance, when _Dalila_ sinks into his +arms on the couch, he nearly upset me by saying fervently out loud: +"_Ach! endlich weiss man was est ist ein schoenes Weib im Arm zu +haben?_" ("Ah! at last one knows what it is to have a beautiful woman in +one's arms.") I considered this a distinct reflection on his adoring +Baroness, and withheld the signs of delight he no doubt expected. He +told me once, one only wish he had,--just to see my _Spinne_, or +_lingerie_ closet. One day, as we were all in the greenroom, during a +rehearsal, waiting our turn to be called to the stage, I saw S----'s +eyes transfixed with horror. Looking in the direction he pointed I saw +the opera soubrette Z----, putting on her rubbers and crossing her legs +in doing so. This action revealed to our delighted gaze trouserettes of +red striped canton flannel, shirred into a band half way between calf +and ankle, and there adorned with a blanket-stitched frill of the same +material. S---- was too sickened by the sight to do more than helplessly +gasp, "Typical!" to me. A curious person; fastidious, sensual, +unquestionably endowed with genius, he just couldn't behave. + +He was asked to sing _Siegfried_ once, at a neighbouring opera house, on +very short notice. He had to dress in the train in order to be there on +time when the curtain went up. Fellow travellers, who saw him enter the +train dressed in the ordinary way, were rather horrified to see a +half-naked savage emerge at the journey's end; but S---- was quite +impervious to the sensation he created. He never wore the hideous tights +most _Siegfrieds_ try to make you think are skin, but his splendid +shoulders rose naked from his bearskin, and his bare legs were bound +with furry thongs. + +The _Heldenbariton_ was of another type. He had been twenty-five years +on the stage, and twenty in this theatre. Opera singing for him was like +going to his office. He had his house with a charming garden, his +family, and a circle of friends and acquaintances, which included nearly +the whole population. There are many cases like his in this class of +theatre, and a pleasant life they lead. After eight years in the same +_Hoftheater_ they are eligible for a pension, a certain proportion of +their salary, which increases with their years of service, up to a fixed +point. Only certain _Hoftheaters_ have this pension fund; it is very +nice for some singers, but a great hardship for others. If you leave +that theatre before your eight years are up, you lose all that you have +paid during your engagement. Contribution to the pension fund is +compulsory for all singers and actors in that theatre. One singer whom +I knew had spent sixteen years in different theatres, always paying a +pension tax, and never receiving the benefit of one penny from the +money, as her engagement in each place came to an end before the +stipulated eight years. Unscrupulous directors take advantage of this to +fail to renew a singer's contract when it gets near the eighth year. The +invaluable _Genossenschaft_ is also trying to remedy this abuse. + +Some of the regular members of a _Hoftheater_ have enviable concert +reputations as well, though in Germany the two professions are quite +separate, and concert singing is generally looked upon as the higher +branch of art. The critics are suspicious of the opera singer in +concert, to such an extent that I was advised, at my first Berlin +recital, to keep my real standing in the profession dark and present +myself without my title of _Hofopernsängerin_. I suggested to my agent +that, as I was quite unknown in Berlin, it might be well to spend a +little money in extra advertising. "Advertising?" said he, "they will +think you are a soap!" So I sang unheralded except by the usual +half-inch in the daily papers. In contrast to the publicity campaigns +and press-agents of this country, let me give another instance of how +they did things in Germany before the war. On being engaged at this +_Hoftheater_, I thought I ought to let the public know it. I wrote my +agent, Herr Harder, asking him to spend 1000 marks ($250) for me in +judicious advertising of my engagement. He answered that there was no +way in which he could place the money to further my interests, and +returned it! The first contract which was offered me for a concert tour +in America, provided for $2,000 to be paid down for advertising before +the tour began. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +THE ART OF MARIE MUELLE + + +One factor in my success was the beautiful wardrobe I was enabled to +have through the kindness of Mr. and Mrs. Frank S. Jones. The first +clothes I ordered from Marie Muelle in Paris, the summer before I went +to Metz, I left entirely to her. She showed me designs and had bolts of +wonderful shimmering silks unrolled for my inspection, and brought out +boxes of curious embroideries, which she kept for her special friends. +The _Amneris_ and _Dalila_ costumes she made me were very French of that +period of the _Comique_; pale pinks and greens and everything in long +wigs. I wore them a few seasons, but as I grew more in knowledge I did +not feel at all Egyptian in pink _crêpe de Chine_, nor Syrian in pale +green. My brother Cecil and I love the Egyptian part of the Louvre, and +have spent hours there together. We found a fascinating bronze princess +of the right period, which we proceeded to try and copy for me for +_Amneris_. + +[Illustration: DALILA AS I USED TO DRESS IT] + +We were staying out of town at Giverny, the artist colony made famous by +Monet, Macmonnies, Friesieke, the A. B. Frost family and many artist +friends. I had a big studio with my brother, and he made huge designs of +the wings the princess used for her skirt, pinning them on the wall of +the studio, then colouring them in the tones of the mummy cases, +allowing for their fading through the ages. These designs we took to +Muelle, who was most enthusiastic. We worked hard and long on that +costume, getting the headdress just right, and making it practical as +well as correct. The jewelry I made myself, from wooden beads painted +the right colour and in the rue de Rivoli I found just the right +Egyptian charms and figures of blue earthenware to hang on the necklace. +My wig maker could not seem to satisfy me, so I finally took a +short-haired black wig, and braided into it one hundred strands, made of +lustreless wool. The dress seemed to lack something when on, so I +twisted ropes of turquoise beads round the wrists and the blue accented +the whole. + +The _Dalila_ clothes I had been wearing then seemed hopelessly pale, +washy and conventional, so we hunted the shops of Berlin and Paris for +vivid embroideries and searched museums for Syrian women. They did not +seem at all popular, though we found magnificent reliefs of men. Taking +these as a basis, we built some barbaric robes of scarlet and purple, +added a fuzzy short black wig, and I felt much more "like it." I found a +necklace of silver chains with clumps of turquoise matrix, in Darmstadt, +and had a headdress made to match it. A comparison of the _Amneris_ and +_Dalila_ photos will show how one's sense of costuming develops. + +We bought all the books on the subject we could find, and studied them +for hours. We cut out reproductions of historic portraits and invested +largely in photos in the different art galleries we haunted, and pasted +them into scrap books. Caps and headdresses have always interested me +intensely. The one I wear in "Meistersinger" I copied from a portrait in +Antwerp. The Norwegian one I wear as _Mary_ in "Fliegender Hollaender" I +bought in Norway, together with the rest of my costume. + +Nothing gives such character to a silhouette as a characteristic head, +and having to do endless old women, I could give them all just as +endless changes of headgear. A comparison of the photos will also show +how one grows into the rôle with years of playing, and how one's eyes +"come to," how one develops histrionically--how the silhouette acquires +snap and vim and carrying power at a distance, and outlines become crisp +and authoritative. + +My first _Carmen_ clothes were very _Opéra Comique_ and not at all +Spanish gipsy. I studied the Spanish cigarette girls and those of gipsy +blood as carefully as possible, and my idea of the rôle changed +naturally. I went to Muelle one summer, and told her that I was no +longer happy in satin princess dresses. She said that Zuloaga had just +designed and superintended the making of Breval's clothes for the +_Comique's_ real Spanish revival of _Carmen_. She could duplicate these +for me as she knew just where to send in Spain for the flowered cottons +in garish colours, and the shot silk scarfs that Zuloaga had imported +for Breval. I was delighted at this and adapted the costumes to my +needs, using the last one exactly as Zuloaga had intended, with the huge +red comb, made specially in Spain. + +When I sang _Carmen_ before Prince Henry of Prussia in Darmstadt, he +sent word to me that my skirts were too long, no Spanish woman wore them +so long. I knew, however, that they were the right length, and any one +can see by studying Zuloaga's paintings that the soubrette length skirt +is not worn on the proud, swinging hips of the Spanish girl. I have been +told by Spaniards that I am an exact reproduction of a Spanish gipsy as +_Carmen_, which shows my studies were not in vain. People have said that +Merimée's and Bizet's _Carmen_ is not Spanish, and perhaps they are +right; but in aiming to portray a Spaniard, what model can one take but +a real one? + +My _Orfeo_ clothes I have never changed. The _crêpe de chine_ for them +was imported by Mounet-Sully for one of his characters, and Muelle gave +me the piece that was left over. Its beautiful creamy colour and thick +softness cannot be improved upon, to my mind. + +Marie Muelle is now the first operatic costumer of the world. This +reputation she has built unaided through her own unfailing energy. +Through her rooms pass the most fabulous-priced opera singers, the +greatest actors, the stage beauties, famous managers, producers, and +designers, the ladies of the great world seeking costumes for wonderful +private _fêtes_--and gentlemen seeking the ladies--all the varied crowd +of many nationalities to whom the old childish pastime of "dressing up" +is a business or a pleasure. The present establishment in the rue de la +Victoire is quite impressive. The hall is usually half-filled with the +trunks of "Muelle artists" engaged in America, who bring their things +into New York in bond to avoid paying the ruinous customs charges, and +are therefore forced to go through the weary round of dispatching the +same old stage wardrobe out of the country and bringing it back again +every season. Even when the clothes are quite reduced to shreds and +patches the rags have to be elaborately packed, identified by lynx-eyed +officials, and sent at least outside the three-mile limit of the +American Continent to be thrown away! + +The first big white reception room of the Maison contains a long table +usually littered with samples, some chairs, and a large mirror lit like +that of a star's dressing room. There is a mantelpiece covered with +photographs of singers of all grades of celebrity, each dedicated with a +message of admiring affection to Marie Muelle. Around the wall are +various _armoires_, one containing a library of works on costume, +another a glittering collection of stage jewelry, a third many +portfolios of water-colour designs for every sort and kind of theatrical +garment for every rôle. + +Oh! those designs! A young soprano has won an engagement in Monte Carlo +and wants a stage wardrobe for her repertoire. Out comes the "Modern +French" portfolio with a bewildering series of blonde and sinuous +_Thaises_, Moyen-Age _Mélisandes_, a scintillating _Ariane_ in contrast +to a demure little work-a-day _Louise_; and the lady spends a delightful +afternoon in selecting her favourites. + +Then Muelle sends for an armful of samples-- + +"_Crêpe de chine_, of course, for the _Thais_. Yes, in flesh pink with +plenty of embroidery. Here is an _échantillon_"--and she pins it to the +drawing. + +The singer picks out a scrap of heavy, lustrous crêpe-- + +"No, not that quality. That is something special, and there is no more +to be had for love or money." + +Colours and fabrics are decided upon, all tested for becomingness under +the bunched electric lights, which mimic the strong light of the stage. +Each design has an assortment of tags of material pinned where many +others have been pinned before. Muelle is an expert in colours for the +stage. She doesn't talk learnedly of synthetic dyes, processes, or +German competition, but she can give you a bright blue that is warranted +to stay blue, no matter what vagaries of lighting a stage manager may +indulge in. + +Her pale colours never turn insipid, nor her dark ones muddy. She keeps +a special dyeing establishment busy with her orders alone, and +twenty-four hours seems time enough to obtain any shade known to the +palette. + +The textiles once chosen, Camille is called to "take measures" and +arrange for the fittings. + +"And now, one question," says Mademoiselle, "Is your stage level, or +does it slope towards the back? Very well, that is all." + +When the singer arrives for her first trying-on, the fitting room is +filled with lengths of material, and Mademoiselle herself stands in the +midst, brandishing a huge pair of shears. She throws a length of silk +over one of your shoulders, puts in two pins, and bunching the material +in her left hand, gives a slash with the scissors in her right, with a +recklessness that makes you shudder. A pull here, a fold there, two more +pins--and the stuff hangs as almost no one else can make it hang, +accentuating a good figure and disguising a poor one. + +Occasionally in filling a regular order she will stumble upon an unusual +effect. One day they were making Moyen-Age sleeves for the dress of a +well-known singer whom Mlle. Muelle has gowned for years, but who has +never been included in the list of her special favourites. The sleeve +was of slashed silvery grey, lined with cerise, the lining showing on +the edges. She picked up a bit of cloth of silver and pulled it through +the slashes. The effect charmed her. + +"_Tenez!_" she said, "That is too good for her. We'll keep that for La +Belle Geraldine." + +"La Belle Geraldine," as Miss Farrar is known in Paris, is one of +Muelle's most constant patrons. Ever since her Berlin days she has been +costumed by the Maison Muelle, and she stands very high in the list of +Mademoiselle's favourites. + +The outer room may contain the photographs of celebrities great and +small, but in the inner room there are just two--a portrait of Miss +Farrar as _Elizabeth_ and one of myself as _Carmen_. + +Opening off the main reception and fitting rooms are others lined with +_armoires_ and stacks of boxes running to the ceiling. Then come the +rooms for cutting and sewing, and the embroidery rooms. Muelle uses +quantities of solid embroidery and _appliqué_ work, where other +costumers are content with stenciling and gilding. She has the secret of +a metal thread that does not tarnish. Her idea is that the use of +first-class materials, good silks and satins, real velvets is a +necessity in these days of electric lighting, which is as revealing as +sunlight; that the substitution of imitation fabrics went out with the +use of gas in the theatre, and that the superior wearing qualities alone +of the best materials justify the greater expense. + +The capacity of her _armoires_ and the size of the accumulated +collections they contain were tested some years ago by the special +production of Strauss's "Salome" at the Châtelet Theatre in Paris, when +Muelle was called upon, at ridiculously short notice, to furnish all +costumes for a cast of 150 people. There was a royal ransacking of +cupboards and jewel cabinets, but everything was ready on time for the +dress rehearsal. + +[Illustration: DALILA AS I NOW DRESS IT] + +A greater feather in her cap was the order to costume the new +productions of the Russian Ballet, from designs by no less a +personage than the great Leon Bakst himself. Then ensued a dyeing of +silks and a printing of chiffons, a stringing of beads and knotting of +fringes which set the whole establishment humming like a beehive. + +For all their thousand problems, the costumes were finished and +delivered at the appointed time. + +Since that triumph there has been hardly an important costume event in +all Paris in which Muelle has not had a share, if not entire charge. She +costumed Astruc's first season in the Théâtre des Champs Elysées. She +has been responsible for the costuming of many productions of the +Russian Ballet, and for great spectacles like Debussy's "St. Sebastien" +and "La Pisanelle" of D'Annunzio. Society knows her as well as the +stage, for she has been the presiding genius at many an exquisite fête, +Greek, Roman, or Persian, held in lovely gardens behind the prosaic +exteriors of exclusive Parisian homes. + +But all this has not turned her head, nor changed her toward her old +friends. She still loves a good gossip. Many a note have we had from +her--"I am delighted that Mademoiselle is returning to Paris, and hope +that she will come to see me. I have quantities of stories to tell her, +and we shall die of laughing." + +But though she enjoys a choice tidbit, she will tolerate no malicious +tale-bearing. She refused an order, tactfully and firmly, from one +singer because the lady tried to tell tales out of school against one of +Muelle's chosen favourites. Her revenge in this case was typical. She +knows that advancing age is the enemy _par excellence_ of popularity for +stage people, so she makes a point of always referring to the delinquent +as "La Mère So-and-So!" + +The list of her kindnesses to artists is unending. One case that I know +of personally is typical. A girl with an unusually beautiful voice had +arranged a début, leading to a first engagement, and she ordered her +wardrobe from Muelle. She failed to be engaged after her début, however, +and one disappointment after another came to her, so that it seemed +impossible for her to make a start at all. But Muelle had faith in her, +and kept the beautiful clothes, unpaid for, hanging in her presses for +several years. At last the girl made a great hit in Russia, and is now a +well-known singer, and, needless to say, a faithful adherent of the +Maison Muelle. This is only one instance of the kind, and, of course, +there are many, many more in which Mademoiselle's kindness does not find +a monetary reward. + +Often have I heard her suggesting economy to those whose salaries are +not in the "fabulous" class. She will show a girl how to costume two +rôles, with the same dresses, by combinations and changes so cleverly +thought out that the keenest public won't detect them. _Elizabeth_ and +_Elsa_ may wear the same mantle, right side out in one rôle and wrong +side out in the other. An extra tabard of brocade or embroidery will +allow an _Ophelia_ to wear the gowns of _Marguerite_--all tricks of the +trade, and well understood in the Maison Muelle. + +Brilliantly clever, immensely capable, good-natured, and big-hearted, a +splendid organizer and the faithfulest of friends, Marie Muelle has +earned by the hardest of hard work, and now justly enjoys her title of +"First Theatrical Costumer," not only of Paris, but of the world. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +THE NON-MILITARY SIDE OF A GERMAN OFFICER'S LIFE + + +One of the first things you do on arriving at a new residence in Germany +is to acquaint the police of your presence. This is called _Anmeldung_. +It is a fearsome experience and admits of no trifling. You go to the +appointed stuffy office, and tell your nationality, birthplace with date +of birth, your parents' names, their profession if any, and your own, +their birthplaces and ages, if they are dead and what they died of, +whether you are married or single, number, names and ages of your +children, and any little extra detail that may occur to the official in +Prussian blue who holds the inquisition. If you have an unusual name, he +won't believe you when you claim it. A girl I knew was christened Jean, +but she is down in the police records of Berlin as Johanna, because her +policeman said that Jean was a man's name, and French at that! + +Every servant maid has a book, which must be signed by the police when +you engage her, and when she leaves you, before she may take another +place. When you engage her she must be _angemeldet_ too, in order that +she may be charged with her proper insurance tax. This amounts to about +five dollars a year; the employer pays one-half, the servant the other. +Many employers pay it all. This entitles the servant to treatment at the +dispensary or in the hospital if she is ill. The police are very careful +of her comfort, and pay a visit to the house in which she is employed to +see that her room is big enough, airy enough, warmed in winter, and that +her bed is comfortable! She has a long list of "rights" including so +many loaves of black bread and so many bottles of beer per week; and she +dare not be offended if you keep everything under lock and key. + +You have not yet finished your _Anmeldung_ if you keep a dog, for he +must be registered, too, and you pay highly for the luxury. The +_Polizei_ decides when you may and may not play on your piano or sing. +Before nine in the morning, after nine at night, all musical instruments +are taboo. The sacred sleeping hour after dinner, from two to four, must +also be observed in silence in Berlin. Nothing dare interfere with the +after-dinner nap; even the banks are closed from one to two, or even +three. You write to the _Polizei_ in Germany where the Englishman writes +to the _Times_. I remember a perfect avalanche of anonymous cards in +Darmstadt because a child in our house would practise with her windows +open and neighbours thought it was the _Hofopernsaengerin_ Howard. + +The intricacies of paying your taxes take some study. Foreigners must +pay taxes on money earned in the country; town and county taxes are +payable every three months, on alternate months, in two different parts +of the town. You arrive at the _Staedtische Halle_ to pay your town +taxes, and you are very lucky if, after picking out the right month, you +succeed in hitting the day when the place is open. A small sign on the +locked door may greet you: "Closed on the ninth and fifteenth of every +month." If day and month are right, you may easily strike the wrong +hour, for town taxes are payable, say, from eight to ten A. M., and two +to five P. M., while county ones are from nine to twelve, and four to +seven. There are church taxes besides, very small if you are Catholic +and larger if you are Evangelical. I succeeded in getting out of these +by declaring myself neither. Unfortunately I did not know the word for +undenominational and so had to say that we were "heathen." My sister was +asked in a rasping official voice, filled with the large contempt for +women which a certain type of German official always reeks with, "_Sind +Sie ledig?_" She, poor dear, had never heard "_ledig_" before, and +stammered "_Was?_" The question was rapped out again, and she said, +"_Ich--weiss nicht._" When she got home and looked up _ledig_, she found +the man had been asking if she were married or single. What he made of +her answer we never knew. + +All these little things are very amusing in Germany. The way everything +seems _verboten_, at first is annoying, but later amusing. The paths in +the Tiergarten in Berlin always used to tempt me to be bad. I always +wanted to walk on the path reserved for bicyclists, or horses, or sit on +the benches reserved for children only. The letter boxes say to you, +"_Aufschrift und Marke nicht vergessen!_" ("Address and stamp not to be +forgotten!") The door mat shrieks at you, "_Bitte, Fuesse Reinigen!_" +("Please wipe your feet.") Towels, brushes, etc., all say "_Bitte_" at +you. I believe one could travel all through Germany with just "_Bitte_," +and get an insight into the different phases of German character through +the intonations of this word. + +A rather annoying custom in Darmstadt was the way the bakers +over-celebrated every holiday. They had usually the "_Erster, Zweiter, +und Dritter Feiertag_"--first, second and third holiday, and they toiled +not on those three days. All the bread you could get, if you had +neglected to provide enough, was square pretzels, baked exceptionally +large and hard. This may have been a Darmstadt custom only, as they +vary so all over Germany, that what holds good in the north may be quite +unknown in the south. For instance, cream is _Sahne_ in Berlin, _Rahm_ +in Darmstadt, and has even a third name in other parts of Germany, which +I have forgotten. You can get a wonderful _Sandtorte_--a firm, delicious +cake, in Berlin, but I never succeeded in getting it just right in +Southern or Middle Germany. + +A quaint old custom in Darmstadt was always observed on the first Sunday +in Advent. The Grand Duke always did his shopping for Christmas on that +day, and the country people thronged into the town. A band used to play +before the shop in which the Grand Duke was, and move as he moved. We +gave an extra long performance at the opera, "Goetterdaemmerung," or +some such serious business, but the Grand Duke never could honour us +with his presence, as every one in town would have felt cheated if he +had. + +The shopping in Darmstadt was really quite remarkable. We always thought +it an excellent thing that after eleven o'clock in the morning not a +scrap of meat was visible in the white-tiled butcher shops, everything +being put away on ice. + +Food is taken very seriously, of course, and asparagus is honoured above +any other vegetable by having its own subscription season. That is, you +subscribe at the beginning of the season, so much a day, and asparagus +is delivered to you daily while it lasts at that price, the sum not +varying with the fluctuations of the market. + +The old market place was a delight on full market days. The grumpy old +women would sit in the middle of their piles of fruit and vegetables, +while you threaded your way along the uneven cobblestone lanes they had +left in between their stalls. Brilliant awning umbrellas have been +adopted and glow in the sun, against the darkly moist, old walls of the +frowning castle just behind. The old Dames call out to you, "Well, +Madamsche', nothing from me today? Aren't my things good enough for +you?" "Madamsche'" is a left-over from ancient French times, and the +final "n" is left off, as are all "n's" in Hessen dialect. + +This dialect also lacks "r's." They tell a tale of the Railroad +conductors calling out "Station Daaaaamstadt!" so loudly and +persistently as to annoy Grand Ducal ears, and they were ordered to pay +more attention to their "r's." Now they call out in a superior tone +"Starrrr-rtion--Damstadt!" and feel sure every one is satisfied. + +We had exceptional opportunities of knowing Germans of all classes, from +the cleaning women in the theatre to royalty. The military types are +most varied, ranging from the Prussian Junker to the _gemuetlicher +Bayer_, with his easy South German ways. We met many officers and their +families, both in Metz and Darmstadt. In Metz, during the last year, we +grew to know and be fond of a young Bavarian lieutenant. With him we +drove and picnicked in the lovely Metz country. It was early spring, and +we would take the train to some little village near by, and have our tea +in the woods or at one of the thousands of _Gasthäuse_ that dot Germany. +I remember one Sunday afternoon in a still, steep-sided ravine, the +walls of it rising sharply on either side, thickly wooded with giant +beeches; the sun-flecked grass aquiver with myriads of white ethereal +wind-flowers. A shrine, with a blue-robed Virgin looked down on us, and +the wood-hush was only broken by the songs of birds, twittering and +gurgling high above us in the branches. Suddenly far off the sound of +singing; and slowly a procession of children came into view, singing in +well-harmonized parts as they walked. They all genuflected before the +Virgin and wound off into the woods, their voices dying away in the +distance. + +We often studied the old battlefields, so fiercely contested in 1870, +and F---- would point out to us just where the different regiments +advanced and fell. A long way off seemed the horrors of war, and we +never dreamed what much greater horrors were soon to descend on us. + +We loved the Bavarians with their kind artistic souls in those days, and +yet they tell me they were among the worst in the early days in Belgium. + +The military spirit was rampant in Metz, of course, and we got to know +that side of it well, as some of the officers had English wives, who +were very good to us. The delightful manners of the officers always +charmed us; we were told they are trained to social manners by their +superior officers. The cavalry regiments were the smartest ones, both in +Metz and Darmstadt, the Infantry being solidly aristocratic, but less +dashing. The _Pioniere_ (Engineers) were rather despised socially, while +the poor _Train_ or Commissariat, was utterly looked down upon and +hardly bowed to. The Bavarian infantry has its special social standing, +because the old nobility is largely represented in it. What they lack in +riches they make up in pride. All the other German infantry regiments +wear dark blue trousers, no matter what colour their tunics; the +Bavarians, however, have stuck to their light blue trousers, in spite of +all attempts to change them. The Prince Regent was famous for wearing +his much too long, and very wrinkled over badly fitting boots. The +smartest officers wore the _Ballon Muetze_ (balloon cap) introduced by +the Crown Prince and ineffectually forbidden by his father. It is called +"balloon" because it is much higher than the ones worn by less smart +officers. The height of the collar is the other important thing. In a +sterling officer of the old school, it is low and comfy; the smarter you +are the higher your collar. If they are fat, the two or three creases at +the back of the neck above the collar, always look to me +unmistakably--German. + +The life they lead is in general very simple, according to our ideas. +Their Casino is their meeting place in the evening, like an officers' +club. Some of them are tremendously hard workers, most ambitious, and +showing real interest in their men. F---- used to teach his more +illiterate ones to read and write, and many were the stories he told of +the thick-headed Bavarian peasants. The difference in these men, when we +saw them arriving in the fall, as rookies, and after a year's training, +was absolutely amazing; slumped shoulders had straightened, lower jaws +had decided to connect with upper ones, and eyes focused intelligently. +Each officer has his _Bursch_ or private servant, who usually chooses to +be one. These are treated as friends by their masters, if the latter +happen to be non-Prussian in character. I said once to F----, "Is Karl +your servant?" "No, he is _mein Freund_" he said. + +An officer in Diedenhofen where we occasionally sang while I was with +the Metz opera, used to send me gorgeous flowers. He had a way of +sitting near the stage and applauding by flapping his handkerchief +against the palm of his white kid glove, which so enraged me that I +never acknowledged the flowers. One night, an ugly old contralto took my +part, as I was laid up, and that was the night the officer had selected +to present me with a huge basket of white azaleas and blue satin ribbon. +The old dame rewarded the house in general with a false-teeth smile on +receiving them over the footlights, which must have discouraged my +admirer as the flowers stopped abruptly. + +We quite often saw young officers very drunk on the streets in Metz, at +about five in the afternoon. Asking F---- about this, we were told that +it was only the young ones, if we would notice, and that they were +obliged to empty their glasses, when toasted by superior officers at +regimental dinners. If these gentlemen caught their eyes, as they raised +their glasses, many times during the two o'clock dinner, the silly young +fellows' heads naturally grew befuddled, but it was not etiquette to +refuse to empty their glass. This custom was very hard on a _Faehnrich_ +or Ensign, and was later done away with. + +The smartest officers had English dogcarts, and were certainly most +dashing. Many clever ones in the cavalry made money out of horses, +buying and selling them amongst themselves. In Darmstadt they introduced +the English hunt, and wore the pink. We used to go up to Frankfort for +the "gentlemen races," and often saw our own Northern cousins, whose +names we knew, but whom we never had the opportunity of meeting, riding +with great skill and daring. These races were much encouraged by the +Kaiser, and sometimes giant Eitel-Fritz would come and look on, or the +dandy Prince Schaumberg-Lippe would make his horse mince round the ring. +He was a great beau and ladies' favourite and the horrible accident that +has deprived him of his beauty in the battlefield, seems an impossible +thing to have happened to just him. + +Our friend F---- was known in his regiment as "Revolver mouth." This +title he earned through his witty tongue and his habit of hitting the +bull's-eye in his table conversation. His great friend, a smart young +_nouveau riche_, in the most exclusive cavalry regiment, who had much +more money than brains, was the butt of much goodnatured chaff from +F----. One evening F---- recounted to a group of brother officers how +S----, who was notorious for his absent-mindedness and poor memory, was +seen miles away from home, galloping down a dusty road. F---- hailed him +and said, "But where's your horse?" "That's true," said S---- looking +down in utter astonishment, "I must have forgotten to get on him." + +S---- was famous for his sharpness in choosing and trading horseflesh, +and F---- used to call him on the 'phone, saying "Is this Herr S----? +_Guten tag!_ I am Graf Pumpernickel." Then he would elaborately arrange +a rendezvous in some very public spot in Metz, at which S---- was to +appear with the horse he wished to trade. Of course when poor S---- kept +the appointment, only a group of jeering young rascals greeted him, and +S---- never discovered who Graf Pumpernickel was, though the joke was +often repeated. + +The money question of the poorer officers, often proves very serious. +They are forbidden to earn money in any way except by writing. They +cannot marry the girl they choose unless between them they have a +certain sum, a minimum; this keeps many fine young officers and charming +girls from matrimony; and frequently results on the man's side in +far-reaching evils of entangling affairs, and illegitimate children. An +officer said to me once, he _thought_ he had no children, but a pretty +woman who kept a shop in the Kathedral Plate once sent him a baby's +pillow and he never was quite sure just what that meant. The Berlin +demi-mondaines are certainly fascinating creatures, dressed in the most +exquisite Paris clothes, and it is easy to understand how some penniless +Graf may become hopelessly involved in an affair with one of them. +Officially such things are frowned on. Talking of officers' troubles one +day, F---- told me that suicide was often the _only_ possible solution, +and for the honour of one's regiment one was sometimes expected to end +one's life. An acquaintance of his had had a revolver sent him by his +commanding officer as a gentle hint, on finding himself involved in a +scandalous affair. + +In one Bavarian regiment, if you had debts, you were liable to be +summoned at literally a moment's notice before your Colonel, and ordered +to pay your debts in so many days, or leave the regiment. The usual +thing was then to obtain the hand in marriage of the most attractive +girl you knew with the most attractive bank-account. Sometimes they +disappeared to America. Frau Seebold told us once, while she was singing +in New York one winter, with an Austrian prima donna, that a man applied +at the door for work during a heavy fall of snow. She told him to clear +it away, and then come in for his money. He came, and noticing her +strong accent, asked if she had long left the Fatherland. On her +replying "no," he burst into a flood of German, and told her his pitiful +story, while she made him hot coffee and tried to comfort him. He had +been a lieutenant in a smart regiment, had gotten into trouble through a +brother officer betraying his trust in him, and had had to disappear to +America for the honour of the regiment. The poor fellow put his head on +the kitchen table and sobbed as he told her how he sank lower and lower, +till finally he shovelled snow. He also told her there was a club in New +York where ex-officers who were coachmen, truck drivers, or waiters by +day, could be gentlemen and comrades by night. He said their crests were +carved above their places on the wall, and no one could belong except +those of high birth. All this was years ago, and I have no idea whether +such a place still exists. + +When a sudden silence falls on a party in Germany they say, "A +Lieutenant pays his debts." Promotion is very slow, and to arrive at a +decent income takes years. A Bavarian Colonel has only eight thousand +marks a year. The equipment of an officer is very expensive; their +Parade uniforms must always be spotless, and though you may wear tricot +cloth every day, your parade uniform must be of finest broadcloth, and +your sword knots of shining silver though a dash of rain ruins both. The +scarlet collars are more extravagant even than the white cloth ones, as +white may be cleaned at least once with gasoline, but scarlet is too +delicate, and the slightest perspiration makes a lasting stain. This was +all before the war, though, and perhaps the dazzling uniforms have given +place for ever to dull khaki. If so Germany is the drabber, for the +colour was a thing to make one's heart leap. In Darmstadt the first four +rows in the orchestra were reserved for officers at reduced rates, and +that beautiful border of colour always framed the stage in a brilliant +band on opera nights. + +In Metz the rule against appearing in "Civil" on the street was very +strict, and F---- used to come to see us in a full set of tennis +flannels brandishing a racket, though he had never played in his life! +In Darmstadt the same strictness prevailed. A friend of ours, a Major +holding a very high position, had to dodge round corners, when he was +out of uniform, in case the terrible General Plueskow should see him, +and order him twenty-four hours' room arrest! By the way, when General +Plueskow, who was about six feet seven, was in France as a young man, +the French made a quip about him, "Who is the tallest officer in the +German army?" was the question, and the answer was "Plueskow, because he +is _Plus que haut_." + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +GEESE AND GUESTS + + +I was on the whole very happy in Darmstadt. All the leading contralto +work came to me by right, and it was brightened by an occasional rôle in +operetta. They found they could use me for smart ladies in such things +as "Dollar Prinzessin," and I greatly enjoyed the dancing and gaiety of +those performances. We had many operas in the repertoire that are seldom +or never heard of in this country, "Evangelimann," "Hans Heiling," +"Sieben Schwaben," all the Lortzings, "Undine," "Wildschuetz," "Zar und +Zimmermann," "Weisse Dame," etc. Such things as "Fra Diavolo," and +"Lustige Weiber," were always delightful to play. + +We gave "Koenigskinder" the first year it was brought out in Germany. +Our clever Kempin designed charming sets for it, lit in the modern way, +and the soprano, though a plain little thing, had a heavenly sympathetic +voice, with a floating quality most appealing in the high part. During +the _Première_ at the end of the last act, just as we were taking our +calls from an enthusiastic public, a strange bearded man stepped out of +the wings and joined us. Humperdinck, of course, whom I recognized in a +minute from his photos. He said nothing to any of us, and we often +speculated as to why he did not. He must have been pleased with the +production, or he would not have shown himself; indeed we heard he was +pleased, but no word was vouchsafed us. + +For our geese we had grey Pomeranian beauties and immense white birds +from Italy. The Italians, besides being bigger were more numerous; they +saw their opportunity to bully the Teutons within an inch of their +lives, and they took it. There was a tank of real water on the stage, in +which they loved to splash, but do you suppose a German goose was ever +allowed to go near it? Ominous hisses kept them away, and they hated +hissing as all actors do. The foreigners gobbled up all the food, before +the others could get it, and the only time that there was any unanimity +among them was when they were doing something they should not. One night +the largest Italian stepped into a depression near the footlights, +caught his foot, squawked loudly and passed on. The second largest +immediately followed suit; there were eleven of them, and they all in +turn caught a foot, squawked and waddled on, to the great delight of +the audience. It was agonizing for us on the stage, waiting for each +squawk. + +Animals were always a trial to the performers, though considered to lend +a sure magnificence from the manager's point of view. We used to have a +pack of hounds in the first act finale of "Tannhäuser." They always +behaved beautifully and were allowed to run without leashes. One night, +however, our little round _Souffleuse_, as the prompter is called, named +"Bobberle" by the tenor as she was as broad as she was long, had taken +her bread and sausages into her tiny pen. The dogs suddenly winded this, +made a dive for the _Souffler Kasten_ (prompter's box), scratched out +the package, devoured the contents and then politely left their cards on +the box; poor Bobberle in helpless rage prompting the while. Since that +night the dogs have been chained two and two. + +We often had famous guests. Edith Walker sang several times with us, and +Knote quite as often. Schumann-Heink, a great friend of the Grand Duke's +(she told me she would go through fire for him), sang _Azucena_. She had +always been my girlhood's idol, and my ideal of an artist, so I embraced +the opportunity to send her a wreath. They said she was much pleased by +the attention from a contralto! She used some of my _Schmink_ to make up +with, and I proudly have the stubs to this day. She made us all laugh +in rehearsal. When she says in the last act that they will find only a +skeleton when they come to drag her from her prison, she passed her +hands over her ample contours and emitted a spontaneous chuckle that was +irresistibly infectious. Bahr Mildenburg came to us also and revealed to +me what _Ortrud_ might be. Especially in the first act is she +overwhelming. In playing the part later I always felt her influence, and +many things I do in that act were inspired by thoughts she gave me. +Watch most _Ortruds_ in that scene. They simply stand in what they +consider mantled inscrutability, trying to portray evil in a heavy, +unsubtle manner; and then see Bahr Mildenburg, if you can. All the +really great people I have ever met are unpretentious and absolutely +charming to work with. Only the near-great seem to consider it necessary +to remind you all the time that they are other than you. The greater the +man the simpler his manner, I have always found, and I think many will +agree with me. + +There was an excellent store of men's costumes to call on; beautiful +embroidered coats and waistcoats from the eighteenth century, real +uniforms of many regiments of bygone days, and the best Wagnerian +barbaric stuff I have ever seen, with the exception of van Rooy's. + +One of the principal men singers was a tall dark fellow, with a most +passionate disposition. We played together often and he fell very much +in love with me. One day when we were all together at a wood coffee +house, his wife asked him how he had broken his watch which she found +smashed on the floor one morning. He said he had dropped it while +reading the night before, but he told me he had been sitting thinking of +me long after his wife had retired, and suddenly saw his watch shattered +in a thousand pieces on the floor across the room, where he had hurled +it. He was devoted to his little son, a charming sunny little chap, with +the dark colouring of his mother. + +When I think of these good comrades of mine I cannot but wonder what the +war has done to them. The Hun element seemed to be in very few of them, +but I can remember it in one. This impossible person, frightfully +conceited, lacking absolutely in humour, annoyed and goaded me through +two long years with his boorish manners, low ideas of American life, +loudly expressed, and crass ignorance of all ideals of living. I came to +rehearsal one day and found the colleagues assembled in the green room +looking very grave over something. This man H---- said "Ah, here she +is!" Then he proceeded to hand round to every one a clipping, which +seemed to hurt and annoy them all. He would not show it to me, +insinuating that I knew all about it. This I stood for an hour and a +half; finally I insisted on seeing the clipping which was from the +leading paper of a neighbouring city. The critic reviewed a _première_ +we had just given, slating every one but myself, and saying that I +belonged on the world-stage. This had been sufficient grounds for my +persecutor to explain the bad criticisms of my other colleagues to them, +by telling them that I had an affair with this to me of course, utterly +unknown, unheard of critic. When I realized just what he meant, I saw +black, seized a property crook stick that lay on the table, and struck +him violently on the arm. I then came to, and rushed to the window to +cool off. He took the blow without a word, and when I finally turned +back from the window ready in a revulsion of feeling to tell him that I +was sorry to have hurt him, I found the others all smiling broadly, in +relief that I had cleared the matter up. Of course none of them had +believed for a second what he had tried to make them believe. + +We gave the whole of Goethe's "Faust" in four evenings. We had Lassens' +music and I sang two angels and an archangel, a sphinx and a siren +during the performances. The mechanical part of the production with its +flying witches, flying swings for _Faust_ and the devil, traps, dark +changes, built-up effects reaching from the footlights to almost the top +of the proscenium arch at the back of the stage, and a thousand and one +details were managed without a hitch. + +"Butterfly" we gave for the first time while I was there, and the Grand +Duke took a great interest in the performance. He sent down some +beautiful kimonos from his private collection for the _Butterfly_ to +wear, but paid me the compliment of letting me get my own. I had +searched costumers and Japanese shops in vain, in London, Paris and +Berlin, for a plain coloured kimono such as servants wear, and finally +got one direct from Japan. The _Suzukis_ I have always seen have been +attired like second editions of _Butterfly_ not realizing in the least +the value of the contrast to them if they look like a real servant. I +have had letters from people who knew the East intimately, who have said +very flattering things about my portrayal of the manner of a Japanese, +after they have seen my performance, in company with real Japanese. +This, considering my height, has always pleased me immensely. If you can +feel in a vast audience that even one person knows, understands and +appreciates the study you have put upon a rôle to make it true to life, +you are rewarded for your pains. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +RUSSIANS, COMMON AND PREFERRED + + +The Grand Duke was always very good to me. He liked talking English with +my sister and me, and always referred to the Germans as "they," never as +"we." He asked me to the palace one evening to dinner. We dined in a +room hung with portraits of his beautiful sisters. They looked like fair +angels, the portraits having been painted when both the Czarina of +Russia and her sisters were quite young girls. We were told by friends +that the Czarina used to be perfectly exquisite as a young woman, +usually gowned in pale grey with a huge bunch of violets. After dinner +we went up to the Grand Duke's own private music room where guests were +seldom invited. The piano was set high, on a hollow inlaid sounding box, +an idea of His Royal Highness's which improved the tone immensely. +Behind it on the wall was a life size painting of a Buddha-like female +figure. This was in creamy brown and gold, inlaid with chrysophrases, +and lit mysteriously at will from either side, on top, or bottom. The +lighting he preferred, and which he told me he used when he played for +hours--he knew not what--was provided by four rings of glass, suspended +horizontally from the ceiling, through which a radiant sapphire light +poured. I don't know how it was managed, but it was very beautiful. In +one corner of the room was a grotto, also blue lit with a charming, +quiet, nude figure, and a fountain that drip-dripped as you listened. + +I sat down at the piano and played and sang all the negro melodies my +father had collected in the Bahamas years before. I think the guests +were rather bewildered by the swift pattering English, but the Grand +Duke and his cousin, the Princess Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein were +charmed with them. Princess Victoria and her mother, Princess Christian, +King Edward's sister, were afterwards good enough to be patronesses at +my first recital in London. + +The Grand Duke loved beautiful Oriental effects, and never seemed to me +to be in the least German. He came to a supper-dance once, given by a +Baronin O----, dressed as an oriental potentate of sorts. He kept the +several hundred guests, and the good dinner waiting over an hour, +because he insisted on making up the whole court himself. His wife wore +a wonderful headdress she made herself, copied from the fresco in his +music room. It was all gold beads and emeralds. Round her neck was a +huge pear-shaped green stone. I was thinking of the chrysophrases I had +seen inset in the wall of the music room, and said: "What wonderful +chrysophrases, Your Royal Highness." "Not chrysophrases, emeralds," she +gently corrected me. + +The Baroness had engaged some people to entertain the Grand Duke at +supper, served in the huge new ball-room, but two days before the ball, +she telephoned she was in despair as the people had _abgesagt_, and she +could get no one else. Would I be so awfully kind as I was coming +anyway, to help her out? Every one in town knew all my intimate songs as +I had sung them at various functions where the court was invited, so +Marjorie and I had to put on our thinking caps to find a new "stunt." +Marjorie played the _Laute_, that big, graceful instrument so popular +with the love-sick girl in Germany, and I knew some old French songs +like "Claire de Lune," that I sang to her accompaniment. I went to the +theatre and borrowed the tenor's Pagliacci costume, whitened my face and +dressed Marjorie as a _Pierrette_. At a given signal I sprang from +between purple curtains, put my finger to my lips, turned and beckoned +to _Pierrette_ and led her to the little stage the Baroness had built. +The songs went off very well, and the day was saved. Later I changed to +a _Dalila_ costume, and danced with the Grand Duke, dances he invented +as we went along, a favourite amusement of his. He always held his +partner to the side, with one arm about her waist, and I must say it was +very practical and comfortable. He danced beautifully and his favourite +partner was a tall Fräulein von B---- a friend of ours. Once returning +from a concert in a little town in the Bergstrasse where I had been +singing, and which had been attended by part of the court, this same +Hofdame and a famous violinist happened to be with us. We took +fourth-class tickets which entitle you to travel with the peasants in +large wooden box-cars, with benches running round the walls. We all +danced to the violinist's playing, while the peasants looked solemnly on +from their benches. I collected _pfennige_ in a hat which the violinist +then put on his head, _pfennigs_ and all. It was a lovely trip. + +We heard some of the formal court balls were most amusing. We never went +to them as we had not had ourselves presented formally, though this +could have been easily arranged. The supper usually consisted largely of +ham and spinach, typical of the German Royal simplicity. The dancing was +conducted under difficulties. Reversing was not allowed, and all the +dancers had to go in the same direction. When the Grand Duke wished to +dance, his Chamberlain went in front of him to clear the way, as it was +always dreadfully crowded. The women were not permitted to pick up their +gowns, although trains were _de rigueur_ and no short skirts allowed. As +nearly all the men are in uniform, including spurs, the ladies have to +make frequent trips to the dressing room to repair damages. And yet it +is fatal to wear an old gown, as the Grand Duke has a terrific memory +and will say: "Oh, that is the charming gown you wore at Kiel two years +ago, isn't it?" + +All the officers and their wives above the rank of Major must be invited +to the court balls, and, in a small principality like this, those of +lower rank receive invitations too. One Lieutenant, a member of one of +the oldest and poorest Darmstadt families, brought his bride to her +first court ball. She was pretty, but beneath him in social position, +and he had forgotten to tell her the rule about the trains. She lifted +her bridal finery out of the way of the devastating spurs, and was +politely requested by a messenger from Royalty to drop it again. Alas! +She forgot the warning and again switched her train up from the floor, +upon which the oldest _Ehrendame_ (Maid of honour), requested her to +leave the dancing floor. The poor husband felt it so keenly that he +asked to be transferred to a regiment in another town, and his request +was granted. + +They have a custom of choosing an _erster Taenzer_ for every big ball. +He is usually one of the young officers of the highest birth, and his +duties are to assist the hostess in every possible way, and lead all the +dances. + +Court etiquette is really a most hampering institution. In talking to +the Grand Duke for instance, I might not introduce a topic, he had to +give all the leads. This naturally has a deadening effect on the +conversation. At first the tongue-paralyzing "Yes, Your Royal Highness," +"No, Your Royal Highness," even more paralyzing in German, "_Ja wohl, +Koenigliche Hoheit_," "_Nein, Koenigliche Hoheit_," had to be gone +through with, but after a few minutes' conversation I might follow the +simple English custom in talking with Royalty, and say "Yes, Sir," or +"No, Sir." When the Grand Duchess left a crowded ball-room it was +painful both for her and for us. As she advanced, modest and +self-conscious, one made a low _Knix_; to one lady she would give her +hand, always bristling with rings, and you had to kiss the back of it, +risking cutting your lip on the rings; to another merely a glance of the +eye, or a nod of the head, and so the slow, tortuous exit was made. In +the town on muddy days, you might come on the Grand Duke suddenly in a +narrow street and you had to back up against the wall to let him pass, +at the same time dragging your best skirt in the dirt in the +knee-straining curtsey. + +I often thought how immensely popular would be the Prince or Grand Duke +or King, who would one day say, "Oh, stop it, all of you, and give me +your hands and your eyes like human beings." But _what_ would the Kaiser +say? + +Before we went to Darmstadt the Grand Duke had had a tragedy from which +they said he had never recovered. His adored little daughter Elisabeth +was the idol of every one, and the town children's fairy princess. She +was asked to visit her aunt, the Czarina, at Petrograd. While there she +died very suddenly, though in perfect health when she left Darmstadt. +She is believed to have eaten some poisoned food prepared for the Czar's +own children. A monument to her in the _Herren Garten_ at Darmstadt, +shows a glass coffin of the fairytale type; in it lies sleeping +"Snow-White," with the gnomes around her. Above, a weeping willow +brushes soft fingers over the sleeping princess. + +We had several _Backfisch_ admirers; the English "Flapper" comes nearer +to translating this strange word than anything I know. These girls +followed us closely in the streets for a year and finally met us. At +first my sister had her band and I had mine. Finally they dwindled to +just two, very sweet, charming young girls, of whom we became very fond. +Marjorie's was the daughter of a colonel, a count, who was very strict +and military with his delicate flower of a girl. + +As I have said, strange revealing glimpses of the Hun element came to us +now and then, the spirit which now seems to engulf all the better German +people. Two of our girl friends were daughters of a famous noble house. +Their father was a very old General who lived in great seclusion. His +pretty, fair daughters L---- and E----, were often at our house, and +were very fond of my mother who lived with us then. The old General +finally died, and the girls were worn and bent with grief from his long +illness and the trials of nursing him. Their brother was with his +regiment, and for some reason could not get to them in time to make +arrangements for the funeral. The girls were left badly off, and could +not afford a pretentious ceremony. When they tried to explain this to +the undertaker, he was incredulous, but finally said with a brutal +sneering laugh: "Of course you can have a _pauper's_ funeral if you want +one." Everything was done in a way to make it all as hard as possible +for the poor girls by these brutes, and they used to come and tell us +with floods of tears of the insults they had to swallow. At last the +brother arrived, and of course as soon as he appeared in _uniform_ he +was bowed down to and served as only a uniform is served in Germany by +such brutal types. + +During the second year in October word came to us that the Czar of +Russia was coming to rest with his family at the Grand Duke's hunting +lodge, just outside Darmstadt. We were nervous at the thought of all the +Russian students who always throng the Technical School at Darmstadt. It +seemed such an easy thing to bomb a man in such a small quiet town. They +took great precautions, however, and nothing happened. + +I sang many times for the Czar, in "command performances" of _Dalila_, +etc. When he left he was good enough to send me a brooch "as a +remembrance of his wife." It is the Imperial crown, with sapphire eyes, +surrounded by a laurel wreath. He used to sit in a box nearest the stage +with the Grand Duke. In the next box were the little Grand Duchesses, +Olga, Tatiana and Marie, and sometimes Anastasia, the littlest one of +all. They would call in the intervals, "Papa, come in here; _do_ Papa +dear." They always spoke English together. He would go to them and they +would climb all over him, petting him and playing with his hair. It was +rather charming to watch. + +Prince Henry of Prussia was there too, as these three, the Grand Duke, +Czar, and Prince Henry are, or were, fast friends. When they left the +theatre a curious crowd always gathered to see them, but we never had so +much as a glimpse of them, for five black, mysterious motors, closely +hooded, left in a procession, and no one ever knew which one the Czar +was in. The Czarina never came to the theatre; she was intensely nervous +just then, and went nowhere. + +The Czar was to leave Darmstadt on the Monday, and on Sunday we were to +sing "Meistersinger" for him. The day before I had felt frightfully ill, +and suffered as I had been doing for several weeks with pains in my +side. Sunday morning I sent for a doctor, the pain being so bad I was +afraid I would not be able to get through the performance that night. +The doctor in turn sent for the surgeon, who packed me off in an hour to +the hospital for an appendicitis operation. The next morning I was +operated upon, and they told me the Grand Duke had sent to ask how I +was, as the Czar wished to know if the operation was successful before +he left town. I thought it showed a charming, kindly thoughtfulness of +others. + +The nurses were all most kind to me in the hospital, but the surgeon was +utterly uninterested in anything but the healing of the wound itself, +and paid absolutely no attention to the other rather distressing +occurrences of my illness. One could see that a highly strung, nervous +American woman would have fared badly with him. + +Sazonoff was with the Czar's suite, and I remember the Darmstadtites +were much insulted because he always took the train to Frankfurt half an +hour away, or to Wiesbaden (one hour), for luncheon or dinner, as he +said there was nothing fit to eat at the local hotels. I secretly quite +agreed with him. + +We often went ourselves to Frankfurt for tea, or a wild American craving +would come over me for lobster or chicken salad, and we would up and +away to Wiesbaden for supper. Darmstadt was very conveniently situated +for short trips, surrounded as it is by interesting towns--Heidelberg +only a short distance south of us, or Mannheim close enough for a day's +visit. I sang _Niklaus_ in "Hoffmann" in Mannheim for the first time +without a rehearsal, having learnt the part in my room at the piano +without a Kapellmeister to give me the _tempi_, and never having seen +the opera. That was a trying experience, not helped by the tenor +knocking me flat down in the Venetian scene as I rushed on to tell him +that the watch was coming. He weighed about two hundred and fifty +pounds, and colliding with him in midcareer, I gave him right of way by +going down flat on my back. + +At Frankfurt we heard a wonderful performance of "Elektra" with Richard +Strauss conducting and Bahr-Mildenburg as _Klytemnestra_. I shall never +forget her in it, nor the orchestral effects Strauss produced. I felt at +the end as if I had been watching an insane woman, so marvellous was +Bahr-Mildenburg's portrayal of the half-demented creature. Her large +face, pale, with haunting, sick eyes, her scarlet, gold-embroidered +draperies, the clutching, bony fingers on her jewelled staff, the +swaying body she seemed barely able to keep erect, the psychology of the +queen's character, all this together combined to give the exact effect +she wanted, and to convey it strongly and clearly to the farthest seat +in the big theatre. + +We grew to know very well a Russian boy, whose family had interests in +Darmstadt. He told us much of Russia and he and his sister seemed +creatures of a different world to us. She was frail and exotic looking, +with very curly, bronze hair, a skin like a gardenia petal, and the +tiniest full-lipped, blood-red mouth I have ever seen. At home she spent +most of her time in the saddle or in the stables. She had men's uniforms +made, and rode out with the officers dressed as they were. They could +both drink enormous quantities of _Bowle_ and follow it up with +champagne and Swedish punch, and never even flush pink. Only S---- used +to become very talkative and spout Greek verses by the hour. At that +time we lived in a pension, and every Saturday night or after a big +performance of mine, say "Carmen," he would arrange an elaborate fête. +Sometimes we all had to appear dressed as Romans in sheets and wreaths, +before he was satisfied. One night I remember I grew tired of our all +being so monotonously beautiful, and came down dressed as a Suffragette, +with the false nose I wear as the _Witch_ in "Haensel und Gretel," +flowing grey locks, spectacles, and some ridiculous costume, half Greek +and half witch. S---- was so horrified that he never once looked at me +during the evening and I finally saw that he was so genuinely unhappy +that I changed to something more esthetic. + +He had as much spending money apparently as he desired, but his sister +never had a cent. She had no evening gown and only shabby clothes. She +seemed blissfully unaware of any shortcomings of her wardrobe, however, +and only once felt the lack of a party dress. We arranged something for +her that time, as she had no money to spend, and her brother did not +seem to think it necessary to give her any. After a particularly +successful fête, S---- would wander the deserted streets and kneel +before fountains in the public squares, dipping water from them with +his derby hat, and pouring it on the earth as libations to Pallas +Athene, as he always called me. And he was not in the least drunk, if +you will believe me, only fearfully Russian. + +When they left the pension their luggage at the station consisted of a +pile of shabby hand-baggage, mostly newspaper parcels. The girl had no +purse but a soldier's little coin case of goatskin, so Frau von A---- +emptied her own bag, and stuffed L----'s possessions into it. Their +indifference to all these things which would all have been regulated and +in keeping with their position if they had belonged to any other country +than Russia, I believe was quite typical and seemed to me rather +sublime. + +S---- afterwards made a trip round the world. Goodness knows how he +found out whether I was singing or not, but some night after singing one +of my big rôles I would receive a monstrous basket of red roses, or an +armful of orchids, cabled for from Honolulu or China. He even remembered +my _Dachshund's_ birthday, and cabled the baker to send Peter a +wonderful _Torte_ with birthday candles. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +THE GRANDMOTHERS' BALLET + + +All this time I was working very hard at the opera. Our repertoire was +very large, including nearly all the Italian operas, from Verdi to +Wolf-Ferrari, and the German operas from the time of Weber and Mozart up +to Humperdinck. Everything was given in German, some of the translations +good and some poor. At first it had seemed terribly difficult to +accustom myself to the German sounds in _Dalila_ or _Carmen,_ after the +sonorous French, but latterly German came to seem quite as natural, +though never so beautiful nor singable. Every one in the audience, +however, understood the text, and surely this is the important thing. +How can they enter into the spirit of an opera when they are guessing +whether that is a love phrase or an insult that the tenor is singing? +The prejudice against translating into the vernacular has had to be +overcome in nearly all European countries and will, I suppose, be only a +question of time with us. In Russia, operatic composers flowered and +reached their world prominence only after the Russian language was used +for the libretto. In Germany Italian was discarded for the language of +the singers only after a long struggle, but the great abundance of +German operas came after it was adopted, not before. In France also +Italian libretti were used for generations, but can any one imagine a +Debussy composing a "Pelléas et Mélisande" to an Italian libretto? Each +school must find itself in its own tongue, and I question whether these +matters can be hurried. + +I have always thought a good English translation would contribute more +to the general pleasure of the audience than a misunderstood gabble of +words, even though English is perhaps lacking in the subtle charm worked +upon us by foreign speech. + +My colleagues by this time accepted me almost as a German, and I did the +routine work as though I were a German. Surely this experience is more +profitable than an occasional appearance on a more famous stage, such as +many of my own country-women aimed at. I often heard of their struggles +against intrigue, and long pauses between rôles, while they waited +hoping for a chance. We all worked steadily through the season and +rehearsed every day. The scheme of rehearsals was worked out and given +to us every two weeks on a printed _Spielplan_. This showed us exactly +which operas and plays were scheduled for the next fortnight, and all +the rehearsals we should have to attend, beginning with the room +rehearsals for the soloists alone, then the stage rehearsals without +chorus, the stage rehearsal with chorus and piano, and finally the +_General Probe_, or last orchestra rehearsal on the stage, with +everything as at a performance. At the side of the _Spielplan_ was a +tentative list of works in preparation with their probable dates of +appearance. All this made the work very systematic, and I knew exactly +what time I should have for study and what for myself. If a rare week +passed without my singing at least once I grew restless and unhappy. My +constant aim was to learn and develop, and every rôle taught me +something. Versatility is a most useful attribute on the operatic stage, +and if you play all the way from _Fides_ to soubrette parts in operetta, +and the audience sticks to you, you may be considered fairly versatile. + +I remember one strenuous week in particular. I had to sing _Dalila_ in +Prague on Wednesday evening. "Zauberfloete" was scheduled for Tuesday in +Darmstadt, and by taking a late train I could arrive in Prague in time +to dress for _Dalila_. I had to sing the last bit of the _Third Lady_ in +"Zauberfloete" in travelling dress with a black cloak thrown over me and +then rush straight to the train. We travelled all night, changing at +Dresden in the middle of the night, and waiting at the noisy station +for some time. Arrived at Prague I went straight to the theatre, the old +one with gas lamps for footlights. "Don Giovanni" of Mozart was given +for the first time in this very theatre they told me, and was, I +believe, directed by Mozart himself. I duly sang my _Dalila_ and sped +back to Darmstadt, where I had to sing _Frau Reich_ Thursday night; and +this tiring lady has to have a certain lightness of touch no matter how +much train smoke you have swallowed. My troubles were not over yet as I +had to take the train that night for Edinboro, Scotland, where I was to +appear with the orchestra, and on the following night in Glasgow. The +journey was long and tedious, and the only bright spot I can remember +was while we crossed a bit of Belgium. We had had a lunch basket handed +in with the typical bottle of _vin rouge_, and neither Marjorie nor I +wanted it. The next time our train slowed down we happened to have an +engine beside us, and I handed the wine through the window to the +driver, who received it with true Belgian imperturbability. + +I was very tired and very sick crossing the channel. We arrived in +London in a terrible storm, feeling absolutely exhausted. Marjorie said, +"The only thing that hasn't happened is, that we have not yet lost our +baggage." We waited on the cold platform--it was November,--till all the +luggage had been taken out of the vans--no familiar trunks for us. I +went worn out to the hotel, leaving poor Marjorie to struggle. She made +the round of the stations where possible trains from the coast might be +met--all of no avail. The next day was Sunday and we could not possibly +have found a gown for me to use at the concert. We slept that night in +towels and underclothes, and if you've ever done it you know what sort +of an all-night funeral _that_ is. The next morning early the missing +trunks were found and we continued our journey. We were much amused when +we found that no trains left for Scotland during the day on Sunday, and +that they had to wait for the friendly cover of the night before they +dared nefariously to slip out and break the Sabbath calm. Monday night I +almost broke down on the platform during the concert, in one of the +hugest halls in the world. Marjorie comforted me and sent for some +whiskey which I gulped down between songs. Gradually the chilled blood +in me thawed, and my voice with it, my nerve came back and I scored a +success, as I did the following night in Glasgow. We then went back to +Darmstadt the quickest possible way, having been in six countries in as +many days. + +We walked a great deal in the beautiful country round Darmstadt, and I +sometimes rode over the miles of charming bridle paths. We made +expeditions into the beautiful Taunus country, all gold and scarlet in +autumn. The delightful custom of having _Wald Haeuse_ at convenient +distances in every direction round the city, makes these expeditions a +great pleasure. The coffee is usually good, and the cakes always so. + +Darmstadt is on the Bergstrasse, almost a highway through that part of +Germany, and we were pestered one year with a constant stream of +beggars. They were usually ex-theatre people they said, and I found they +only came to me and not to my colleagues, so word must have been passed +round that an "easy" and extremely rich American lived in the town, who +was good for at least a mark. + +The strangest stories circulated about us, and why we should choose +Germany to live in. One was that I was the illegitimate daughter of King +Edward, therefore a cousin of the Grand Duke, which explained a likeness +to him which I could see myself. They said my sister and mother were +really no relation to me, but simply paid to take care of me. + +As I have said we had several picturesque privileges because I was a +_Grossherzogliche Beamtin_--an employée of the Royal house. I used to go +on certain days to the old Schloss near the theatre, no longer the +residence of the reigning family as it was too old to be comfortable. I +passed under shadowy arches and through cobblestone courts, surrounded +by aged windows, till I came to where the _Schloss Kellermann_ lived. I +went down a steep old stone stair into the bowels of the earth, where I +was greeted by the Head Cellarman, who wore a white apron and took +orders at a candle-lit table. I told him just how much Rotwein I wanted, +or perhaps a bottle of champagne for a treat, and paid a ridiculously +small sum for it all. The Grand Duke got it duty free and at special +rates, and we, as his employés were entitled to this rate too. For a +small fee two large flunkies in _Grossherzogliche_ uniforms would +deliver it to my apartment later in the day. I believe the cellars were +very wonderful, but I never was asked to investigate. + +I think only the principals had this privilege, neither the chorus nor +the ballet sharing it, but I may be mistaken. + +Our ballet was rather pitiful. Kind-hearted directors hesitated to +dismiss faithful servants of years' standing, and the result was a +phalanx of grandmothers at the back of the stage. I used to give my old +clothes to the chorus and ballet women, and one family in particular I +almost adopted. The poor mother was a handsome creature of about +forty-five. Her eldest son was twenty-four and a carpenter, and two +babies were born while I was in Darmstadt. Children of all ages came in +between. The father drank and used to ill-treat the mother, who had to +dance gaily as a peasant boy or gypsy, and then go home to all that +misery. Little by little I told the officers' wives I knew about these +things and they were very kind about sending their worn clothing to me +to distribute amongst the women. I believe it amused them very much to +see their old evening gowns washed, always washed, and refurbished, +doing duty as "Empire" gowns, or as the latest thing in Paris creations +on the backs of the walk-on ladies in the French comedies. Eighty marks +a month is not much, even if it is paid all the year round, and somebody +has got to help. + +We had a school of forestry in the town, largely attended by American +boys. It was in the period when our Western boys padded their shoulders +tremendously and wore hump-toed boots. These boys were all husky +specimens, who dressed in the most foresty of forest clothes, boots +laced to the knee, wide western hats and flannel shirts. The woods round +Darmstadt are all most tame and well looked after, but the boys seemed +to think they were dressing the part correctly. When left to themselves +these boys were quite well behaved, but the German students tried to +bully them. The beer-drinking type of student, with his ridiculous +little coloured cap stuck on one side of his head, thinks he owns his +own particular café where his _Stamm-Tisch_ may happen to be. They +objected to various mannerisms of the American boys who visited these +cafés, and the American boys replied in their own western way by +knocking the Germans down. This method of fist fighting was quite +unknown to the Germans, who replied by sending a challenge to duel +according to their custom. The American boys in turn knew nothing of +duelling and refused to fight except with fists. I think a good many fat +Germans bit the dust and got up swearing vengeance. Finally, we heard, +the American boys wired to their fellow countrymen who were students in +Frankfort, "Come over tonight and clean up." Exactly what happened we +never heard, but as both sides grew to understand and respect each other +more, the trouble gradually subsided. The Russian element, usually +rather undesirable in Darmstadt, contributed largely to the +disturbances. + +There were several duelling corps in town, and an American friend of +ours, a student at the technical college, told us of witnessing their +extremely bloody combats. Part of the glory is to have yourself sewed up +without an anesthetic, and go on fighting, and we heard sickening +details. It is supposed to make your nerve tremendously steady, and the +ones who go through the stated number of duels, fighting their way +slowly through a regular course of progression, always the winner, must +indeed be shock and disgust proof. The authorities frowned on the +practice but it existed in force nevertheless. One boy killed another +while we were there; he was imprisoned, but on his return was treated as +a conquering hero by the members of his corps. That surely belongs to +Hun training. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +STAGE FASHIONS AND THE GLORY OF COLOUR + + +We played continuously nine months from September to June, and then +scattered for the holidays. I often went to Munich for the Wagnerian +_Festspiel_. We have many German relatives (though not a drop of German +blood), as three of my grandfather's sisters married German officers. +Through remote ancestors we also have dozens of cousins in the north of +Germany. The Munich relations I dearly loved. The son of the famous +court architect, von Klenze, who built nearly all the noble buildings in +Munich for the old King Ludwig of Bavaria, who abdicated his +throne--married my mother's aunt, and their descendants were always very +charming to me. The northern cousins who lived in East and North Prussia +we always heard were quite different, cold, critical, and not warm, and +artistic, and friendly, as I found our southern relations. In Darmstadt +they seem between the two peoples in character, and of course in the +theatre one meets all sorts. + +Our _Souffleuse_, "Bobberle," was from Schwabia, and her sister was a +character. She proved her elegance by wearing the most brilliant colours +on her fat little body, and plastering the family jewelry all over +herself. She screamed remarks about the members of the company to her +friends between the acts, and the remarks were not as undiscerning as +you might think. + +The top box on the right side of the house, was reserved for the humble +hangers-on of the _Personal_. My sister used often to sit up there as +she could just walk in without my having to ask for a seat, while my +mother sat in state in a specially reserved seat in the orchestra, for +which I had to ask each time. The oldest mothers and the _Souffleuse's_ +sister used to be an unending joy to my sister, in their comments. The +order of their seats was theirs by divine right, they thought, and woe +betide some comparatively new-comer who would venture to take one-eyed +Frau S----'s or fat Frau W----'s chair. It was called the _Raben's +Nest_ (the raven's nest), and we felt its influence hanging over us on +the stage. I was quite familiar with the remarks that were made nightly: + +"_Ach! unsere Kaethe spielt ja Heute!_" ("Oh! our little Katy plays +tonight"), the mother of Katy would announce rapturously, and settle +down with her chin on the rail, and her back bent like a jack-knife, +for three hours of proud but critical joy. She had probably toiled most +of the night with her little seamstress to turn out the marvels Kaethe +wore. + +There are certain props that lend an unfailing air of gorgeousness to +the provincial German mind, whether viewed from in front of, or behind +the footlights. An aigrette does duty for years and has a sure-fire +elegance; pinned on a winter hat of black velvet, or a summer leghorn, +or worn with a bow in an evening coiffure, you know its wearer belongs +to the most exclusive social set. Our coiffeur had only one eye, but +used to bring that one as close as possible to the head of her victim +and make it do duty for two. She turned out wonderful puffs and curls. +In "Dollar Prinzessin" I introduced a new style of hair dressing from +Paris: the hair parted, and a multitude of close curls at the back of +the head, the whole surrounded by a rather broad band of ribbon of the +shade one desired. This took Darmstadt by storm, and was repeated for +two years in every conceivable version. The curls I am sorry to say, +turned into tight sausages, but how much more _praktisch_! Couldn't the +curls then be worn at least three times without being re-dressed? + +A lorgnon is of course "Hoch elegant," also quite irresistibly snorty, +if you are playing an elderly Duchess type of person. If you read that +tunics are worn in Paris you put them on all your gowns, though they +may be hideously unbecoming to you. Even the time-honoured +hat-on-the-back-of-the-head outline had to be renounced one season, and +every one peered out at you from a hat or toque brim almost down on the +bridge of the nose in front, and cocked up in the back. Unbecoming--it +was admitted--, but "man" did it in Paris and should Darmstadt lag +behind? + +The problem of clothes for the actress is a terrific one, and I think +almost every one in town knows and makes allowances for this. The men go +further astray in the quest of fashion, or perhaps it is that the +slightest lapse from rigid formality is so noticeable in their dress of +today. In Metz dickeys, or small false fronts, were worn as a matter of +course in the place of evening shirts. If you were long and the dickey +was short you stuck a jaunty, flaming silk handkerchief in your vest in +front, to hide dangerous glimpses of Jaegers. And then why stick +slavishly to the bow tie of white cotton? A black or scarlet string tie +was distinctly more novel, and attracted attention at once if worn with +an otherwise conventional evening coat. + +In Darmstadt the men knew better, but some of them tried to ape the +officers in walk, monocle, or hair brushing, to the huge delight of the +officers. One clever actor always made his greatest climax by suddenly +throwing back his coat edge as he finished a "There, what do you say to +that?" speech, and so revealing the gorgeous black satin lining. This of +course was unanswerable, and never failed of its effect. You knew at +once you had a man of the world before you, a man familiar with the most +exclusive club life, valeted, perfumed and manicured irreproachably, and +you succumbed accordingly. + +The Grand Duke would sit, lynx-eyed, up in his box, and take this all +in. I always felt he never missed anything, and it was inspiring to play +to him. When his box was empty I always missed this scrutiny. + +Sometimes one gets messages that well-known people have been out in +front, and this knowledge, and the thought that some wandering +_Intendant_ in search of talent may be watching you, always spurs you on +if you are tired. Once a famous Dutch painter saw me as _Amneris_. He +was of course quite unknown to me, but sent me word later to say what +pleasure I had given him by recreating in his mind the Egyptian +silhouettes and colouring he loved. I had striven so hard to do this, it +was a great pleasure to know that I had succeeded in suggesting it. + +A dear old gentleman in town, who had travelled much, sent me many +postcards from Spain, because my _Carmen_ brought back to him his happy +days there. He sent me a real Russian "Order" for my _Orlofsky_ in +"Fledermaus," which I always afterwards wore with that gentleman's +severe court dress. Laurel wreaths and wreaths of heavy silvered leaves +were sent to me, with gold lettered inscriptions, and I kept them for +ages in my music room. + +During the last winter in Darmstadt I went up to Berlin to give a +try-out recital. It was managed by the great Wolf Bureau, and my friend +Mr. Fernow at once took an interest in me, which continued as long as I +was in Germany. I heard of Coenraad von Bos, and wanted to have him play +for me. We rehearsed the day before the concert, and I soon found I had +made another real friend in Bos. He said afterwards, when he was told I +wanted just one rehearsal for a Berlin recital, he thought to himself I +must be either very bad or very good. The truth was I could not get a +longer leave of absence from the opera and so more than one rehearsal +was impossible. I have always adored rehearsing, especially for a +concert, with such an artist as Bos to play for me, and one of the +greatest joys of my life was preparing a program with Erich Wolf for a +later Berlin recital. To go back to my concert--Bos worked very hard +that evening to make it a success, calling up all of his musical friends +to tell them of his new find. It _was_ a great success and I have never +read such notices as I received from all the papers. They told me no +foreigner had ever had such unanimous and extraordinary praise for a +first recital, and Papa Fernow kissed me in the green room. + +I should have immediately followed up that concert with two or three +more, but I was obliged to return to my duties, and so lost the +opportunity of reaping the reward of an unusual beginning. + +They wanted me to sign on in Darmstadt, but I felt that I had sung the +repertoire faithfully for three years, and that I wanted more worlds to +conquer, and a bigger town to criticize my work. + +I went to Munich to sing for Baron S----, who liked me and offered me a +contract, depending on the outcome of two _Gastspiele_, or guest +performances, to be absolved the following October, my contract then to +go into effect. + +My farewell in Darmstadt was "Carmen" and the people _were_ good to me. +After the last curtain I left the stage for a minute, and when I came +back to take my calls the stage was filled from side to side with +flowers; they were banked and grouped all round me. The curtain then +went up and down innumerable times, till I felt like weeping at leaving +all these kind friends. For some reason my cab did not come for me and +when I left the theatre the crowd waiting at the stage door followed me +home, calling out "Come back soon," "Auf Wiedersehen," and many kind +things. These are not perhaps great triumphs, but they make an artist's +life very happy, and the life I led for those three years, comes very +near being the ideal one for an opera singer. + +I think it was two years before this, on returning to Paris, that I took +part in Strauss' "Salome." We gave six performances at the Châtelet. I +took the page's small part, just for the fun of it, and so as to study +the opera. The stage manager was a German of course, and spoke very +little French. The singers were all Germans, and the "figurants," +supers, all French. Things did not go well at rehearsals. Burrian, as +the King would cry for wine or grapes, and no one moved to get what he +wished, as no one understood what he was saying, and so could not get +the musical cue. I was the only person able to speak the two languages +fluently, and finally the stage manager asked me to take charge of all +the business on my side of the stage. "_Suivez Madame!_" he would yell. +So I said "Remove throne." "Bring golden vessels." "Clear stage," etc., +to the intelligent crowd of supers, many of whom were young actors, who +wanted as I did to study the opera. I remember one hideous little girl, +who had an unattractive sore lip. Some one told her that it did not +matter much, trying to comfort her, as she seemed so depressed about +it, but she was inconsolable, and replied darkly, "it was always seven +days lost." This brave effort to create the impression of an otherwise +lurid existence deceived no one however, though they were too polite to +show their doubt. + +Destinn's voice rose thrillingly in the love phrases that _Salome_ pours +at _John_; and though she wore a costume that my young French friends +considered consisted chiefly of _chats enragés_,--mad cats,--as it had +two huge animal heads of gold, where such types of stage villainesses +are always heavily protected, the tense quality of her voice, and the +simple strength of her acting suited the character as Strauss had +painted it with his music, and she achieved results that no other singer +I know of could have done. + +I had gone back as usual to de Reszke to have my voice put in order, and +was having, at the same time, my taste put in order by my sculptor +brother Cecil, in our walks and talks about Paris and its museums. My +brother's wonderfully clear vision of art and beauty is never clouded, +and I owe much to my association with him. We used to go to all the +Salons, and I remember vividly the first time we stumbled on a specimen +of the modern Spanish school, then quite new to us. We had looked at +dreary wastes of raspberry jam Venuses, resting on the crests of most +solid waves, dozens of canvases still in the Louis XVI era, and much +pastel-coloured mediocrity, when suddenly I called out "Look, Cec, +something new!" It was a big square of flaming colour--women and a child +in red checked cotton, picking scarlet tomatoes from high-trained vines, +in the brilliant sun. It glowed and fairly zizzed with colour, and had +that radiating, vibrating quality that things have in the hot sunshine. +We had had the "confetti" and "spot" types of work for some years, but +this canvas dwarfed anything modern I had seen in Paris. We have never +found another one by the same man, and have often wondered what became +of his work. + +I think that was when I first fell in love with colour _per se_, though +I had flirted with it before. We had loved Monet and the opalescent, +shimmering lights in his water-garden series, but never had I been so +stirred and thrilled by mere paint on canvas as I was by this Spaniard's +work. It seems that a man only rarely can put colours together that will +have the living dazzling look that one sees in nature. Matisse was a +past master of it, and even though one might not agree with him +otherwise, his colour was a joy. + +Later the Cubists and Futurists invaded Paris. When I am with Cecil and +he talks to me of their work, I see their aims quite clearly, and +understand what they are trying to express, for their "line of talk" is +much more lucid than their work: but when I am not with my brother I +must confess my understanding is dimmed, and I forget the arguments he +used. + +We lived very simply in Paris, having our meals sometimes at the +_quartier_ restaurants, and sometimes getting _filets_ of fresh +mushrooms, peas, and delicious Paris potatoes, with big strawberries +shaped like little whisk-brooms, and _crême d' Isigny_ in its stubby +little earthen pots, and preparing them at home. I had a small apartment +in the same house as my mother, and my brother had his studio some +blocks from us. + +We met Spaniards, Norwegians, French, anything but Americans, of whom we +knew but few--we learnt so much more through talking with people of +other nationalities than our own. Paris is such a marvellous place for +development. As my brother said, he never knew when some one whose +opinion he must respect might not drop into the studio, and give his +work a searching inspection. The atmosphere of having to keep constantly +at your very best because of the rigid intellectual criticism you +encounter at every turn, is most stimulating. + +Rembrandt Bugatti was a great friend of my brother's, of whom I think he +was really fond, and this was a priceless association for a young +student. Bugatti was a genius, unrivalled by any other man of his age, +and very few of any other age, and his tragic death is a great loss to +the art world. His growing deafness and his acute sensitiveness must +have made life impossible for him. His recollection of the happy years +spent in Antwerp, when he and my brother were well-known figures +there--wearing long, swinging, dark blue, Italian cavalry capes, smoking +eternal pipes and working all day in the open air in the Zoo--compared +to what the Germans have made of Belgium, proved too great a spiritual +burden for him. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +ROYAL HUMOUR + + +During that summer Baron S---- died in Munich. This of course was a +great blow to me and I did not know what I could do about my contract. I +went to Berlin to see Herr Harder, who told me I must _gastieren_ +according to contract in October, but as the new _Intendant_ was not to +come into office till November, no one could really engage me, +especially as a very exacting new musical director was coming from +Vienna later in the season, and they would both undoubtedly want to +choose their own first contralto. + +However, I went and sang under trying circumstances, with a very sore +throat and a sinking heart. The colleagues thought I would be engaged, +but I did not see who was to do it, and as it turned out I was +right--and there _was_ no one to do it. This depressed me extremely, but +I resolved to return to Berlin, and devote the year to following up my +previous recital. As a matter of fact, this apparent blow turned out to +be all for the best, as so often happens, for otherwise I should have +been caught in Germany at the beginning of the war, and my career upset, +which happened to several other girls. + +The concert field is a rich one in Europe and I had made a good +beginning. I booked a tour in Holland, through the kindly offices of +Bos, where I was as well received as I had been in Berlin. The critics +wrote such eulogies that I almost blush to read them. People quite +unknown to me would go from town to town to hear me, and I would see +them at Rotterdam or Utrecht smiling up at me. I have never sung to such +adorable audiences. They seem to understand all languages, and a "Claire +de Lune" sung in French seems to please them as much as Schubert's +magnificent "Allmacht." + +The "coffee pause" half way down the program, was quite a shock to me +the first night, but I soon grew to look for it, and enjoyed the smell +of the strong smoking coffee the waiters used to carry round on trays to +the audience. It was rather disturbing, however, to have to watch the +waiters finish up the contents of the pots, at the back of the hall, +while I began on the second half of the program. Evidently to them the +coffee, and the audience, were of first importance, and the mere singer +quite secondary; all of which is point of view. + +My sister and I lived at The Hague, and Holland is so delightfully +small that we could nearly always return there, after the evening's +concert in another town. I went back in the spring for another series of +recitals and felt that I was returning to old friends. I was offered a +tour to Java, and would love to have undertaken it, but could not see my +way clear just then. + +In December I was in Berlin for a week or two, and Harder sent me word +to come and sing for Mr. Percy Pitt of Covent Garden. The two contracts +I had held so far had been closed with a minimum of delay and trouble, +and now I was to make the biggest one of my career in the same simple +way. I was not in the best of voice when I sang for Mr. Pitt, but I sang +the Siegfried _Erda_, and was disgusted with myself for singing so +badly. He asked me if I were ready to sing the list of leading rôles +which he read to me, and on my answering in the affirmative engaged me +on the spot; proving, to me at least, that successful or unsuccessful +_Vorsingen_ and even _Gastspiele_ have very little to do with most +engagements. In the case of a singer of any reputation at all, the +Director has usually made up his mind pretty well beforehand what he is +going to do. If he wants you he takes you, even if you have sung badly +that particular time, and if he does not want you, nothing that I have +heard of can make him engage you. + +This contract was for the following spring. We were to give the "Ring" +of Wagner, three times, and Arthur Nikisch was to conduct. Also +"Koenigskinder" was to be given for the first time at Covent Garden, and +I was one of the few who had sung the _Witch_ at that time. "The Flying +Dutchman" completed the list of operas I was to sing in. + +After closing the contract we left for Bergen, Norway, where I had a +concert engagement. One great advantage of having my dear friends, the +Jones, back of me, was, that I could take a big journey like this; and +though it might eat up all of my profit I did not have to refuse it on +that account. + +We were fascinated by Scandinavia, and though I went to sing with the +orchestra in one concert only, I remained in Bergen to give three +recitals by myself. The trip across the Finse railway, over the snowy +glaciers, I shall never forget. The line had only recently been opened, +and very few passengers shared the trip with us. We saw a herd of +reindeer, and I fed some of them with coarse salt at one of the +stations. Bergen itself was warm and muggy and smelt of fish. Everything +in the place smelt of fish, even the hotel towels. Two kindly women +managers took charge of my concerts, and I felt far away from America +till I saw a portrait of Miss Emma Thursby in their music shop. + +The warm-hearted Norwegians were delightful to us, and we met many of +Grieg's relations, and heard tales of him. One of his cousins, I think, +came all the way to Berlin to study with me, but to my great regret I +had no time to give her. + +I was interviewed on my first day by a nice little fellow, who could +hardly speak German, and no English nor French. Our conversation was +conducted under difficulties, but was most enjoyable none the less. The +next day I received a request for a photo from him, with a card saying: +"_Seit ich Ihnen sah bin ich sterblich verliebt._"--This bad German +means approximately, "Since I saw you I am mortally in love." + +We loved our stay in Scandinavia. I remember when we first arrived in +Christiania we could not make out why the streets were thronged with +good looking men and women, from two o'clock till three in the +afternoon, and quite empty after that. We walked through the snowy, +glittering avenues, and met all these healthy red-cheeked pedestrians +talking and laughing and having a wonderful social time. We then +discovered their meal times are quite different from ours. You have an +early cup of coffee, then a light breakfast at eleven o'clock, then +dinner at three or four, preceded sometimes by this walk. Supper is +served at eight-thirty or nine, and is usually laid out on a long table +in the centre of the room. There are cold meats and salads; cold fish +and pickled fish; queer breads; and, of course, you go first for the +wonderful _hors d'oeuvres_ of countless varieties, for this is where +they grow. + +A Swede once told me you could always tell a German travelling in +Sweden, because when the _Schwedische Platte_ or _hors d'oeuvres_ were +passed to him, he made a meal of the dainty mayonnaise and savoury +morsels, instead of eating them as an appetizer, as is intended. In the +beautiful station of Copenhagen, decorated in the old Norse style, with +scarlet-painted wooden carved beams, we were served with all we could +eat of these dainties with bread and butter, for about forty cents--and +I wished I were a German! + +On the way home, we were storm-bound at Copenhagen, and I at once fell +in love with that city, and its wonderful blond race of big men and +women. We heard stories of divorces and passionate love affairs, that +made other nations pale by contrast. One delightful man told us he had +had no objection to his wife having _one_ lover, but when he found she +had seven, he thought it time to get a divorce! He still quite often saw +her, and said they were the best friends in the world. He liked to take +her out to dinner and the theatre and tell her all about everything. He +called us "The Misses Chickens Howard," and was only restrained by +business engagements from following us from place to place. That was a +hobby of his, he said, when he found a sympathetic artist. + +We crossed back to Germany, and I sang with Nickisch for the first time, +in Hamburg. His room behind the stage swarmed with ladies, in the +_entr'acte_, and the concert master told me it was always so. A valet +looked him over carefully before he went on the stage, pulled down his +coat, and patted the Herr Professor's shoulders. I remembered the cuff +story in Metz and watched through the crack of the door to see if it +still held good--and it did! + +Later I sang with Mengelberg in Frankfort. He said to me, eating apples +the while: "I engaged you because friends of mine in Holland told me you +could sing. Can you?" After the concert he came to me again, still +eating apples, and said: "_Es is wahr. Sie haben eine Prachtvolle +Stimme, und koennen prachtvoll singen_," and kissed my hand. + +To hear Mengelberg direct "Tod und Verklaerung" of Strauss, with his own +orchestra is one of the most tremendous things I have ever experienced. +One is transported. A little man with a tight mouth and an aureole of +fair hair, he is feared by his men, but _how_ he is respected! That +winter he spent almost every night in the train, as he conducted +regularly in Holland, Germany and Russia. + +I have always been able to get on with really great musicians, and have +found only the second best _difficile_ and small. The path seems +suddenly smooth when in rehearsal, you feel this wealth of absolute +knowledge and authority supporting, leading and inspiring you. Anxiety +vanishes and one's best pours from one without effort, only with the +sensation of wringing every last drop of beauty from the phrase. + +We returned to Sweden to concerts with Stenhammer, and I should have +crossed to Helsingfors to sing _Dalila_, but had to return on account of +engagements in Germany. + +Through our forbears, as I have said, we have many relations in Germany; +and in Berlin we enjoyed immensely knowing our cousins the von M---- s. +The General had just been moved back to Berlin to fill an extremely high +military position, and as he was musical we, of course, had much in +common. The daughters were all beautifully brought up; simple girls, +frank and natural as German aristocrats are. They gave a musical, at +which the General and I both sang. Their apartment was very large, but +was so crowded for the concert that I felt as though the Duchess of +Dalibor sat almost in my throat as I sang, and her enormous pearls +distracted me in the "Sapphische Ode." I have never seen such +unbelievably huge pearls. We were asked to stay to _Abendessen_ after +the concert, and it consisted chiefly of the sandwiches and refreshments +left over from the party. This showed us again the absolute simplicity +of the well-born German of irreproachable position. + +The girls were very intimate with the Kaiser's only daughter, Princess +Victoria Louise, and when her marriage to the Duke of Brunswick's son, +was celebrated, Irma was one of the bride's-maids. Onkle Geo, as we +called him, told us about the Kaiser, to whom he was devoted. At the +dinner table, he said, His Majesty would usually talk only with the men +present, ignoring completely the ladies who might be present. + +When the General made his re-entry into court for the first time after +receiving his high office, all the courtiers present watched to see just +how he would be received by His Majesty, which would then give the +keynote for his treatment by the whole court. After the general +reception, General von M---- was invited to go into a more private room +with several more gentlemen. This promised well, as it was in this room +that the Kaiser talked more intimately with the guests of his choosing. + +The General held his helmet with its _Feder-busch_, or crest of white +feathers on his arm, and felt the eyes of all assembled on him as the +Kaiser came quickly into the room, and made his way to him. Now was the +critical moment that might have everlasting consequences. Onkle Geo +confessed to nervousness, but His Majesty guessed the situation, and +said, "Hum! _You_ need a new helmet, that _Feder-busch_ is shabby," in a +bantering tone. The courtiers knew this was meant for friendly, humorous +comment, and was intended to be laughed at, so they laughed accordingly +at Onkle Geo's confusion, and the ice was broken. "And my helmet was +quite new!" said Onkle Geo, half indignantly, half laughing. + +The court was very simple, and we heard stories of this through other +friends who had the _entrée_. A Graefin D----, returning one evening +from a court ball given in honor of the then Regent of Bavaria, gave me +a bon-bon done up in silver paper, with a little photo of the Kaiserin +on it. The bon-bon was white, and the Graefin said as long as any one +could remember, these had been the official souvenirs of court dinners: +only the photo varied. + +One charming girl we knew, a great favourite of the Empress, came back +from the Palace one Christmas day, and told us what she had received +from Her Majesty as a Christmas greeting--a small, old-fashioned tippet +and muff of woolly white Angora, and two small, cheap Japanese vases, +that some one had given the Empress the year before. The Royal +magnificence one would expect gave way to--extreme simplicity let us +call it. + +The Kaiser took a keen interest in the opera, and gave wonderful +presents to his favourite singers. We saw a spectacle at the opera house +that he was supposed to have inspired, and which was carried out under +his direction. It was a sort of panorama of scenes in Corfu, where he +spent much time. It must have been horribly expensive, for I never saw +so much scenery at any performance, and it really was exquisite to see +those beautifully reproduced scenes unfold before one. + +Such things, however, as painted castles and woods and flowers always +seem to me excessively naïve. The Russian idea of a wonderful +imaginative back-drop is infinitely more stimulating to a performance. +Of course, there are places where it cannot be used. If the scene is +laid in a Childs' restaurant a back-drop might perhaps be comic to a +mind not yet used to making its own pictures; but I hope and believe the +aim is towards simplicity in this direction; but the simplicity must be +carried out by artists, and first-rate ones. Who, who has seen the +leaping figures of the Russian Ballet in "Prince Igor," has felt a lack +on the scenic side because the tents with their feather of smoke were +suggested on a flat back-drop? Who longed for real, that is, one-side +real, tents--with steam escaping from a semi-hidden pipe through the +top? The luridness was suggested by colour far more skilfully than if +rocks, thinly swaying and lit by red lights, had cluttered up the wings. +Make the audience do the thinking, blend stimulation with simulation, +and if your artist has been a true one no one will cry for flapping +pillars, or crumpled leaves on a net. + +"Boris Goudonow," as it used to be given at the Metropolitan, is a good +example of what real artist vision can do with colour. Those who saw +those figures in brilliant green, kneeling with their backs to the +audience, barring off the procession scene, while the towering minaret +of the cathedral carried the eye up and up at the back, will surely +never forget the light and shade grouping. It has since, I am sorry to +say, lost some of its skilful arrangement, which I suppose is +unavoidable, but the performance is still homogeneous and a unit, as to +_décors,_ score and costumes. + +It was on the Kaiser's birthday that we saw "Corfu," and afterwards we +went to the newly-opened Hotel Esplanade for supper. I have never seen +such a sight. All imaginable uniforms were there, on all types of +officers and foreign diplomats. Some looked magnificently romantic, and +some as if they had stepped from the comic opera stage. The women, as +usual in Germany, though plentifully be-jewelled, looked dull and +inadequate beside the men. + +One summer night in Berlin, we went to Max Reinhardt's small theatre, +the Kammerspiel, to see "Fruehlingserwachen." My dear friend, Oscar +Saenger, was in town, and I had happened to see him in a box at the +opera the evening before. He had come to see Berger, the giant baritone +whom he had transformed into a tenor, in his first performance of +_Siegmund_. I think Putnam Griswold, that splendid type of the best +American singer, sang the _Wanderer_ that night. Saenger asked us to go +to the theatre with him, as we had not met in years, and by chance we +chose "Fruehlingserwachen" of Wedekind. Never shall I forget that +evening. The quiet, dark wooden walls of the theatre, and the +comfortable box they showed us into, in which we sat, seeing but unseen +in the obscurity; the lack of applause when the curtain fell, and +then--the performance. German actors lead the world, in my opinion, and +the intensity of those players, the skill with which they played those +most unhappy children, the tremulous, inadequate mother, that dark scene +with its girl-women shriek, left us breathless and dazed. + +The highest possible tribute I pay to German actors, and to some of +those gathered together that winter in that theatre. Such a _Falstaff_ +I never saw as we saw there in "Henry V," nor such marvellous +presentations of Shakespeare. Moissy as _Prince Hal_ in his father's +deathbed scene; the _Doll Tearsheet_; the collection of hangers-on in +the Inn Scene, the understanding of the spirit of Shakespeare--all these +were priceless joys. Shakespeare does not spell bankruptcy in Germany, +and the people really love it, and perhaps there is a reason why. + +The next night in the same house, you might see a translation of a +French drawingroom comedy. With the exception of one or two, these +people were quite as at home in that as in classic drama. That I had +never believed possible till I saw it proven. It had always seemed to me +that the French were absolutely unrivalled in such things as "Mlle. +Georgette, ma femme"; but they were even more sincerely, yet just as +lightly done by Reinhardt's people. It was always such a joy in Europe +to go to the theatre in London, Paris or Berlin. To see Lavallière with +her inimitable _gamine_ ways, was the most delicious of pleasures; and +the polish of the older actors of the French stage, the _Marquis_ or +_Marquise_, or old butler or housekeeper, as the case may be, is a +wonderful model for the student. French actors seem to be able to come +into a room, sit down at a table and talk for half an hour, using almost +no gestures, without becoming in the least boresome or monotonous. When +scenes of strong passion are wanted, the Germans, I think, excel their +French rivals. A Frenchman, or, for that matter, any Latin, is inclined +to rant just a bit, and become unconvincing, at least to an Anglo-Saxon +mind; but the German, when called upon for strength and power of +passion, rises thrillingly and gloriously, and completely sweeps you +away. + +Even in Darmstadt we had many notable performances. That of the +"Versunkene Glocke," for instance, was most memorable. We had a splendid +old actor for the _Well Spirit, Nickelmann,_ and nothing could have been +wetter or more unearthly than his sloshing slowly up from the depth of +the well, his webbed, greenish fingers appearing clutchingly first, and +then his grating, fishy croak, "_R-r-r-rautendelein! R-r-r-r-rautendelein!_" +The faun was also excellently done by a young fellow with marvellous +faun-like agility; altogether these unpretentious people realized the +fairy-tale spirit, the wood feeling of the story, in a most imaginative, +subtle way. Where in America in a town of Darmstadt's size could you see +such a performance? + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +COVENT GARDEN AND--AMERICA + + +In due time we set out for London. One of our cousins had found us +delightful diggings in M---- Street, which I was able to enjoy, as dear +Mr. and Mrs. Jones sent me an extra cheque to impress London with. We +were waited upon by an old butler, and his wife did the cooking. Such +legs of lamb, and deep plum tarts, with lashings of clotted cream! Such +snowy napery, and silver polished as only English butlers can polish it. + +It was not by any means my first visit to London, professionally. I had +sung in private drawingrooms in previous seasons, and had also given a +recital. Her Royal Highness Princess Christian of Schleswig-Holstein, +and her daughter, Princess Victoria, graciously consented to be my +patronesses at this concert. I had not the slightest idea how to arrange +for them, after they had kindly consented to be present, but I gathered +that a special pair of comfortable chairs must be put directly below the +stage, with a little table. Then I thought "Flowers or no flowers?" I +should have loved to send them, but English Royalties are so simple and +natural I instinctively felt that any ostentation would be distasteful. +Somehow one hates to do the wrong thing in the presence of Personages; +it is an un-American feeling, but a human one. + +They applauded me a great deal, and after a bow of acknowledgment to the +nice audience I gave the Princesses each time an English, +straight-up-and-down curtsey, and I hope that was right. In Germany a +back-swaying, one-toe-pointed-in-front curtsey was demanded. These +things are at once trivial and vastly important. + +The decent getting Their Royal Highnesses in and out of the hall I left +to the capable manager, to whom Princess Christian said as she passed, +"She ought to be singing in Covent Garden." I very soon was. + +I was rather nervous at the beginning at Covent Garden. Most of the +others were so famous, and all of them so much older than I. However, I +soon got recognition and they were all very nice to me. I enjoyed +especially talking to Van Rooy. He told me all about the wonderful +armour he wore in the "Ring." Never have I seen his equal as the +_Wanderer_. As he himself said, the old line of singers, the giants, the +de Reszkes, Terninas, Lehmanns and Brandts, seemed to have died out. I +often look for the grand line, the dignity, the flowing, noble breadth +of gesture one saw in the older Wagnerian singers, but how often does +one see it now? Of course, my memories of them are those of a very young +girl, but I saw the same thing in Van Rooy, though his voice showed +wear, and the bigness of their impersonations is stamped indelibly on my +memory, dwarfing the lesser ones. + +Nikisch came for the last few rehearsals. He took that raw, +English-sounding orchestra, with its unrelated sounds of blaring brass, +and rough strings, and unified and dignified it by his personality, his +work and his brain power till it produced what he would have--Wagner in +his glory. His gestures were like a sculptor's. My brother, who came to +stay with us, also noticed this. Nikisch seemed to sculpt the phrases +out of the air, and brought home again to us both the close relation +between the lines of music and the lines of noble sculpture. The +Parthenon freeze--is it not music? My brother says the Air of Bach is +absolutely one with the outlines of this masterpiece, just as pure, +noble and majestically simple, moving in slow, stately rhythm. + +We gave the "Ring" three times and I sang the _Erdas_ and _Fricka_ and +_Waltrautes_. The latter in "Goetterdaemmerung" I enjoyed doing so much +with Nikisch. We only rehearsed it at the piano, and he said as he sat +down: "_Jetzt bin ich neugierig. Entweder kann die Waltraute +wunderschoen sein, oder sehr langweilig._" ("Now I am curious. +_Waltraute_ can either be very beautiful or very uninteresting.") He did +not find it _langweilig_ however. + +I had one of my fits of depression I so often get after singing, (when I +feel I must leave the stage, I am so hopelessly bad, and nothing any one +can do or say cheers me inwardly), and it was particularly abysmal, the +day after _Waltraute_. One never sings just as one would like to, and in +my head I hear the phrase so much more beautifully done than any one but +Caruso can do it. That day I sat at lunch with my faithful Marjorie, who +always puts up with me. We were lunching in a little place near us, and +I was deep in the blues. Marjorie's eye fell on the _Daily Telegraph_ +and we saw a wonderful criticism by Robin Legge; just a few words, but +so sincere and appreciative. It helped such a lot. Criticism can mean so +much to one for good or evil. The thought of a cruelly amusing phrase +the critic has coined, unable to resist the very human temptation, will +come winging to you the next time you step out on the stage to sing the +same rôle, and you feel that sardonic wave striking you afresh and +jangling your already quivering nerves. It takes courage after that to +go on. On the contrary, a few words of appreciation of what you have +tried so hard, through such long years to do, will tide you over many +black hours of discouragement, and you think: "I can't be so absolutely +rotten, didn't X---- write that about me? and he's supposed to know +something about it." An intelligent constructive criticism is the most +helpful thing possible, and stimulates one to work to correct one's +faults. Personal remarks wound one's feelings deeply, and one is obliged +to swallow hard and go bravely on, but the policeman's life is not a +happy one. + +[Illustration: CARUSO'S CARICATURE OF KATHLEEN HOWARD] + +The Royal Opera is in the middle of the vegetable market, and on the +days when produce arrives, the streets are full of cockney porters. It +was rather amusing one day, going to rehearsal. I was dressed in my new +black satin suit from Paris, and a smart little white hat. A porter +caught sight of me, pushed back the other men on both sides of me, and +said, "Get out of the loidy's wy, cahn't yer, Bill? That's roight, Miss, +I always loikes to see the lydies wen Ahm workin', that's right, Miss, +very neat, too." The next day it was raining and I was not so smart, and +the same man saw me and said with an air of disappointment, "Ah don't +like it 'aaf so well as yisterdy, Miss." + +I have often heard of American singers who could "bluff" or "hypnotize" +directors into giving them chances which they thought they were entitled +to, and from which they always emerged with flying colours. This is the +tale of how I once, and only once, tried to "bluff," and how I nearly +got caught at it. + +When the list of rôles for Convent Garden was submitted to me in Berlin +I had actually sung on the stage all of them but one, _Brangaene_. I +always found this lady so weak, compared to _Isolde_, that she had never +interested me especially, and I had never studied her. I decided, +however, that having sung ninety-nine per cent. of the rôles they wanted +I could risk the one per cent., _Brangaene_, hoping that Kirkby-Lunn +would not relinquish her. I learned the rôle, though, in record time +between concert dates, and trusted to "luck." The season was drawing to +a close, and all the operas had passed off well, when, just as we were +going to dinner one evening, I was called to the 'phone and told Madame +Kirkby-Lunn had been taken suddenly ill at the beginning of the first +act of "Tristan," would probably not be able to go on in the second, and +would I please come right down and make up. + +In a nervous tremor, for _Brangaene_ is not easy without orchestra +rehearsal, and I was not quite sure of all the business cues, I went +down, hunted out something to wear, put on my trusty "beauty" wig, +hurriedly went over the second act with an assistant conductor, finding +my memory was standing the strain, and then stood trembling in the +wings. I thought to myself "Nemesis!" and shivered. What I hoped +was--that if Madame really was going to have to give up it might be just +before the lovely "Warnung" behind the scenes, because I had always +wanted to sing that. + +There I stood and the rouge soaked into my face as it always +mysteriously does, when one is not at one's best, leaving me pale and +anxious--a real _Brangaene_. Poor Madame Kirkby-Lunn sang just as +beautifully as ever though, but fainted after the second act. I went +into her dressing room and offered to do the last bit and let her go +home after her plucky fight. She, however, said she realized it was a +thankless task for a singer to finish another singer's performance, and +that she would not think of asking me to do it. She rested awhile, I +still hovering, as requested by the management, till all was over; and I +then went home, more exhausted than if I had sung a performance, but +resolved to sin no more, and thanking my gods that I had not had to face +that critical assemblage without adequate preparation. + +The Italian season was to come directly after ours, and they all came +drifting in during our last days, to report for rehearsal. One day as I +was up in my dressing room, preparing for a matinée, I heard a golden +droning below me, rising and falling on half breath--Caruso at a room +rehearsal. Words cannot describe the beauty of it, but it gave me +exquisite pleasure. A day or two later I was at the Opera House on some +errand and chanced to hear the rehearsal of "Pagliacci." Caruso was +strolling about the stage, beautifully dressed as usual, with a pale +grey Derby hat, gloves of wash-leather and light-coloured cane. The time +came for his famous solo. He stood near the footlights with his eyes on +the conductor, as we usually do when running over a familiar rôle with +an unfamiliar conductor. He began softly with his wonderful effortless +stream of tone, so characteristic, and so impossible of imitation. As +the music worked on his emotions, always just below the surface with +this great artist, his voice thrilled stronger and stronger in spite of +him, till suddenly in full flood it poured out its luscious stream--and +one thanked God anew for such a voice. + +Covent Garden on the night of a Court ball holds the most brilliant +audience I have ever seen. The English woman is at her best in evening +dress, the jewels are fabulous and the whole affair most dazzling. I +remember one evening seeing King Manoel of Portugal in a box. It was +shortly after his hasty flight from his own country, and by an odd +chance his box was just under a very large "Exit" sign, the pertinence +of which was striking. + +Destinn was our _Senta_ in "Holländer." She was just back from America, +and at rehearsal she had to cut out several portamenti which, she said, +she had contracted from the Italians, but which infuriated the German +conductor. At the stage rehearsals she directed everything in accordance +with Bayreuth tradition, which attaches the utmost importance to every +slightest stage position; and the other singers followed her directions +with an almost reverent devotion. At the performance she was wonderful, +as usual. She wore a real Norwegian bridal headdress, a sort of basket +of flowers. A Cockney super, on his way out, remarked in passing me, "I +s'y, wot price Destinn's hat?" + +It was strange, coming from Germany, where every word almost is +understood by the audience, to sing to people whose facial expression +did not respond to the text; one feels that the inner meaning of the +words is lost, is going for nothing, and this leads to a vague sense of +irritation, if one allows the impression to dominate. + +There were several young Americans with us with glorious voices, +straight from Jean de Reszke's studio. They were to sing the +_Rheintöchter_, and some of the _Walküren_ in the "Ring." One or two +were full of ambition and thankful for the experience they were +receiving, while being paid. Some of them, however, showed a quite +extraordinary attitude, not rare among students of the moneyed class. +The air was filled with their complaints at the length of rehearsals, at +the discomfort of the swings for the _Rhinemaidens_, at anything and +everything. I was present one day when one of them called Mr. Percy Pitt +aside and gravely took him to task for not having the swings adjusted to +her comfort--thereby incidentally killing her chances with the +management, for a beginner is before anything a beginner in a great +Opera House, and is supposed to find her level and make no fuss about +it. These girls constantly spoke loftily of their displeasure at the way +things were run. When they were offered an extension of their contracts, +owing to the repetitions of the "Ring," they could hardly be brought to +consider signing on. I said to them, knowing the game, "Girls, some day +you will be on your knees to get such engagements as you now hold. You +have the chance of singing difficult parts with a great Master in a +great Opera House, and you don't seem in the least to realize what that +means." + +I regret to say my prophecy was nearly correct, for I think only one, a +really serious girl, has prospered in her career. The attitude one +assumes to one's operatic work in early years is surely reflected later, +and the best advice a student can follow is that given me by +Schumann-Heink, "Sing everything, no matter what they ask you to do." + +It was very amusing to hear the discussions as to what the audience +should wear. We gave the performances more or less on the Bayreuth plan, +beginning early and with one unusually long pause. As it was broad +daylight at the hour set for the curtain to go up, and as the perfect +Londoner loathes to be about after dark in anything but evening dress, +the problem bothered many. Besides, evening dress is _de rigueur_ at +Covent Garden. Some rushed home in the longest pause to dress and dine; +some frankly omitted the first acts and came late, splendidly +be-jewelled; some wore evening dresses and kept on their evening coats +till the sun was decently down; and then bared their suitably naked +shoulders. Others were just dubby and high-necked, and brought +sandwiches in their pockets, feeling the holier and more Germanly +reverent in consequence. + + * * * * * + +It is a great help to be able to afford to have some one with you in +opera life. Home surroundings are the most conducive to good work, and +it is hard to make a home alone; but you do not absolutely _need_ any +one, if this is not possible. My "morals" were never in danger--no +"infamous proposals" were made to me by agent, conductor or director. In +my first engagement, one or two of the giddier members of the company +had affairs with young officers--in no case a flagrant scandal, as with +a married man. Their relations to each other in the theatre were all +that could be demanded. The most exaggeratedly correct behaviour was +exacted from me. One day in Metz, for example, we went for a walk in the +country with the lyric baritone, a nice little chap, who was a great +friend of ours. It was a lovely, frosty day in autumn, and we were +walking fast through a forest road, when we passed a carriage with the +very prim wife of an officer sitting in it. The next day, an +acquaintance of ours told us, as a joke, that the same woman had said +that afternoon to her, "I thought you told me that Fräulein Howard was a +lady?" "So she is," said our friend. "Oh, no," said the other, "she +can't be. I saw her and her sister walking with one of the singers from +the theatre, and they were behaving very badly." "What were they doing?" +asked our friend. "They were all three holding on to his stick!" said +she, in a horrified tone! + +I went abroad to learn my business and I learned it. There is much talk +about it not being necessary to go abroad to prepare oneself for an +operatic career, but the time has not yet come in America when the +student can find the same opportunity to practice, or work out _on the +stage_ her beginner's faults. In Europe you can do this in blissful +semi-obscurity. I hope and believe the time will come when a girl will +not have to go through all I went through in order to develop her +talent, but may do it in her own country. But the wonderfulness of +Europe for those whose eyes are open cannot yet be replaced by America, +and a real artist will surely flower more perfectly on that side of the +water. + +To those who go I can only say that I hope they may have the tremendous +advantage of fairy god-parents, as I had, and perhaps a sister Marjorie. + +After the season closed at Covent Garden I met the manager of the new +Century Opera, soon to be opened in New York. He offered me a long +contract, and I finally decided to return to America. I saw a photograph +of Edward Kellogg Baird in a musical paper at this time, and read of his +connection with the enterprise. I said to myself, "That is the type of +man I shall marry--if I ever do marry." + +I came to the Century, met my husband, E. K. B., and worked with him for +the success of the opera, which lay very near our hearts; but the war +and other unfortunate circumstances proved too much to overcome, and we +were forced to suspend. I finally attained the Metropolitan Opera, which +I find the most absorbingly interesting house with which I have ever +been connected, and which is the greatest school of all. + + + + +REPERTOIRE + + + 1. Carmen In French, German, English. + + 2. Amneris (Aida) French, German, English, Italian. + + 3. Azucena (Trovatore) Italian, German, English. + + 4. Fides (Prophète) French, German. + + 5. Dalila (Samson et Dalila) French, German, English. + + 6. Martha (In Faust) French, German, English. + + 7. Siebel (In Faust) French, German, English. + + 8. Maddalena (In Rigoletto) Italian, German, English. + + 9. Nancy (In Marta) Italian, German, English. + +10. Ortrud (Lohengrin) German, English. + +11. Lucia (Cav. Rus.) Italian, German, English. + +12. Lola (Cav. Rus.) Italian, German, English. + +13. Mary (Flieg. Hollaender) German. + +14. Erda (Siegfried). + +15. Erda (Rheingold). + +16. Schwertleite (Walkuere). + +17. Grimgerde (Walkuere). + +18. Waltraute (Walkuere). + +19. Waltraute (Goetterdaemmerung). + +20. Erste Norn (Goetterdaemmerung). + +21. Fricka (Walkuere). + +22. Flosshilde (Goetterdaemmerung). + +23. Flosshilde (Rheingold). + +24. Hexe (Haensel und Gretel) German, English. + +25. Nicklaus (Hoffman) German, English. + +26. Valencienne (Merry Widow). + +27. Frederika (Waltzertraum). + +28. Dritte Dame (Zauberfloete). + +29. Oeffentliche Meinung (Orpheus in der Unterwelt). + +30. Orfeo (Gluck). + +31. Molly (Geisha). + +32. Georgette (Gloeckchen). + +33. Pamela (Fra Diavolo). + +34. Graefin (Trompeter). + +35. Orlofsky (Fledermaus). + +36. Frau Reich (Lustige Weibe). + +37. Page (Salome). + +38. Olga (Dollar Prinzessin). + +39. Magdalena (Meistersingers). + +40. Graefin (Heilige Elisabeth) German, English. + +41. Martha (Undine). + +42. Hedwig (Wilhelm Tell) German, English. + +43. Gertrude (Hans Heiling). + +44. Marzellina (Figaro) Italian, German. + +45. Graefin (Wildschuetz). + +46. Ascanio (Benvenuto Cellini). + +47. Jacqueline (Arzt wieder willen) German, English. + +48. Gertrude (Romeo and Juliet) German. + +49. Stephano (Romeo and Juliet) German, English. + +50. Hexe (Sieben Schwaben). + +51. Ulrica (Masken Ball) Italian, German. + +52. Hexe (Koenigskinder). + +53. Cleo (Kuhreigen). + +54. Suzuki (Butterfly) English, Italian, German. + +55. Magdalena (Evangelimann). + +56. Carmela (Jewels of the Madonna) English, Italian, German. + +57. Mother (Louise). + +58. Cieca (Giaconda) German, English, Italian. + +59. Nutrice (Boris). + +60. Blumenmaedchen (Parsifal). + +61. Annina (Rosenkavalier). + +62. Albine (Thais). + +63. Mistress Benson (Lakme). + +64. Margarethe (Weisse Dame). + +65. Cypra (Zigeuner Baron). + +66. Fattoumah (Marouf). + +67. Amelfa (Le Coq d'Or). + +68. Mrs. Everton (Shanewis). + +Etc., etc. + + +STUDIED NOT SUNG + + Brangaene (Tristan). + + Mutter Gertrud (Haensel und Gretel) + + Etc., etc. + + +THE END + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Confessions of an Opera Singer, by Kathleen Howard + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CONFESSIONS OF AN OPERA SINGER *** + +***** This file should be named 32980-8.txt or 32980-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/9/8/32980/ + +Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was +produced from scanned images of public domain material at +The Internet Archive.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Confessions of an Opera Singer + +Author: Kathleen Howard + +Release Date: June 26, 2010 [EBook #32980] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CONFESSIONS OF AN OPERA SINGER *** + + + + +Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was +produced from scanned images of public domain material at +The Internet Archive.) + + + + + + +</pre> + +<hr /> + +<div class="centeredimage" style="width: 344px;"> +<a name="frontispiece" id="frontispiece"></a> +<a href="images/ill_frontispiece.jpg"> +<img src="images/ill_frontispiece_sml.jpg" width="344" height="500" alt="Photo of Kathleen Howard, Autographed" title="Photo of Kathleen Howard, Autographed" /></a><br /> +<span class="caption">Photo of Kathleen Howard, Autographed</span> +</div> + +<p><a name="page_002" id="page_002"></a></p> + +<p><a name="page_003" id="page_003"></a></p> + +<div class="centeredimage" style="width: 381px;"> +<a href="images/ill_title.png"> +<img src="images/ill_title_sml.png" width="381" height="550" alt="image of the title page: +CONFESSIONS OF +AN OPERA SINGER +BY KATHLEEN HOWARD +NEW YORK MCMXVIII +ALFRED A. KNOPF" title="image of the title page: +CONFESSIONS OF +AN OPERA SINGER +BY KATHLEEN HOWARD +NEW YORK MCMXVIII +ALFRED A. KNOPF" /></a> +</div> + +<p><a name="page_004" id="page_004"></a></p> + +<p class="c">COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY<br /> +KATHLEEN HOWARD BAIRD<br /> +Published September 1918</p> + +<p class="c">PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA</p> + +<p><a name="page_005" id="page_005"></a></p> + +<p class="c top15"><i>To<br />Marjorie</i></p> + +<p><a name="page_006" id="page_006"></a></p> + +<p><a name="page_007" id="page_007"></a></p> + +<h3>FOREWORD</h3> + +<p>So many fantastic tales have come to us of students' life abroad, of +their temptations, trials, finances, successes and failures, that I have +attempted to give here the true story of the preparation for an operatic +career, and its fruition. My road leads from New York to Paris, to +Germany and thence to London, and back to the Metropolitan Opera House. +My operatic experiences in Germany are inalienably associated with the +lives of the people, particularly with the German officer class, viewed +publicly and privately; in fact in the town where I was first engaged, +Metz, I found they were as vital a part of the Opera house life as the +singers themselves. Their arrogance tainted the town life as well, and +here I first became acquainted with the pitiful attempt at swagger and +brilliancy which often covered a state of grinding poverty, or the +thwarted natural domestic instincts which were ruthlessly sacrificed to +the "uniform"—the all-desirable entrée to society, for which no price +was too high to pay. I hope this book will be of interest not only to +those whose goal is the operatic<a name="page_008" id="page_008"></a> or concert stage, but to those to whom +"human documents" appeal. It is a story of real people, real obstacles +overcome, and contains much intimate talk of back-stage life in opera +houses.<a name="page_009" id="page_009"></a></p> + +<h3>CONTENTS</h3> + +<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" summary="toc"> +<tr style="font-size:80%;"><td>CHAPTER</td><td> </td><td>PAGE</td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">I</a></td><td>THE WAY IT ALL HAPPENED</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_013">13</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">II</a></td><td>A STRUGGLE AND A SOLUTION</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_021">21</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">III</a></td><td>PARIS AT LAST</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_030">30</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">IV</a></td><td>PENSION PERSONALITIES</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_039">39</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">V</a></td><td>OPERATIC FRANCE VERSUS OPERATIC GERMANY</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_050">50</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">VI</a></td><td>PREPARING RÔLES IN BERLIN</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_059">59</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">VII</a></td><td>MY FIRST OPERATIC CONTRACT SIGNED</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_067">67</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">VIII</a></td><td>MY ONE LONE IMPROPOSITION</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_076">76</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">IX</a></td><td>THE MAKINGS OF A SMALL MUNICIPAL OPERA HOUSE</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_085">85</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">X</a></td><td>MY DÉBUT AND BREAKING INTO HARNESS</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_100">100</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">XI</a></td><td>SOME STAGE DELIGHTS</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_110">110</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">XII</a></td><td>MISPLACED MOISTURE AND THE STORY OF A COURT-LADY</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_123">123</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">XIII</a></td><td>HUMAN PASSIONS AND SMALLPOX</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_139">139</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">XIV</a></td><td>DISCOURAGEMENTS THAT LED TO A COURT THEATRE</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_153">153</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XV">XV</a></td><td>SALARIES AND A TENOR'S GENIUS</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_164">164</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">XVI</a></td><td>THE ART OF MARIE MUELLE</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_172">172</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">XVII</a></td><td>THE NON-MILITARY SIDE OF A GERMAN OFFICER'S LIFE</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_184">184</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII">XVIII</a></td><td>GEESE AND GUESTS</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_199">199</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIX">XIX</a></td><td>RUSSIANS, COMMON AND PREFERRED</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_206">206</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XX">XX</a></td><td>THE GRANDMOTHERS' BALLET</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_220">220</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXI">XXI</a></td><td>STAGE FASHIONS AND THE GLORY OF COLOUR</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_230">230</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXII">XXII</a></td><td>ROYAL HUMOUR</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_242">242</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align="right" valign="top"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII">XXIII</a></td><td>COVENT GARDEN AND—AMERICA</td><td align="right" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_257">257</a></td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td><a href="#REPERTOIRE">REPERTOIRE</a></td><td align="right"><a href="#page_270">270</a></td></tr> +</table> + +<p><a name="page_010" id="page_010"></a></p> + +<p><a name="page_011" id="page_011"></a></p> + +<h3>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</h3> + +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="illustration list"> +<tr valign="top"><td align="left" colspan="2">Kathleen Howard</td><td align="right"><a href="#frontispiece"><i>Frontispiece</i></a></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">I</td><td align="left">Carmen as I Used to Dress It</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_076">76</a></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">II</td><td align="left">Carmen as I Now Dress It</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_084">84</a></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">I</td><td align="left">Amneris as I Used to Dress It</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_126">126</a></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">II</td><td align="left">Amneris as I Now Dress It</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_134">134</a></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">I</td><td align="left">Dalila as I Used to Dress It</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_172">172</a></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">II</td><td align="left">Dalila as I Now Dress It</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_180">180</a></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="left" colspan="2">Caruso's Caricature of Kathleen Howard</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_260">260</a></td></tr> +</table> + +<p><a name="page_013" id="page_013"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I</h3> + +<h4>THE WAY IT ALL HAPPENED</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">I</span> WAS very young and I was engaged to be married. We had just lost our +money in rather dramatic fashion, and we were all doing what we could to +supply the sudden deficit. My sister began to prepare herself to be a +teacher, my brother left his boarding school and came home to go into a +friend's office, and I—well, I accepted the hand and heart of the young +man in our set with whom I had had most pleasure in dancing in winter +and sailing in summer.</p> + +<p>My heart didn't lose a beat and turn over when I saw him coming as did +those of the heroines in Marion Crawford's novels, but we were the best +friends in the world, and I thought that anything else must be a +literary exaggeration, put in to make the story more exciting; just as +the heroine's eyelashes were usually exaggerated to the abnormal length +of an inch to make her more beautiful, though none of the girls I knew +had them like that.</p> + +<p>He was a young business man, just starting as<a name="page_014" id="page_014"></a> assistant to his father +whose business was an old established, comfortable sort of family +affair, big enough to supply, in time, an extra income for an +unambitious young couple like ourselves. Every one congratulated us +heartily, and I began to embroider towels and hem table napkins and to +dream about patterns of flat silver.</p> + +<p>The whole arrangement was satisfactory to the point of banality, and I +might be quite an old married woman by this time, but—I had a voice.</p> + +<p>Nine-tenths of me, at this age, were the normal, rational +characteristics of a well-brought up, bright, good looking girl. But the +last tenth was an unknown quantity, a great big powerful something which +I vaguely felt, even then, to be the master of all the other tenths, a +force which was capable of having its own way with the rest of me if I +should ever give it a chance. My voice, the agent of this vague power, +had developed rather late. It is true that our whole childhood had been +coloured by music, that we read notes before we could read letters, and +that music was our earliest and most natural mode of expression.</p> + +<p>My father's greatest joy in life was music, and he always played +imaginative musical games with us in the evenings. The earliest one I +remember was when we were tiny tots. He used to improvise on the small +organ we had and ask us questions which we had to<a name="page_015" id="page_015"></a> answer, singing to +his accompaniment. I was Admiral Seymour and Marjorie was General +Wolsey.</p> + +<p>I remember his singing,</p> + +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="poetry"> +<tr valign="top"><td align="left">"And how would you get your ships along, Admiral,</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: .5em;">If your sails and oars were shot overboard?"</span></td></tr> +</table> + +<p>I sang solemnly,</p> + +<p class="c">"I'd shubble them along with shubbles."</p> + +<p>Afterwards when I began to sing from printed music with him I remember +saying one evening as he was playing hymns and unfamiliar English +ballads for me to sing,</p> + +<p>"Papa, please let me look at the music and follow the notes up and +down."</p> + +<p>I really began reading music at four years old. We played and sang all +our childhood. When Marjorie was seven and I was six we sang Even-song +at the village church, as the members of the regular choir were ill or +absent. Marjorie had a heavenly childish soprano and I a heavy +nondescript voice. But I always pleased my father by singing real +"second voice" and not just following the soprano in thirds.</p> + +<p>He used to give us a note, and we then had to run round our rather large +house humming it. It was the deepest disgrace we ever knew if we had +sharped or flatted when we got back to the starting point. He<a name="page_016" id="page_016"></a> taught us +musical terms by making us dance to different rhythms he played, and +would call out "Allegro," "Vivace," "Adagio," "Molto allegro," "Legato," +and so forth, to which we had to change instantly. Whenever any one came +to the house, we played and sang for them, and though it might have been +rather awful for the visitors it was very good for us to get used to an +audience.</p> + +<p>He used to arrange fairy tales like "Bluebeard" in doggerel verses and +write accompaniments to them, and we then learned them by heart and +rehearsed them, and some grand night played them for all the neighbours. +I remember the way we showed Bluebeard's chamber where the heads of his +wives were kept. We hung a sheet on the wall and Marjorie and I stood in +front of it, with pale faces, closed eyes and open mouths, and our long +hair pinned up high above our heads on the sheet. Another sheet was then +stretched across us, just below our chins, and the effect was rather +ghastly in a dim light. I remember we sang at the last:</p> + +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="poetry"> +<tr valign="top"><td align="left">"Oh, Bluebeard, oh, Bluebeard,</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: .5em;">Frustrated, checkmated,</span></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: .5em;">Dissipated, agitated,</span></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: .5em;">Castigated, lacerated,</span></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="left"><span style="margin-left: .5em;">Bluebeard!"</span></td></tr> +</table> + +<p>When school was over we always gave a dramatic<a name="page_017" id="page_017"></a> performance; if the +weather was fine enough we held them in the big garden that was our +childhood's playground. We dressed behind a huge flowering-currant bush, +and I can remember a performance of an act of "Twelfth Night," in which +I, aged about seven, was <i>Malvolio</i>, Lal, my brother, <i>Maria</i>, and +Marjorie, <i>Olivia</i>.</p> + +<p>I had always been able to sing, but the sudden growth of my voice was a +surprise. One day, in school, we were asked to write a composition on +our favourite wish. All the other girls said they wished for curly hair, +for pretty dresses, for as much candy as they could eat, for any other +frivolous thing that came into their heads. But I took it seriously and +told my dearest wish in all the world—a great voice, a voice with which +I could make audiences cry or laugh at my will. And, strangely enough, +from that time my girlish voice began to grow stronger and stronger, +until I could proudly make more noise with it than any other girl in +school. Then it grew louder and higher, until it was impossible to +ignore such a big possession any longer, and the family decreed that I +must have singing lessons.</p> + +<p>I took lessons accordingly from an excellent local teacher, practised +scales and exercises and later studied the classic songs and arias as +seriously as I could, but it was so fatally easy to be interrupted. We +were<a name="page_018" id="page_018"></a> all out of school for the first time and enjoying our freedom. It +was so much more chic to go down to Huyler's in the mornings, when the +girls only a year younger were hard at their lessons, than in the +afternoon when the whole girl world was at liberty. I would just begin a +morning's work when some one would call me on the telephone to go to the +dressmaker's with her, or help arrange the flowers for a dinner party. I +loved both flowers and dresses, and it was easy to think, "Oh! I'll +practise this afternoon!" and fly off to be gone all day. In the evening +there was my fiancé who had to tell me all the absorbing details of his +office, or there was a dance, or a theatre party, and I took everything +that came my way and enjoyed it all equally. But all the time my voice +was really first in my thoughts, and I longed to study seriously and +intensely, to arrange my whole life for it and its proper development.</p> + +<p>The family, it seemed to me, was more interested in my trousseau than in +anything else. They had scraped together five hundred dollars, and I was +to have it all, incredible as it sounded, to buy clothes with. +Subconsciously all day, and compellingly in bed at night, the thought of +what I could do for my voice with that five hundred dollars was with me. +I saw myself only as a singer, and knew that I could never be happy +unless I were allowed first to get my<a name="page_019" id="page_019"></a> instrument in thorough working +order and then to use it. The phrases, "working out your own salvation," +"fulfilling your own destiny," "the necessity of self-development," and +all those other nicely turned expressions which most students have at +their tongues' end, were unknown to me. I just <i>felt</i>, inarticulately. +But my feeling was strong enough to carry me into action, the step which +phrasemakers, who find complete satisfaction in their phrases, often +omit.</p> + +<p>New York was my Mecca. I talked it all over with my fiancé, told him +what a year there would do for me, making it clear that I expected to +sing professionally after our marriage. He agreed to everything and +promised that I should do as I wished. His possible objection disposed +of, only the financial difficulty remained, looming large before me. +Deeply and more deeply I was convinced in my own mind that I might marry +in old clothes, but not with my voice untrained. I finally summoned +courage to propose to my family that I should use the precious five +hundred for a year's study in New York instead of a trousseau. +Miraculous to relate they agreed, and I was boundlessly happy and saw my +path golden ahead of me.</p> + +<p>We all spoke and thought of my future as that of a concert singer. My +intention of marrying seemed to make anything else out of the question. +Indeed,<a name="page_020" id="page_020"></a> at that time, the Metropolitan in New York formed the only +oasis in the operatic desert of America. There were spasmodic attempts +at travelling companies in English, but no other sign of a permanent +institution throughout the length and breadth of the country. I must +confess, however, that the operatic bee buzzed considerably at times in +the less conspicuous portions of my bonnet. One or two musicians of +standing, who heard me sing, pronounced mine "an operatic voice," and +strange longings stirred inside me when I saw the Metropolitan singers +on the boards.<a name="page_021" id="page_021"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II</h3> + +<h4>A STRUGGLE AND A SOLUTION</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">T</span>HAT winter in New York was a revealing experience to me in many ways. +Numbers of things assumed different values in my estimation. One of the +first new things I learned was the comparative insignificance of $500 as +a provision for a year's expenses. I lived at one of those boarding +houses which are called both "reasonable" and respectable, but are +vastly inferior in both comfort and society to the European pension +which costs a good deal less. I had lessons in singing, diction and +French, all of which counted up to a great many dollars a week. My five +hundred began to shrink at an alarming rate, and I don't know what I +should have done if a friend had not advised me to try for a "church +position," that invaluable means of adding to the resources of a +student, which is possible only in America. Besides offering a splendid +chance of financial assistance, the church position system is an +infallible test of the money value of one's voice. How many girls have I +known in Europe embarking<a name="page_022" id="page_022"></a> upon the expensive and dreadfully laborious +preparation for an operatic career, without possessing a single one of +the qualifications necessary to success, without even an adequate, to +say nothing of an unusual, voice! Their singing of "Because I love you!" +has been the admiration of their local circle, even less musical than +themselves, and this little success has been enough to start them on a +career, doomed to certain failure. If they had only tried for church +positions in a large city in America, had competed in the open market of +their own country, they would have been saved a heartbreak and much good +money besides.</p> + +<p>I won a $1000 position almost at once, over the heads of many older and +more experienced competitors, on the merits of my voice alone. The +salary was my financial salvation, but, besides this, my general +musicianship was much improved by the practice in sight-reading and +<i>ensemble</i> singing. I grew used to facing an audience, and found a +chance to put into use what I learned in my singing lessons. Blessed be +the quartet choir of America, say I; an invaluable institution for the +musical sons and daughters of our country.</p> + +<p>The church in which I sang had many wealthy members, and the +dress-parade on Sundays used to be quite a sight. Our place, as choir, +was directly facing the congregation, in a little gallery, so that our<a name="page_023" id="page_023"></a> +hats and dresses were subjected to very searching scrutiny. The +furnishing of suitable garments for such an exalted position became +quite a problem. The soprano was a well-known singer, who, in addition +to a good salary, had many concert and oratorio engagements; and her +furs and ostrich feathers were my despair. I would sit up half the night +to cover a last-year's straw hat with velvet. I made an endless +succession of smart blouses which, as we were hidden below the waist by +the railing, I wore with the same "utility" black broadcloth skirt. I +constructed the most original collars and jabots for them out of odds +and ends.</p> + +<p>I remember one was made of a packet of silver spangles sewn in rows +overlapping each other like fish scales. One of my engagement presents +had been a silver mesh bag, and when I wore it at my belt, and the +collar round my neck, the choir used to call me "Mrs. Lohengrin." As we +took off our outdoor wraps to sing, my smartness in the gallery was +assured, but the cleverest manager can't contrive at home a substitute +for furs, and the soprano had chinchilla! I was years younger than the +others and they were very sweet to me.</p> + +<p>Living at my boarding house was a young doctor, who also would have +liked to be nice to me. But my exaggerated conscientiousness would not +allow me<a name="page_024" id="page_024"></a> to have anything to do with one man while I was engaged to +another, and I refused all his invitations to the theatre and to +Saturday afternoon excursions. My one indulgence was in standing-room +tickets for the Metropolitan. What a boon to girls in my situation would +be the inexpensive municipal opera and endowed theatres of Germany with +their system of <i>Schule Vorstellungen</i> (students' performances) of +standard plays and operas at prices that put a comfortable seat within +the means of even the most humble purse! This was the lack the Century +Opera would have supplied.</p> + +<p>My church engagement was to come to an end May first. The thought of +turning my back on the start I had made depressed me fearfully. I had +given my word to marry and did not think of wavering. But the letters of +my fiancé and his rare visits to New York had not helped us to +understand each other better. Many hours I walked the floor longing for +advice, and wrestling with myself. I said to my sister, "I have my foot +on the first rung of the ladder and now I must take it off." It all +seems so simple now. Almost any other girl would have broken her +engagement without much thought. But I had not been brought up that way, +and so I had hours and days of misery.</p> + +<p>The one thought that comforted me was that I could<a name="page_025" id="page_025"></a> go on at any rate as +well as it was possible in my own town, and though it would be much +harder to make a career from there, it <i>could</i> be done with the +co-operation of my husband. It was hard for me to talk in those days, +but one day driving down Fifth Avenue in a hansom, a rare treat, I +remember my feelings were too much for me, and I burst through my +repression and told him how I <i>must</i> develop that side of me, and he +said, "And I'll help you, little girl; you can count on me." I believed +him of course. But while I was dreadfully serious, he, as I learned +later, ranked my singing with the china-painting and fancy-work of his +relations, as a sort of harmless pastime, to occupy my leisure moments. +The truth was, of course, that, as often happens, he had entirely +mistaken my character, had made his ideal woman out of his head, given +her my outward appearance, and fallen in love with her. The real "me" +was a disconcerting stranger, of whom he caught only occasional +glimpses.</p> + +<p>About the first of May, I returned home. They were all at the station to +meet me; my fiancé had even broken into his office hours to be there +too. We had seen each other seldom during my absence from home, for New +York was a long way off, and he was saving his pennies religiously for +the great event. When we married, our income would be a tight fit<a name="page_026" id="page_026"></a> in +any case, and I could not help rejoicing that my singing might add +considerably to it. There were no $1000 church positions in our town, +but one or two of the churches paid respectable salaries to their +quartets, and I hoped soon to begin to make a concert career.</p> + +<p>For a little while after my return I was very happy. Every one was so +nice to me and seemed to think I had done remarkable things already. Our +church asked me to sing a solo the Sunday when the bishop was expected, +and I held a sort of reception afterwards and heard many pleasant things +about my progress. After my hard work and self-denial, the rest, the +gentle flattery, and the comfort of home surroundings were very welcome.</p> + +<p>Only with my fiancé things were not so satisfactory. Something, I did +not know what, was the matter; but it all culminated one evening in his +saying that no married woman should follow a profession, that she should +find "occupation enough in her own home." This was really a great shock +to me, as he had promised me his support in my work so often. Imagine my +surprise after a three years' engagement, when he had his family tell me +just three weeks before the wedding that I was to give up all hope of +singing professionally after encouraging me in it during the entire +time. I knew by then that I could never be<a name="page_027" id="page_027"></a> happy nor make him happy if +I gave up all thought of singing professionally.</p> + +<p>I asked him very quietly if those were his convictions, and, on his +affirmative answer, I took off his ring, returned it to him, and went +upstairs without one more word, feeling as if I had been awakened out of +a nightmare, and though still palpitating from the shock was +experiencing relief at finding it over. In my own room I stretched my +arms above my head and said, "<i>Free!</i>" A marvellous vista of freedom +opened to me after the months of strain. I could hardly bear to go to +sleep; it was so wonderful to plan how I could go ahead and study, +study.</p> + +<p>The next morning I saw my mistake in supposing the affair to be over, +for there ensued many trying days and floods of tears all round. Then +came the solemn and awkward returning of all the engagement cups and +saucers and knicknacks, to nearly our whole circle of acquaintance. My +family stood by me and performed this unattractive task, while I packed +up to return to New York.</p> + +<p>I had given up my choir, and now found it a difficult matter to get +another. All the churches had made their arrangements for the year and +the best I could hope for was occasional substituting in case one of the +altos was unable to sing. I made the round of the agents' offices. Some +heard me and<a name="page_028" id="page_028"></a> were complimentary, some refused as their lists were full. +But when I mentioned the word "engagement," I was always met by the +rejoinder "No experience." I used to say to them, "But how can I ever +get experience if you won't give me a chance?" They would shrug and +answer that that wasn't their affair.</p> + +<p>It seemed a hopeless deadlock. No one would engage me without experience +and no one would give me an opportunity to become experienced. I knew +that the one way out of the difficulty was to go abroad and get +experience there. I have said that the idea of singing in opera had +always made a strong appeal to me, and I knew that I had some of the +qualifications necessary for the stage—a big voice, good +stage-appearance, and ability to act (we had always acted) as well as a +great capacity for hard work. But the essential qualification, without +which the others were all ineffective, was the financial support +necessary to get me there and to provide means of studying and of living +adequately while I prepared myself for opera.</p> + +<p>I despaired of obtaining this, but the way was suddenly opened for me in +what seemed a miraculous manner. Friends of mine in the church, Frank +Smith Jones and his wife, offered to finance me through my years of +preparation and for as long afterwards as I might need their aid. These +real friends were<a name="page_029" id="page_029"></a> behind me for years, and I owe them more than I could +ever repay. They made it possible for me to have my sister with me, for +me, a rather delicate girl, an inestimable benefit. In the seventh +heaven of joy, I prepared to go to Paris to study with Jacques Bouhy, +recommended to me by my New York teacher. I packed my few clothes, some +songs, and a boundless enthusiasm, and set sail.<a name="page_030" id="page_030"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III</h3> + +<h4>PARIS AT LAST</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">I</span> CROSSED on one of the steady big boats of the Atlantic Transport Line. +I remember only one passenger, a boy of even then such personal +magnetism that he stands out in my recollection as clearly as any one I +have ever met, though he was then only a young fellow and unknown to +fame. His name was Douglas Fairbanks and his ambition was to go on the +stage. He said as we neared England: "Well, some day we'll read, +'Conried of the Metropolitan Opera House presents Miss Kathleen Howard,' +and 'Charles Frohman presents Mr. Douglas Fairbanks.'" His prophecy, +which I recall even to the spot on the boat where he made it, and the +expression of his eyes which matched mine at that moment, has almost +been fulfilled.</p> + +<p>I reached Paris in the beginning of September with "my instrument" in +working order, with a smattering of French, a letter of credit for +$1000, and a large supply of courage. I found my voice adequate to all +my demands upon it, but the money just half<a name="page_031" id="page_031"></a> enough (it was increased +the next year). As for my courage, I have had to go on renewing that +ever since, until it has become the largest factor in my success. Emma +Juch told me once that she always said it was not difficult to attain +success and make a career. Perhaps her success was made at a time when +the competition was less keen, but I at any rate could never agree with +her.</p> + +<p>I arrived in Paris early in the morning and went to a small hotel in the +rue Cambon. It quite thrilled me to ask the chambermaid for <i>eau chaude</i> +instead of "hot water"; and I felt proud of knowing that the midday meal +was called <i>déjeuner à la fourchette</i>. I remember that meal to this +day—it began with radishes and butter, those inseparable companions in +France, went on to omelette, then cold meat and salad, with small +clingstone peaches and little white grapes for dessert. Red or white +wine was "<i>compris</i>," and the bread was a yard long, cut half through +into sections, and laid down the middle of the table. It was all +half-miraculous to me, and afterwards when I went out to stroll under +the arches of the rue de Rivoli I thought myself in fairyland. The +jewelry, lingerie and photograph shops delighted me, as they have +innumerable tourists, and the name "Redfern" over a doorway gave me a +thrill. The Place de la Concorde seemed one of the most beautiful places +I<a name="page_032" id="page_032"></a> had ever seen, an opinion which I still hold, by the way, and I felt +like a queen when I called an open <i>fiacre</i> and drove in state toward +the Arc de Triomphe, stopping to buy a big bunch of red roses for twenty +cents from a ragged man who ran shouting beside my carriage. In the +evening I went to the opera and wondered at the great stairway and at +the big auditorium, and still more at the poor performance I saw there +but which I accounted for by the fact that September is the dull season.</p> + +<p>That first day was all thrills. The next was spent in arranging hours +for lessons, and collecting pension addresses from all my acquaintances, +as I saw that it would be impossible to do my work in a hotel. I set +bravely out on my hunt for a dwelling place. Prices have increased +considerably since those days, for at that time it was possible to get +very good board and lodging on the left bank of the Seine for five +francs a day. My professor, Jacques Bouhy, however, lived near the Arc +de Triomphe, and I wished to be within walking distance. I toiled up and +down a great many stairs, and peeped into a great many rooms without +finding what I sought. I could not bear to wait a day to begin working, +and was just a bit discouraged, when I had the good fortune to meet two +girls from home, who gave me the address of the pension where they had +stayed.<a name="page_033" id="page_033"></a> I rushed off at once to see it, and found a very nice house of +several floors, situated in a <i>cité</i>, a sort of garden behind the first +row of houses on the street, so that its windows faced a view of trees +and flowerbeds with circular gravel walks around them, instead of +cobblestones.</p> + +<p>The head of the pension was an old woman who looked like a Bourbon but +was really a bourgeoise. It was nearly noon when I arrived, but she was +still in a wonderful dressing gown of purple and yellow stripes, with +<i>chaussons</i>, cloth slippers, on her feet, and an elaborate coiffure of +dyed black hair above her yellow old face. She came to me in the salon, +a long narrow room with French windows framing tree-tops, the windows +and doors all hung with rose-red velvet which looked as if it had been +in place since the First Empire. There were sofas of rose, and chairs of +the same with black wooden rims, tables and mantel-pieces with thousands +of things on them, and an old-fashioned square piano in the corner. +Madame was most gracious, remembered the name of her former lodgers, +said they were <i>très gentilles</i>, turned a neat compliment to the +American nation, and showed me the rooms herself.</p> + +<p>I chose a back one of good size, nicely furnished and hung with a pretty +chintz. It had a <i>cabinet de toilette</i>, or large cupboard for washstand +and trunks,<a name="page_034" id="page_034"></a> opening off it, and I was to have it with complete board, +for two hundred francs a month ($40). The price was really higher, but +my arrangement was for the winter. I was to pay extra for light and +heat. The room had an open fireplace with a <i>grille</i> or fire-basket in +it, for which I could buy <i>boulets</i>, coal dust pressed into egg-shaped +balls, for three francs a sack. Later, I could have had a <i>salamandre</i>, +one of the excellent small stoves which fit into the fireplace, really +warm a room, and require filling only once in twenty-four hours. But I +wanted something to poke, and I had an idea that Paris winters were not +very formidable. As a matter of fact, anything more penetrating than +their damp sunless cold it is impossible to imagine.</p> + +<p>For light, there was a huge lamp for which I could buy <i>luciline</i>, a +kind of highly refined kerosene which has no odour and burns well. I +made my bath arrangements with Jean, Madame's old servant, who with his +wife, Eugénie, was the real head of the establishment. I had bought a +collapsible rubber tub, and Jean was to bring me a big can of hot water +every morning. I found that I had to tip occasionally or the water +became as cool as Jean's manners. Madame showed me her dining room, and +told me with pride that her cuisine was of an excellence renowned. I +went to fetch my trunks and hire a piano,<a name="page_035" id="page_035"></a> glad that my long search was +over. The piano was a small upright, a tin pan for tone, as are all +Parisian pianos <i>en location</i>, and it was to cost me ten francs a month, +with eight francs for carting. They are more expensive now. When it was +installed, my Lares and Penates on top of it, and my music on a stool +beside it, I felt that my feet were firmly planted on the ladder leading +to success.</p> + +<p>Then I began to work. And how I did work that winter! I had two singing +lessons a week, and a session with the opera class lasting three hours +in which we went through the dramatic action of our rôles. I slaved at +my repertoire working three hours a week with a coach, and spending +hours and hours a day learning by heart at home. Of course I began with +the very biggest rôles—we all do. The personalities of <i>Amneris</i>, +<i>Carmen</i>, <i>Dalila</i>, <i>Azucena</i> in turn, all in their French version of +course, occupied my mind waking and sleeping.</p> + +<p>Jacques Bouhy was always kind, grave and courteous with me. The thought +of his having created <i>Escamillo</i> and his real knowledge of French +traditions thrilled me. He lent me his copy of "Samson et Dalila" from +which to copy the French words. It had an inscription from Saint-Saens +"À M. Bouhy, <i>grand prêtre et grand artiste</i>." He created the rôle of +the Grand Priest.<a name="page_036" id="page_036"></a></p> + +<p>The only time I ever saw him upset was one day after the Opera class. We +all thought him safely out riding as he always was on Mondays. My +letter, written at that time to my mother, says:</p> + +<p>"This morning in the opera class we had rather an unpleasant time. +Little N., with the beautiful tenor voice, has learned in one week the +first half of the <i>Samson</i> duet for me. He has had to learn it from a +score which has only his voice part written in it. He is frightfully +down on his luck and with the gorgeous voice and speaking French can't +get anything to do, and has no money, not a cent to his name. We had +done that, some one else had sung, and having ten minutes left, Valdejo +told N. to sing again if he would. He was tired, but jumped up and began +the first part of "Faust." He kept forgetting it. Suddenly the door +opened and in walked Bouhy as white as a sheet. He commanded N. to stop +singing and to learn his things before coming again to the class. Said, +why did he sing like a baritone when he was a tenor, mocked him, told +him he was ashamed to have such sounds made <i>chez lui</i>, that he had been +a year on "Faust." What example was he to the others? Every one else had +always worked seriously. He stormed for five long minutes, N. standing +quite still, with his brown dog's eyes fixed on him—then he left the +room. It was frightfully uncomfortable for us<a name="page_037" id="page_037"></a> too. I am sure I have +done just such rotten work so it may be my turn next. Of course Bouhy +was right. N. has been there a year and ought to know it; but he is just +tired out, and never sleeps he says. They say Bouhy is beginning to show +his age. This week he bounced his cook whom he has had for years."</p> + +<p>I had two French lessons a week, and should have had at least one +diction lesson besides, but for an invaluable course which I had taken +in New York with the Yersin sisters. These lessons were a nerve-racking +experience from which I used to emerge with my feathers all rubbed the +wrong way from the strain of trying to imitate the intangible +differences between the various French "e's." But I have always been +grateful for this rigid training, from the time when I first reached +Paris, and, though speaking very little French, could give an address to +a <i>cocher</i> without having to repeat it, until now, when I can thank my +trained ear for a perfect accent in singing foreign languages.</p> + +<p>I think no one ever studied more unrelentingly than I, during that first +year of hot enthusiasm. I began early in the morning, and the only +reason that I did not burn the midnight oil was that I found it cost me +too much in kerosene and firing. I could keep warm in bed for nothing, +and <i>boulets</i> were my pet economy. Coming from a country where a warm +room was taken<a name="page_038" id="page_038"></a> for granted, and where the furnaces in hotels and +boarding houses might have been supplied by Elijah's ravens for all I +knew about it, I just couldn't bear to see my money burning away bit by +bit in a grate; and many a time I have put on my fur-lined coat rather +than add fuel to the dying heap of dreadfully expensive ashes in the +<i>grille</i>.<a name="page_039" id="page_039"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV</h3> + +<h4>PENSION PERSONALITIES</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">A</span>T first I had no companionship and very little recreation, beyond the +ever fresh wonder and delight of the Paris streets as I saw them in my +daily constitutional. One day I went with a girl friend to visit her +<i>atelier</i>. I wrote to my mother:</p> + +<p>"We spent a long time in the life-class room—nude, (not us but the +model). It was a mixed class. A large oblong room, filled with I should +think over a hundred students, mostly men. They sat in a circle facing +the model throne. The floor is not raised, but the effect of an +amphitheatre is produced by rush bottom stools of different heights. +They rest their pads or drawing portfolios on a railing in front of +them. The room is intolerably hot because of the model. What struck us +most was the intense silence and atmosphere of earnestness; no one +speaks and there is only the gentle rub-rub of the charcoal, crayon, or +pencil against the paper. The students look quickly up and down and +never move their glance except from their sketch to the model and back +again. She<a name="page_040" id="page_040"></a> was a very pretty young girl and took graceful half-hour +poses. The one interruption was a quiet voice at the end of a half-hour, +'<i>C'est l'heure</i>'; and they stopped for a few minutes' rest. We went +into another room, where a picturesque old wretch with long black curls, +red velvet waist-coat, long blue cape, well thrown back, black, grimy +hands clasped around his knee, and clumsy, rusty boots stuck out in +front of him, was seated."</p> + +<p>Later one of these old models used to come to my brother. He had a card +on which was printed the list of poses he was prepared to take.—"The +twelve Apostles," "The Eternal Father" and "The God Jupiter."</p> + +<p>I found a little English tea-room about a mile away, and often went +there for tea and muffins which in those days were hardly procurable in +French places. The tea-habit is only about ten years old in France. The +people in the shop soon knew me by sight, which was just as well, as I +would begin going over the words of some part in my head and walk out +serenely, quite forgetting to pay for my tea. I still go there +occasionally when I am in Paris and remind them of that. I sometimes +went to the two operas and to the theatre, but not nearly often enough, +as I could spare neither time nor money, and the late hours made a +concentration on the next morning's<a name="page_041" id="page_041"></a> work more difficult. The concert +world was a great disappointment to me. I think I longed for nothing so +much that year, as to hear great orchestral music well performed; but +the Lamoreux and Chevillard concerts did little to satisfy this craving, +and I was amazed at the roughness of the strings and the narrow scope of +the programs. Many of the great artists avoided Paris in their tours, +the reason given being lack of suitable concert halls.</p> + +<p>On the other hand, a whole new school of composition was opened to me +that winter by a fellow <i>pensionnaire</i>. Charles Loeffler and Henry +Hadley spent part of the winter in our pension, and Mr. Loeffler +introduced me to the French modernists. Later in the winter we often +talked over their works together. He used to stroll into my room about +tea time, saying he liked to watch me make tea for I had such attractive +fingers. He used to take me to the odd corners of his beloved Paris, +<i>cafés</i> haunted by long-haired <i>Sorbonne</i> students, and <i>cafés +chantants</i>, where the frank improprieties of the ditties were for me so +impenetrably disguised by the <i>argot</i> in which they were written that I +did not understand a word of them. "When your French gets more +colloquial," he used to say, "I shan't be able to bring you here any +more. Oh! if you were only a man!" He always ended with this +exclamation, and I never knew why, for my woman-hood<a name="page_042" id="page_042"></a> did not seem to +disturb him particularly. Perhaps he felt the want of a sort of Fidus' +Achates to confide in. He took me to two famous places, and this is my +description of them in a letter to my mother:</p> + +<p>"We went first to the famous 'Noctambules' in the Quartier Latin. It is +where the wittiest men of their <i>genre</i> are to be found. They are many +of them decorated by the government. One hears witty topical songs, +<i>chansons d'amour</i>, and absurdities telling of the eels and fishes in +amorous conversation, such extravagances as the French love. There is no +vulgarity. Their diction is marvellous, and of course they sacrifice, +entirely, their tone to their words. All around the walls are posters +and drawings of famous artists and caricatures of Parisians. The +performers are called on in turn by the master of ceremonies, and take +their stand on a little platform in front of the piano half way up the +room. When they have finished, if they have been popular, we are all +called on to join in the <i>doublement</i> for Monsieur so and so. This +consists of clapping to a certain rhythm, which is thumped on the piano: +1 2 3 4 5,—1 2 3 4 5,—1 2 3 4 5—1 2 3—and over again."</p> + +<p>In those days Charles Fallot was still at the "Noctambules" and used to +arise, very black and white and thin, and gaze at himself in the big +mirror opposite,<a name="page_043" id="page_043"></a> while he gestured with his long, skinny arms and +thoroughly French hands, and delivered himself of his witty <i>double +entendre chansons</i>. Another night we went to a famous Montmartre place, +Boite à Fursy, but it was not at all the same thing, and we neither of +us liked it.</p> + +<p>Henry Hadley had the room above me, and often told me my hours of +playing "Carmen," etc., nearly maddened him. I always studied in bed or +at the piano, without singing, and rarely used my voice when committing +rôles to memory. Hadley often had Cyril Scott, the English composer, in +his rooms, and I used to listen with joy to Scott's imaginative playing. +It was like birds sweeping and swooping, all keys and intervals were +interwoven. He always said, one hand on his forehead, "I have no +understanding for limitations of harmony or rules of tempo." And indeed +why should one have? He liked nothing older than Debussy and was +unspeakably bored by Gluck or Beethoven and their ilk, though he loved +"Carmen." Hadley still retained a strong admiration for Wagner and +respect for the old school, though he much appreciated the moderns and +the modern orchestra. I first saw Mary Garden as <i>Mélisande</i> with him. +We both sat rapt and spellbound to the end, transported by what was to +me a perfect revelation as to scoring for modern orchestra,<a name="page_044" id="page_044"></a> the +intangible operatic form, and most of all the subtle imaginative acting +of Mary Garden. Her power of suggestion in those days was capable of +conveying any shade of thought or delicate mood to the spectator. That +performance has always been and will always be an inspiration to me.</p> + +<p>Hadley was always starting off on impossible journeys to Egypt and the +Orient, in search of "material." His talk was filled with the strangest +scraps of out-of-the-way information, like bright-coloured rags in a +dust heap. Bauer lived a door or two away, and I used to hear him +practising and then hear his concerts. A wordy war would rage at our end +of the table at dinner, while old Madame, from her seat of honour in the +centre, would cry, "<i>Mais français, parlez français, mes enfants!</i> You +crush my ears with your English!" Of course, no attention was paid to +her. Joining passionately in the discussions, though not themselves of +the <i>métier,</i> were two American girls, living on the top floor, who were +supposed to be writing a play together. One or another of the composers +was usually more or less in love with one or other of the girls, and +they took sides accordingly, for and against the recognized masters of +the past. The two were amusing, always doing something eccentric.</p> + +<p>At one time they had an incubator in their room, the gift of a passing +admirer, and we engaged passionately<a name="page_045" id="page_045"></a> in raising chickens. The machine +was heated by a huge kerosene lamp, and they were always turning it too +high and having it fill the room with blacks and smoke, or letting it go +out altogether. However, two or three chicks, more strenuously +determined to live than the rest, managed to struggle out at length, and +their advent was heralded by the whole pension. We had marked our +initials on the eggs, one egg each, and when mine showed the first signs +of life, I held it in my hand till it was partly hatched. The little +pecks inside the shell were fascinating to feel in one's palm. As soon +as the chicks could walk, they were taken downstairs into the <i>cité</i>, +and their attempts to scratch gravel were hailed by the assembled +inhabitants of the garden in a rapture of several languages. One +Englishman wanted to make them little jackets, so he could take them for +walks in the <i>Bois</i>.</p> + +<p>Discussion was meat and drink to all these people. Their cry was +"Sensations, sensations! Let the artist experience everything in his own +person!" This doctrine sounded rather a menace to conduct, but talking +endlessly about sensations seemed to be equivalent in most cases to +experiencing them. Nevertheless, some of them indulged in desperate +orgies of black coffee and cigarettes as an invocation to their muse; +and one of the composers assured me that the great symphonic poem on +which he was at work, had been<a name="page_046" id="page_046"></a> inspired by breaking a bottle of +Houbigant's <i>Idéal</i> in a closed cab and driving for hours in the <i>Bois</i>, +inhaling the perfume. They loved to recount these Gargantuan excesses, +and were extravagant in praise of midnight oil, attic windows, and the +calm inspiration of early dawn after nights of frantic toil. They were +dreadfully sincere, and very amusing to watch, but it seemed to me that +there was a great deal of stage setting for very little play. They +tended the green shoot of their artistic development with such fantastic +care, that it was in danger of dying from too much consideration. +Personally, I was too busy, either for sensations or the analysis of +them, though I used to wonder what this Paris could be like into which +they journeyed and from which they returned full of tales of affairs and +lovely women and gorgeous houses. It all seemed most romantic and +interesting to me.</p> + +<p>The other end of the dinner table represented staid conventionality in +contrast to our anarchism. In the centre sat Madame and beside her her +life-long friend, the editor of one of the Paris newspapers. Some hinted +that he was something more than a friend, in spite of Madame's seventy +years. Opposite her, was Madame M——, once an American in the days of +long ago, but with no trace of it left except in her persistent accent. +She was reputed to possess one hundred dresses, and certainly the +variety of her costume<a name="page_047" id="page_047"></a> was amazing; but as she was at least fifty-five +and had preserved every gown for the last thirty years, her annual dress +expenditure, after all, was probably not extravagant. Her old husband +was never allowed a word when she was present, so he revenged himself +for the privation by interfering with every game started after dinner in +the <i>salon</i>—bridge, poker, patience, no matter what it was, he always +insisted that the players were quite wrong and that he could show them +how it was done in the clubs.</p> + +<p>There was a young Russian girl with a pretty face and pretty clothes, +whose hands, however, betrayed her peasant origin. Her beautiful sister +was engaged at the Grand Opera, so she was an object of great interest +to me. There were some Swedes, and nondescript Americans, and a charming +French family, a mother and two daughters, bearers of an historic name, +who had come up from their <i>château</i> in the South of France that the +girls might have masters in various "accomplishments," and were living +in the <i>pension</i> from motives of economy. On Sundays their brother, a +young naval officer, used to dine with them. With his pale, aristocratic +face, and with little side-whiskers, the high stock of his uniform, his +strapped trousers and narrow, arched feet, he was like a John Leech +drawing come to life. Then there was a large Frenchwoman, Madame la +Marquise de Quelquechose,<a name="page_048" id="page_048"></a> who lent the lustre of her title and her +ancestral jewels to our <i>bourgeois</i> board. At least, she said her jewels +were heirlooms, but her ancestors must have had a prophetic taste in +jewelry, as I often saw replicas of her ornaments in the shops of the +rue de Rivoli. An old Englishwoman completed our list of permanencies. +In spite of twenty years' residence in Paris, she would still ask for +"oon petty poo de pang" in a high, drawling voice. There were transients +of many nationalities, but these were our regular inmates.</p> + +<p>An interesting man sometimes dined with us. Writing my mother about him +I say:</p> + +<p>"Last night Mr. H—— dined here and told us many yarns about Sarah +Bernhardt. He said once when he was in California he was asked to meet +her and they all went on a hunting picnic together. She dropped her robe +when she got to the island where they had <i>déjeuner</i>, undoing a wide, +heavy, Egyptian gold and precious-stone belt, and appeared attired in a +man's velvet hunting-suit. He says she adores to talk <i>cancan</i>, and +referred to the manager as 'that <i>cochon</i>.' After breakfast, she threw +the champagne bottles far into the lake and shot them to pieces at the +first shot. The only posey thing she did was when she undid her belt and +threw it far across the road, and when he asked her if that was the way +she treated<a name="page_049" id="page_049"></a> such beautiful things, she said that the man who gave it to +her was domestic!... It is colder than charity here at present, at least +I feel it so in the house. I shall start my fire today for the first +time. Yesterday I bought a bunch of violets, and do you know why? To +keep myself from buying chestnuts, which are bad for the voice. You see, +if I spent my <i>sous</i> for violets I could not afford more for chestnuts. +Thus prevented I myself."<a name="page_050" id="page_050"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V</h3> + +<h4>OPERATIC FRANCE VERSUS OPERATIC GERMANY</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">A</span>FTER a few months of strenuous endeavour on my part, I began to be a +little dissatisfied and restless. I saw clearly that in a year's time, +working at such pressure, I should have a sufficient repertoire to begin +my apprenticeship on the stage; but I did not see my way to a <i>début</i> +quite so clearly. I talked with the other pupils, to get their ideas of +progression. They all said, "When I make my <i>début</i> at the Opera," or +"the Comique." They were all sure of an opening at the top and +apparently would consider nothing less than leading rôles in a world +capital. That was not my idea at all. I did not care about a <i>début</i>. I +wanted to learn to act, to do my big parts over and over again before an +audience, to sing them into my voice, to learn to make voice, face, and +my whole body an articulate expression of all that the rôle had to say.</p> + +<p>I tried to find out how the singers of the two operas had made their +careers. Some, I learned, though doing leading work, still paid for +their performances by taking so and so many francs worth of seats every<a name="page_051" id="page_051"></a> +time they sang. Some had gained a hearing by the influence of their +teachers. Some were there by "protection." The Russian girl's sister was +very beautiful, but she was not very gifted either vocally or +histrionically, and I wondered at her engagement, until I heard that she +was the <i>protégée</i> of a certain rich man. The winners of the first prize +at the Conservatoire had a chance given them, and one or two had made +good to a certain extent, and still sang occasionally. But, I thought, +if the débutantes of the Conservatoire must be given an opportunity, +there can be very little room for other inexperienced singers, and +certainly none for foreigners. The "France for the French" spirit had +impressed me tremendously, as it must all foreigners in Paris. Generous +as the city is to them, she rightly gives her rewards to those of her +own race first.</p> + +<p>The opera class was another source of annoyance to me. The one idea was +"copy what I show you"—make a faithful imitation whether it expresses +what you feel or not; it doesn't matter what you feel so long as you +pour everything into the same moulds and turn out neat little shapes, +labelled "love," "hate," "despair," all ready for use, and all "true to +the traditions of the French school." The first lessons of all were in +standing and walking, and there began my sadness. The traditions +demanded that one's feet be<a name="page_052" id="page_052"></a> set eternally at "ten minutes to two." Mine +would deviate from this rule, and I aided and abetted them in their +mutiny. My instinct was to sit down occasionally with my knees together, +instead of always draping one leg at the side of the chair. I often felt +like singing quite a long phrase with no gestures at all, instead of +keeping up a succession of undulating arm-movements.</p> + +<p>Our dramatic coach, a fiery individual, who chewed coffee-berries +persistently, struggled in vain to teach me to lay one hand on my heart +in the traditional manner, two middle fingers together, little one +crooked, thumb in. Sometimes mine looked like a starfish, and sometimes +like a fist, and both were taboo. Gestures had to melt into each other; +there were different ones for different emotions, and woe betide you if +you mixed them! There was a sort of test speech beginning, "<i>Moi, qui +vous parle.</i>" The hand at "<i>moi</i>" had to be laid upon the chest in the +approved manner. I have forgotten the middle, but the end was, "<i>Et vous +jure, que je le ferai jamais!</i>" At <i>jure</i> one elevated the right hand, +the first two fingers raised, and at <i>jamais</i> the right arm described a +figure eight across the upper half of the body, with the gesture of +tearing away a long beard. We did this all winter and never reached +perfection, that is, an exact copy of Valdejo, our instructor.<a name="page_053" id="page_053"></a></p> + +<p>We had to practice the classic walk—slowly advancing, foot dragging, +stomach out, very lordly to see, one arm bent from the elbow with the +forearm and hand resting against the body—a most difficult thing. The +different versions were very comic, but the idea was excellent and I +used it later in "Orfeo." Certainly a pulled back tummy would not be in +character in a Greek tunic.</p> + +<p>Later, we had to act scenes from our operas, and there I got on better. +I used to get absorbed in the character to the extent of becoming +perfectly oblivious of my surroundings. I remember once, as <i>Dalila</i>, +throwing myself so hard upon the supposed couch of <i>Dalila</i>, that I +thumped my head on the marble mantel behind me. My watching class mates +burst into a snicker, and I into real tears of anger, not of pain. I had +entirely forgotten them when their giggles wrenched me back into the +present; but their great pride was never to forget themselves and always +to be ready to imitate the coach in cold blood. He, however, appreciated +that I had something in me, and used to thump me on the back, and call +me "Canaille!" when I did anything that pleased him—a curious +expression of approval.</p> + +<p>I am not denouncing the ordinary "opera class." This method of slavish +imitation doubtless has its usefulness for some people. The old order of +opera<a name="page_054" id="page_054"></a> singer was often trained by such schooling. But Mary Garden had +opened my eyes to the new order of singing actors, and the old method +was no help to me. I longed for a real stage on which to try out my own +ideas, and find by experience whether they were right or wrong. I wanted +to gain that subtle quality, "authority," which is nearly as important +as voice itself, that routine which makes one forget the four long bones +of the body, and blends all its members into an instrument of +expression, homogeneous and harmonious.</p> + +<p>In my researches into the life-stories of French singers, I heard much +of "the French provinces" as a training school, and turned my attention +to accumulating all the information on that subject that I could gather. +I heard tales of southern audiences who cheered their singers to the +echo, waited in a mob to tear the horses from their carriages after a +performance, pelted them with flowers and expressed their approval in +other picturesque fashions. The reverse side of these tales is of +directly opposite character, when benches are torn up and flung over the +gallery by the "gods," disappointed at not hearing a favourite singer, +and the head of the unlucky substitute is the target for their missiles +till he makes good with a high note loud enough to pierce the din of +their protestation. If a wretched singer clears his throat<a name="page_055" id="page_055"></a> loud enough +to be heard, he will be greeted at each entrance by a chorus of +throat-clearing from the gallery. If his acting of a part strikes them +as being pretentious or over-solemn, groans and cries of +"Shakespear-r-r-e" reward his efforts. To crack on a high note is the +certain signal for a riot of yelling and jeers, but the unhappy singer +must stick it out at any cost, for if he leaves the stage, they wait for +him outside and set upon him bodily.</p> + +<p>"If you've made the round of the Provinces," as Harry Weldon, who has +done so, once said to me, "you can sing in Hell!"</p> + +<p>Of course, not all provincial audiences are so "temperamental" as the +southerners, but, as far as I could learn, paid performances and +protection seemed to exist everywhere in greater or less degree. The +repertoire was limited and old-fashioned—the standard French operas, +"Faust," "Mignon," "Carmen," "Hamlet," were performed, with "Traviata," +"Trovatore," "Aida," "The Barber," some Meyerbeer, and many of the +lighter works, like "La Fille du Regiment." Among the more modern works +were "Werther" and "Manon" of Massenet, with "Bohème" and "Butterfly" +and perhaps "Louise." "Lohengrin" and "Tannhäuser" were sometimes given, +but the big Wagner dramas, the classics of Mozart, Weber and Gluck, and +the moderns like Debussy, Dukas, Strauss, Humperdinck,<a name="page_056" id="page_056"></a> seemed +neglected. Over all there hung a general lack of method, musical +thoroughness and discipline. I must confess that I judge largely by +hear-say, as the only provincial French opera house of which I have any +personal knowledge is that of Nancy. So it may be that I do "The +Provinces" an injustice. Of course, both Monte Carlo and Nice offer many +novelties. But then Monte Carlo is not a provincial French opera at all.</p> + +<p>On the other hand, the stories I heard of the great operatic machinery +of Germany began to attract me irresistibly. The organized system of +opera, the great chain of opera houses, the discipline of their rigid +schooling, the concentration and deep musical sincerity of their +musicians, the simplicity of German life, all seemed to offer what I was +looking for. The dramatic quality of my voice would have more scope in +their more varied repertoire, while surely in their hundred-odd opera +houses I might find a place to work out my ideas in peace.</p> + +<p>Every one thought me crazy. My teachers tried their hardest to dissuade +me, promising me a great career in France. But I felt a call to Germany +where I hoped to find the right conditions for my own development which +seemed lacking in France. The great barrier was the language—the +difficulty of singing in it, to say nothing of learning it, for I did +not know<a name="page_057" id="page_057"></a> one word. Jean de Reszke said to me later, speaking of German +as a language for singing: "<i>Avec cette langue, vous n'arriverez +jamais.</i>" (With that language, you will never succeed.) However, I have +said that I had a good deal of courage in those days, and I determined +to go to Berlin to try my luck.</p> + +<p>Not that I was tired of Paris. It is still my favourite city offering a +wonderful opportunity for broadening culture to those who can get into +touch with its art life. I owe it a great debt for deepening my artistic +perception, and developing that sense of true proportion which keeps one +from exaggeration on the one hand and pedantry on the other. But I +should not recommend Paris as the best school for the ordinary American +student of singing, who has no opportunity to penetrate into real French +life. There is no lack of sincerity in the real French institutions, the +Conservatoire, the schools of art, the Sorbonne—there are found +concentration, competition, and keenness enough. But the foreign student +of singing does not ordinarily come into contact with these +institutions. In the Paris vocal studios, as I know them, there is a +dissipation instead of a conservation of energy. The students expect to +win the crown without running the race, and money and influence play too +great a rôle. They (vocal students, I mean) tend to exaggerate their +little emotions into <i>grandes passions</i>, and<a name="page_058" id="page_058"></a> hold the most +disproportionate views of their own importance. I do not mean to say +that I agree with a certain singer who brought back harrowing tales of +immorality among American students in Europe. Amongst all the hundreds +of vocal students I have known, I never met one case of flagrant +misbehaviour. In general the girls live quietly and strive according to +their lights, though there is not one in twenty with resolution enough +to concentrate on the hard work necessary for a great career. The +temptation is to fritter away both time and money on the things that +don't matter.<a name="page_059" id="page_059"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI</h3> + +<h4>PREPARING RÔLES IN BERLIN</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">T</span>HE first of September, without a word of German, I set out for Berlin. +My mother had come over during the preceding Spring, to make her home in +Paris with my sculptor brother Cecil and my sister. From this time on I +went to them for the summers, and my sister joined me when I went to +Metz, and has never left me since. It made it harder to leave both +family and Paris behind and go into an unknown land, but I felt it to be +the best way.</p> + +<p>Lilli Lehmann's studio was my objective point. I found her address in a +musical journal, and armed with that, and the address of an inexpensive +<i>pension</i>, I took the train. Arrived in Berlin, I took a <i>Droschke</i>, +directing the driver to my pension by showing him the street and number +on a piece of paper. Somewhere between that <i>Droschke</i> and my room, my +travelling clock got lost, and what a time I had to recover it! The +apple-cheeked maid knew of the<a name="page_060" id="page_060"></a> existence of no other language beside +her own. In vain I made a pendulum of my finger and tirelessly repeated +"tick, tick"—no gleam of intelligence dawned in her Prussian blue eyes.</p> + +<p>The first few days brought a series of disappointments. The Lehmann idea +had to be abandoned. She was out of town and recommended me by letter to +a certain Herr——, to whom she was sending every one who applied to +her. I found him a dear old man indeed, but one who had nothing to say +to me on the subject of voice production which I had not heard already. +However, I decided to begin the study of German repertoire with him, +painstakingly re-learning the operas I already knew in French, and +adding the new ones required for a German engagement. Later I found a +good <i>répétiteur</i>, who knew the operas thoroughly, quite sufficient and +much cheaper, as he charged only four marks ($1.00) an hour. I studied +the words of my rôles with Herr——'s wife, who had been an actress and +a good one, and who laid the foundation of what I am proud to say is now +a perfect German accent. These lessons were five marks an hour and were +quite worth it. I would learn a rôle by heart, sentence by sentence, +looking up every word in the dictionary and writing in the translation +over the German, spending hours in fruitless search for a past +participle which<a name="page_061" id="page_061"></a> did not look as if it belonged to its infinitive, the +only part of the verb, of course, to be given in the dictionary! Then, +sentence by sentence, I would go over it with Frau——, repeating each +word after her, sometimes twenty times! We also used those splendid +books, known I found afterwards to every German actor, in which +paragraphs of words with the same vowel sound or combination of vowel +and consonants are given to be repeated over and over again. Besides +this drudgery, I had German lessons for four months (at three marks or +seventy-five cents) for which I had to translate and write exercises. +All the labyrinths of the declension of articles, nouns and adjectives +in three genders and plurals, lay before me to be explored. The datives +and accusatives haunted my dreams by night, and by day I was reduced to +the sign language.</p> + +<p>I had left my first pension, and crushing down the temptation to live in +one of the big, gay German-American pensions, where justice is tempered +with mercy, so to speak, I moved myself and my piano into a real German +one, where I was the only alien. It was one floor of a large house in a +quiet side street—the top floor, and no elevator! I climbed +eighty-seven steps by actual count every time I came home from a lesson. +I had a huge room, heated by steam, with board for four marks a day. The +meals were<a name="page_062" id="page_062"></a> <i>echt Deutsch</i>. Breakfast was set ready on the dining-room +table at some unearthly hour, and the guests went in and helped +themselves when they chose. The coffee and hot milk were kept warm over +little alcohol flames, and there were delicious Berlin rolls and the +best of unsalted butter. Dinner was at two, and was good in its plain +way. We had some North German dishes which one had to learn to enjoy, +like olives. Hot chocolate soup I grew quite fond of, but beer soup, +sorrel soup, and cabbage soup with cherries in it were never exactly +intimates of mine. One dish of baked ham with dumplings and hot plum jam +sounds strange, but improves on acquaintance; <i>Pumpernickel</i>, and +<i>Schmierkaese</i> are better than their names, and <i>Kartoffelpuffen mit +Preisselbeeren</i> (potato cakes with cranberries) are delicious. We had +good plain puddings and black coffee for dessert every day, and quite +wonderful roast Pomeranian goose and <i>Eistorte</i> with whipped cream on +Sundays. Supper was at eight, and the menu was certainly a model for the +simple life. Bread and butter with slices of sausage and cold ham, +sometimes big dishes of roast chestnuts instead of cold meat, or +potatoes in their jackets, or some of the endless variety of +North-German cheeses—to drink, tea or beer, and that was all.</p> + +<p>My fellow pensionnaires were nearly all teachers,<a name="page_063" id="page_063"></a> or students preparing +to be teachers. They all spoke German and nothing but German, and, at +first, I used to think my mind would drown in the overwhelming floods of +it that assailed my ears. Gradually it came to sound like individual +words and phrases, and soon I dared occasionally to launch a small +conversational barque upon it, avoiding the disastrous rocks of gender +as skilfully as possible, though often at first, by the time that my +genders and cases were all arranged for a sentence, the subject had +changed, and I could not use it. We had a Fräulein Lanz, Fräulein Franz, +and Fräulein Kranz, four or five other Fräuleins and no males at all.</p> + +<p>Another American student of singing came to live there, and in the +evening we used to go to the opera or to concerts together. Everything +begins early in Berlin, and those who had tickets for some entertainment +missed the eight o'clock supper. So plates of <i>belegte Broedchen</i> (rolls +with cold meat) would be set out for them on the dining-table, and all +the others would be sitting there with their needle-work, and would +demand "<i>Nun, wie war es?</i>" when we came in. On Saturdays the evening +paper announced the program at the opera for the week, and we could +hardly wait to look at it. The cheaper seats are in great demand. +Students wait for hours, sometimes from earliest dawn, outside the box +office on Sunday mornings<a name="page_064" id="page_064"></a> when the sale for the week begins. We had an +arrangement with the keeper of a little fruit and vegetable shop, to +save ourselves the wait. We would decide what we wished to see and go +over to his shop on Saturday evening to order the seats from him. He +then went down early enough to secure the front row in the top gallery +for us at two marks fifty, and we paid him twelve cents for his trouble. +Sixty-two cents is quite a high price in comparison to those of the rest +of the Opera House, for the orchestra chairs cost only eight marks. The +top gallery is vast, and the back rows are much cheaper, but the +authorities show their sense in keeping up the price of the front rows +and I don't think there is ever an empty seat there. To concerts we were +often admitted free, on saying that we were students, unless the artist +was a great favourite, and in that case we could buy standing room, or +seats in the gallery for one mark. We always went and came home in the +street cars, paying the two cent fare with a one cent tip to the +conductor, and dressing in our ordinary street clothes, with scarves +over our hair. I used to go alone sometimes, and was never spoken to or +molested in any way. No one looked at you twice, unless you looked at +him three times.</p> + +<p>On Sundays I would take a day off, and, in true German fashion, make an +expedition; in bad weather<a name="page_065" id="page_065"></a> to some museum or picture gallery, in Autumn +or Spring to some out-of-door restaurant. Sometimes I was too tired to +go further than the <i>Tiergarten</i>. Then I would stroll gently across it +and have coffee and cakes at the <i>Zelt</i>, or big open-air refreshment +gardens where the band plays. They are the resort of <i>hoi polloi</i> of +Berlin in countless family groups: the father rather fat with hirsute +adornments, the mother also rather massive, and their plump children, +all drinking beer out of tall glasses and mugs, or coffee in inch-thick +white cups, and eating wedges of highly decorated <i>Torte</i>, with or +without the addition of heaped-up whipped cream.</p> + +<p>If I felt more strenuous, I would take a car out to the Grunewald, a +villa-colony suburb, with roads winding through pine woods. I would sit +under the trees and invite my soul. As I sat there, some girl or boy's +school would come trooping by, singing a <i>Volkslied</i> of interminable +verses, in four parts, having tramped all day for the pure joy of motion +in the open air. Then I would have coffee and a triangle of cherry pie, +and what cherry pie! at the <i>Hundekehle</i>, an immense restaurant on the +border of a small lake, accommodating I don't know how many fat +Prussians at once with refreshments. Every German town has some such +resort, where inexpensive creature comforts are the reward of a long +walk. Such an expedition<a name="page_066" id="page_066"></a> of the whole family is their greatest treat, +and one in which they have the sense to indulge as often as possible. +Even on week day afternoons the housewives find time for a stroll, a +reviving cup of coffee, and a little gossip, though of course that is +not the same thing as going <i>en masse</i> with Hans and the Kinder. Of +course, this was long before the war.<a name="page_067" id="page_067"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII</h3> + +<h4>MY FIRST OPERATIC CONTRACT SIGNED</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">B</span>Y the first of December I had broken the back of the German +declensions, understood a good part of an ordinary conversation, and had +painfully acquired three or four rôles in German. The gadfly of my +ambition began to torment me again, and I determined to look for a +"job."</p> + +<p>Students often ask me "How did you get your first engagement?" This is +how. I went to see the best agent in Berlin, Herr Harder, a man of the +highest reputation for fair dealing, who was the recognized head of his +profession. Opinion as to the agent's powers of usefulness is divided +among singers. Some maintain that they have made all their good +engagements independently, others tell you that you are safe only in the +hands of a reputable agent. I have closed contracts in both ways. The +agent is not omnipotent. It is his business to watch the operatic field +and notify you when there is a vacancy that he thinks would suit you. He +is apt to know first where such vacancies are likely to occur. Directors +who are looking for singers sometimes go<a name="page_068" id="page_068"></a> straight to their favourite +agent. Then he, the agent, sends you word that Herr Direktor So and So +will be at his Bureau on such a day to hear singers. When you respond, +you may find yourself the only contralto among many other voices, or you +may find yourself one of six or seven all wanting the same engagement. +The agent keeps contract blanks in his office, and when he hears of a +vacancy in an opera house, he fills in a blank with your name, the name +of the theatre, and tentatively the salary he thinks they will pay, and +sends it to you. You sign it if it suits you, and return it to the +agent. This is really nothing more than a notification that there is, or +will be, such a vacancy, and is not worth the paper it is written on. +American girls, who do not understand this, will tell you that they have +"been offered Berlin, or Vienna, or Munich," when they have merely +received one of these <i>Agenten-Verträge</i>. A contract is worth nothing as +such, until it is countersigned by the director of the opera house, and +yourself as singer. Even then, it is not valid until you have sung as +many "trial performances" at the opera house as the contract calls for, +and for which you may have to wait six months.</p> + +<p>I told Herr Harder what I wanted—a chance to do big rôles somewhere, +salary no particular object, as I should look upon the experience as the +completion of my training. I sang for him, left with him<a name="page_069" id="page_069"></a> my repertoire +and photographs, and he promised to let me know of the first opportunity +that presented itself. In a short time, he sent for me to come and see +the Director of the Theater des Westens, a Berlin theatre which at that +time was the home of a sort of popular opera. I sang for the manager, +and he was very complimentary. He offered to engage me at once, but he +added, curiously enough, that I was too good for him! They gave only the +older operas like "Trovatore," on which the copyright had expired, and +of these only the ones which the Hofoper did not give, so that I should +have no chance to sing my big parts. At the same time, he said he would +very much like to have me. The offer did not suit my plans, and I +decided to refuse it. I went on with my work until just before +Christmas, when Herr Harder made me a second proposal. This was the +position of first contralto in the garrison town of Metz in +Alsace-Lorraine. The opera was a municipal one, that is it was +subsidized by the town, they played a season of seven months, and gave a +large repertoire including some of the Ring dramas. I was to go down +there, sing for the management, and if they liked me, begin my +engagement the following September, giving me time to make additions to +my German repertoire. As I was a beginner of course I could not give the +usual guest performances.<a name="page_070" id="page_070"></a></p> + +<p><i>Vorsingen</i> is a trying ordeal. The great theatres have regular days for +hearing aspirants, but this was a small theatre. The appointment is +usually made on the stage, sometimes during, sometimes just after a +rehearsal. Groups of the singers regularly engaged in the opera house +stand in the wings, and you feel a nameless hostility emanating from all +of them, especially from the one whom you are going to try to supplant. +The theatre is like a cavern, and the acoustic is of course totally +unknown to you. Two or three pale spots down in the orchestra chairs +indicate the whereabouts of the director and perhaps the stage manager +and first Kapellmeister who have come to hear you. The overhead +"rehearsal lights" are very unbecoming and you are quite conscious of +it. If you are to sing with orchestra, the conductor presents you to the +players, "<i>Meine Herren, Fräulein——.</i>" You bow, and your insides slip +a few inches lower. My first <i>Vorsingen</i> was with the piano. It stood at +one side of the stage, and a whipper-snapper of a third Kapellmeister +dashed more or less accurately into the prelude of the second aria from +"Samson et Dalila."</p> + +<p>Then came a momentous interview in the Director's office. I had sung +such good German, thanks to Frau——, that he had no idea that I +understood only about three words in five of what he said. For form's<a name="page_071" id="page_071"></a> +sake he kept saying, "<i>Sie verstehen mich, Fräulein?</i>" and when I +answered "<i>Ja</i>," he was satisfied. His wife, who thought she spoke +English, was present, and tried to say a great deal, but my German +proved the more serviceable of the two. I gathered that I was offered a +two season contract, to sing the leading contralto parts, at the +princely salary of 150 marks a month! (about $35). There was no +<i>Spielgelt</i>. Salaries are usually divided into so much per month down, +and so much per performance, the number of performances per month +guaranteed; that is, one is paid for a certain number whether one sings +them or not, and any performances over and above this number are paid +extra. If a performance is lost by one's own fault, through illness for +example, the <i>Spielgelt</i> for that performance is forfeited. Three days +absence from the cast through illness, even though one may be scheduled +to sing only once during those days, is counted as one <i>Spielgelt</i>.</p> + +<p>Illness is, in fact, almost a crime. In addition to losing your money, +you have to have witnesses to prove that you are really ill, for theatre +directors in Germany are a suspicious lot and take nothing for granted. +If you wake on the morning of a performance with laryngitis, that dread +enemy of the voice, or if you fall downstairs on your way to the theatre +and sprain your ankle, you must notify the theatre<a name="page_072" id="page_072"></a> before a certain +hour in the day, perhaps ten or twelve, or four o'clock, that you cannot +sing that night. Your word for it alone won't do. Every theatre has +special doctors on its list, and you must call in one of these, whether +he is your regular physician or not. He makes an examination and gives +you a signed statement that you are unable to appear, adding, if the +disorder be serious, how many days it will be in his opinion, before you +can return to work. It often happens that the man most experienced in +treating your illness, the best throat specialist in town, for example, +is not on the books as "Theater-Arzt," and then if you wish to be +treated by him, you sometimes have trouble with the theatre doctor. In +the theatre in which I was first engaged, I had a disagreeable +experience of this kind. I was ill with bronchitis, and sent word to the +theatre the day before, that I should not be able to sing <i>Marta</i>, in +"Faust," on the night scheduled for it. I had already committed the +deadly crime of illness once before that season, and this time my +defection was particularly annoying to the management because they had +to get a guest for "Faust" anyway, and they would be forced to send +posthaste for another to sing the <i>Nurse</i>. Their irritation with me was +equalled, if not surpassed, by that of the regular theatre doctor, whose +professional honour had been outraged the last time<a name="page_073" id="page_073"></a> by my insistence +upon the services of a very clever throat specialist who lived in the +town, and whose aid I had had the bad taste to prefer to his own. +Between them, I was the corn between the upper and nether millstone. +Next day the theatre sent word that they would accept nothing but a +certificate from their own doctor, and the doctor shortly after appeared +at my bedside. I could hardly speak out loud, but managed to whisper a +request that he would write me an "<i>Attest</i>" for three days. To my +surprise he began to hem and haw, and finally stammered out: "There is +really no reason in my opinion, why you shouldn't sing this evening!" I +was so furious I saw red. I sat up in bed, and whispered savagely:</p> + +<p>"You say I can sing tonight! Very well, get out of my room, and I'll go +to the theatre and sing this evening, with my voice in this condition, +and <i>you</i> will be responsible for the consequences!" He got up, twisting +his hat in his hands, and stammering something. I simply fixed my eyes +on him, and fairly glared him out of the room. Then I dressed like a +hurricane and rushed to the director's office.</p> + +<p>"I have come to sing <i>Marta</i>," I announced hoarsely.</p> + +<p>"Oh! <i>liebes Fräulein</i>——" began the director, positively scared by my +pale face and furious eyes, "<i>Of course</i> we don't want you to sing when +<a name="page_074" id="page_074"></a>you are so hoarse. Doctor—— was quite mistaken; please go home and +take care of yourself. We'll get a guest for the <i>Nurse</i> at once!"</p> + +<p>"Very well," I said, "I will go home if you say so; but remember +Doctor—— says I can sing, and I am ready to do so on his +responsibility."</p> + +<p>I went back after my illness to see the director, who to my surprise +began to attack me violently about my absence. He stormed, and thumped +the desk, and would listen to nothing I said. I tried to tell him he had +no right to speak to me in that way, as I had really been ill, and had +always done my duty when well. He raved back that I had <i>not</i> done my +duty, and it seemed to me so futile to argue, that I walked out without +answering and left him raving. I went home and stayed there for five +days, and at the end of that time the director sent his secretary "to +explain" and ask me to return to my duty. It was an awkward interview +for him, poor man, so I let him off easily, graciously accepted the +somewhat disguised apology, and, as I was quite recovered and eager to +sing again, signified my willingness to appear the following night.</p> + +<p>To return to my first contract.—There was a formidable list of rôles +which I must agree to have ready, and the director also insisted on my +studying with a certain well-known woman teacher in Berlin!<a name="page_075" id="page_075"></a> I conveyed +to him as well as I could, that I would settle all this with my agent, +as I had no intention of agreeing to all of it, and was afraid to trust +my German to say so diplomatically. He added, "Of course you are too +good for us, Fräulein." This was the second time I had been told I was +too good for an engagement. Every one seemed to think I ought to aim at +a secondary position in one of the big opera houses, rather than a +leading one in a smaller place. The prospect of singing pages or +confidants in a capital city, with perhaps one good rôle in a season, +did not meet my needs at all; but no one seemed to sympathize with my +ideas. I wanted to make a career in Germany, as if I were a German +singer, having my own recognized place in the opera house in which I was +engaged, singing the big rôles by right, without intriguing or fighting +for them.</p> + +<p>On returning to Berlin, I wrote to Herr Harder that I would learn a +certain specified number of rôles in addition to those I already knew, +making about twelve in all, and ignored the singing-teacher proposition +altogether as I had formed the intention of going to coach with Jean de +Reszke. On these terms the contract was returned to me signed by the +director, and I was engaged.<a name="page_076" id="page_076"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII</h3> + +<h4>MY ONE LONE IMPROPOSITION</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">“W</span>HEN I make my début” was the phrase that I had heard so often on the +lips of my American fellow students. Each one had chosen her opera +house, and decided in which rôle she would dazzle a clamouring public. +Sometimes one more modest would choose Monte Carlo in preference to +Paris, or if she intended to make a career in Germany, she might +hesitate between the rival merits of Dresden and Berlin. But that the +theatre should be one of the half-dozen leading ones in the world, and +the rôle her favourite, were foregone conclusions before she left +America.</p> + +<div class="centeredimage" style="width: 315px;"> +<a href="images/ill_076.jpg"> +<img src="images/ill_076_sml.jpg" width="315" height="500" alt="I CARMEN AS I USED TO DRESS IT" title="I CARMEN AS I USED TO DRESS IT" /></a><br /> +<span class="caption">I CARMEN AS I USED TO DRESS IT</span> +</div> + +<p>In this respect, I quite shattered the tradition of the prima donna, for +I sang my first part in a small provincial German opera house, at +twenty-four hours' notice, and it was one of those which I have least +pleasure in singing. I remember that a well-known American writer, +living in Paris, said patronizingly to my mother à propos of my first +appearance, "Let us hope that she will make a real début later, for +this<a name="page_077" id="page_077"></a> can hardly be called one, can it?" "Well, after all," answered +my mother, "who knows where most of the great singers of today made +their débuts?"</p> + +<p>Contemporary fiction is full of opera singing heroines who jump into +fame in a single night, like Minerva springing full armed from the head +of Jupiter. Well, perhaps some of them do so—but I have never met a +singer, even of the highest international reputation, who has not had +some dark checkers of disappointment in his career. All his clouds may +have had silver linings, but sometimes the silver gets mighty tarnished +before he succeeds in struggling through the cloud, and sometimes +another singer gets through first and steals the silver outright. I +cannot say that I have ever been in great danger morally on the stage, +but my courage, my nerve, has been sometimes severely threatened, and I +have needed to summon the most dogged determination to keep it from +failing altogether. I feel sure that all successful singers share my +experience in greater or less degree, especially those who have been +trained in foreign countries. Not all of them, by any means, have been +through as severe a school as mine; few American singers at any rate, +have made a career in a foreign country exactly as if they had been a +native of it. Many have been engaged for special rôles in one of the +larger opera houses, and after several years of experience, have<a name="page_078" id="page_078"></a> sung +but a few parts, all of which have been those most suited to them. I +have sung, on the contrary, the entire repertoire of a typical German +opera house, where operas are regularly given of which the Metropolitan +audience has never even heard.</p> + +<p>In my first season, I sang in all fifteen different rôles in the first +seven months of my career. I have appeared in eighty-five, ranging from +the Wagner music dramas to the "Merry Widow" and singing many of the +rôles in three different languages. It has been "the strenuous life" in +its severest form, but I do not regret any of it, nor feel that my +effort has been wasted, for I know that I understand my <i>métier</i>, +comprehensively and in detail, and nothing can take away the +satisfaction of that.</p> + +<p>The beginning of the season found my sister and myself in the town of +Metz, as according to contract we had arrived six days before the +opening. The weather was hot and dusty, and the town seemed deserted, +for the regiments which gave it life and colour was still away at the +Autumn manœuvres. We felt very forlorn at first, strangers in a +strange land with a vengeance, and without the least idea of what the +immediate future might hold for us. My German had improved considerably +since my interview with the director, but my sister did not know one +word. Luckily for her there was almost as much French<a name="page_079" id="page_079"></a> spoken in the +town as German. There were many shops of absolutely French character, +where she was treated with great consideration as coming from Paris. +Even the officials of the town, the post office employés, custom +officers, and others with whom she came in contact, though rather deaf +in their French ear, would make shift to understand her if necessary, +adding an extra touch of rigidity to their already sufficiently severe +manner, in order to nip any "French familiarity" in the bud.</p> + +<p>We went to the hotel that had been recommended to us, as the principal +one in the town was in the process of reconstruction and swarmed with +plasterers and carpenters. It was rather a dreadful place, with enormous +dark rooms, dingily furnished with heavy old-fashioned furniture; but it +was very near the theatre and as we meant to find lodgings later, we +tried not to be depressed by its gloominess.</p> + +<p>Of course, the first thing we did was to visit the theatre. To reach it +one crossed a bridge over the river, picturesquely bordered with old +overhanging houses, then a cobblestone "Platz," and there, rather shabby +but still quite imposing, it stood. On the way I read my name for the +first time on a German poster, with a distinct thrill. I knew my way to +the stage-entrance, and through it to the Direktor's Bureau, where +several shocks awaited me. I learned<a name="page_080" id="page_080"></a> that the man who had engaged me +had been superseded by a new one, who had not yet arrived. Matters were +in charge of the stage manager, a huge, towering creature, with a great +bass voice, who was a rather remarkable actor. He had come down in the +world, having begun life as a cavalry officer, and he had strange gleams +of the gentleman about him, even then. He was, by the way, the one man +in the profession who ever made me a questionable offer. He grew to +admire me very much as time went on, and one day, after I had been there +some time, he asked me to sign a further contract with the theatre.</p> + +<p>"You'll never get anything very much better," he said, "as you are a +foreigner. We'll make a good contract with you, and perhaps, later—who +knows?—you may have a 'protection salary.'"</p> + +<p>He paused to see the effect of his proposal, and was met with absolute +non-comprehension on my part, as I really did not understand, at the +time, the German words he was using. He dropped his proposal there and +then, and the affair had no unpleasant consequences for me, as he never +referred to it again. And that is the single instance of that sort which +I have encountered. Nevertheless, I might possibly have had further +trouble with him, for my appearance really seemed to appeal to him very +much, later in the winter. Just before Christmas, however, he died, +almost<a name="page_081" id="page_081"></a> overnight, as we were in the midst of rushing a production of +"Trompeter von Säkkingen." He had informed me on Friday night that I +should have to sing the <i>Countess</i> on the following Tuesday. I did not +know a word of it, and was on the way on Saturday morning to get the +score, when I heard that he was dangerously ill—and by Sunday morning +he was dead. Poor man! he had some good qualities and real talents, but +it turned out that he was a great scoundrel and had been robbing the +direction left and right, under the pretence of assisting the new +director.</p> + +<p>This new director, who had never even heard my voice, had been a +well-known Wagnerian singer in his day and intended to take some of the +principal baritone rôles in his new position, to the intense disgust of +the regular <i>Heldenbariton</i>. All the outstanding contracts had been +taken over in his name. This sudden change of management, during +vacation time, made a little trouble for me as it happened. None of the +present staff had heard me sing. They knew only that I was a foreigner +without experience, heard that my conversational German was not yet +perfect (a much rarer accomplishment than a perfect accent in singing), +and therefore doubted my ability to do the work of the first contralto. +So they had engaged a native, which meant that it was "up to me" to +prove myself capable at the first opportunity or lose the<a name="page_082" id="page_082"></a> chance of +doing first rôles or perhaps be dismissed altogether.</p> + +<p>Our hotel was impossible for a long stay, and, of course, after my +Berlin experience, my first idea was a good German pension. We went to +the <i>Verkehrsverein</i>—the Information Bureau which is a feature of all +German towns, and asked for a pension address. The man in charge shook +his head. There was only one such place, he said, and he feared that it +would not suit us, but we might go and see. We went accordingly, and +found a nice-enough looking house in the newest quarter, quite the other +side of the town from the theatre. The inside of the house, however, +told its own story—concrete floors, whitewashed walls with garish +religious prints on them, and deal furniture with red and white table +covers much in evidence. The bedrooms were cell-like and garnished with +mottoes, while a Bible and candlestick by each bedside were the only +other decorations.</p> + +<p>"What is this institution?" we asked.</p> + +<p>"It is the German Young Ladies Evangelical Home, for Protestants only," +we were told.</p> + +<p>We thanked the Matron, and decided that we were neither German, +Evangelical nor young enough for such a home, even though we might be +ladies and Protestants.</p> + +<p>Disappointed in our hope of finding a pension, we<a name="page_083" id="page_083"></a> returned to our +friend of the Information Bureau, this time to ask for addresses of +furnished rooms with a decent landlady to attend to them for us. He +shook his head once more—it was very difficult in a garrison town, he +said, to be certain of the character of a house which had furnished +rooms to let.</p> + +<p>"But where do the artists of the theatres usually live?" we asked.</p> + +<p>"Oh! they either take furnished rooms, or bring their own furniture," he +answered, "or live in the smaller hotels. But then they are Germans and +used to judging in such cases. There is, however, an English lady living +here who knows the town thoroughly, and you had better go to her and get +her to find rooms for you."</p> + +<p>As we felt that we could not possibly ask a totally unknown Englishwoman +to find lodgings for us, my sister set out on the hunt alone. As a +foreigner speaking no German, and a woman looking for rooms all by +herself, she was received in a very curious manner by most of the +landladies she visited, and evidently looked upon with strong suspicion. +We were getting desperate, as the time of my début was coming nearer and +nearer and we were still unsettled. Finally we resolved to throw +ourselves upon the mercy of the unknown Englishwoman after all, and +wrote her a note begging her assistance in finding two furnished rooms<a name="page_084" id="page_084"></a> +near the theatre, with a <i>Hausfrau</i> who would look after them and serve +our breakfast. We had to find a furnished apartment as we were not like +some of my colleagues who possess their own furniture and pass their +lives in a sort of singing journey through the country, always +surrounded by their own household goods.</p> + +<div class="centeredimage" style="width: 316px;"> +<a href="images/ill_084.jpg"> +<img src="images/ill_084_sml.jpg" width="316" height="500" alt="CARMEN AS I NOW DRESS IT" title="CARMEN AS I NOW DRESS IT" /></a><br /> +<span class="caption">CARMEN AS I NOW DRESS IT</span> +</div> + +<p><a name="page_085" id="page_085"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX</h3> + +<h4>THE MAKINGS OF A SMALL MUNICIPAL OPERA HOUSE</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">E</span>ARLY the next morning, before we were up, our English friend kindly +came to see us, and with her help we soon discovered just what we were +looking for, in an eminently respectable house, where the <i>Hausfrau</i> was +the wife of a policeman, so that we were under the shadow of the majesty +of the law.</p> + +<p>A young doctor had the rooms, but she assured us that he was moving +immediately, and that we might send our trunks the following day. We +duly arrived the next afternoon with an avalanche of baggage and found +that the poor young man had had no intention of leaving before the end +of the month and had even invited guests for that very evening! Floods +of German ensued between him and the <i>Hausfrau</i>, while we sat +philosophically on our trunks in the hall and waited. Presently she +emerged, rather heated of countenance, to say that it was all arranged, +and to begin moving our things into the bedroom. The doctor<a name="page_086" id="page_086"></a> called us +into the sitting-room, waived aside our explanations and thanks for his +gallantry, and shutting all the doors mysteriously, proceeded to the +only revenge in his power—to defame the character and impugn the +honesty of our future hostess.</p> + +<p>"Keep things locked, I warn you, keep them locked!" he repeated +earnestly, all the while cramming books, bottles and garments +promiscuously into a trunk.</p> + +<p>We made allowances for his need of reprisal, and took his warning with a +grain of salt; and as a matter of fact our landlady never touched +anything of ours except what she doubtless considered her proper +"commission" levied upon our coal and kerosene. She was quite +satisfactory on the whole, except that she <i>would</i> quarrel very noisily +with her policeman from time to time, or rather he with her. When we +remonstrated and said that we could not stand it and that she shouldn't, +she answered that she would be only too glad to get out of her bargain, +but that she had put her money into this marriage and therefore had to +stay in it!</p> + +<p>Her small boy was named Karl, but she always called him "Schweinsche'." +She had a few wisps of greyish drab hair wound round a sort of +steering-wheel of celluloid in the back. On Christmas my sister hunted +for hours for a present for her, and<a name="page_087" id="page_087"></a> finally returned with a +magnificent set of rhinestone-set haircombs. I have always wondered what +the poor woman did with them, as her hair could not have covered an +eighth of their prongs.</p> + +<p>The reason for the summary dismissal of her former tenant was, of +course, the extra money that she made out of our being foreigners who +did not know the tariff, and the fact that there were two of us to be +served. We paid sixty marks, fifteen dollars, a month for the rooms, +service and breakfast of coffee and rolls, and little as this seems, I +don't suppose the doctor had paid a penny over forty. Our colleagues +thought us spendthrifts and gullible foreigners, as they paid about +thirty marks and got their own breakfast.</p> + +<p>My sister had two chafing dishes on which she cooked our supper, but the +two o'clock dinner was a problem. I was too tired after the strenuous +morning rehearsals beginning at ten o'clock, and the strain of trying to +follow all the directions I received in German, to go to the Hotels or +restaurants for dinner, as most of my colleagues did. Our landlady +suggested that she should have it fetched from the officers' mess of the +crack cavalry regiment, whose barracks were near by. She said this was a +usual arrangement. We bought a sort of tier of enamelled dishes, fitting +into each other and carried in a kind of<a name="page_088" id="page_088"></a> wickerwork handle. One +contained soup, the next meat, the third vegetable, while bread or +dessert reposed in the top. We can testify that even crack regiments are +not unduly pampered in the Fatherland, for anything plainer, or more +unappetizing than these dinners, I have never tried to eat. Perhaps they +gained something when served hot in the officers' <i>Casino</i>, but we found +it almost impossible to down them, eaten out of our enamel-ware dishes. +After a time, when the newness of everything in the theatre had worn off +a little, and I began "to feel my feet," we arranged to dine at the +hotel where many of the colleagues met daily. This was a far better +plan, as, in addition to a really hot meal, we had a splendid +opportunity to improve our German. I was naturally making rapid progress +in it, but my sister still had to confine herself to the shops where +they understood French. One day when I came home from rehearsal, she +told me that our <i>Hausfrau</i> had repeated to her a long piece of gossip +in German. Seeing by my sister's face that she had not understood, the +woman said, "Oh, you don't understand, Fräulein. Well, I'll say it all +over again in French." Then she proceeded to repeat it again, very +loudly and slowly—in German!</p> + +<p>Of course it is rather dreadful to be called just "Fräulein" by your +landlady in Germany, but the<a name="page_089" id="page_089"></a> social standing of the singers and players +in a provincial theatre is usually not high enough to warrant anything +else. A position in an opera house in a capital city, or in a +Hoftheater, confers social importance enough upon its holder to entitle +her to the prefix <i>gnädiges</i> (gracious) before the ignominious +<i>Fräulein</i>, which in society is properly used to designate only a +governess, a companion, or a saleswoman in a shop.</p> + +<p>Titles and forms of address are a ticklish subject in the Fatherland, at +any time. It is hard to comprehend the mazes of male progression from +the simple "Rat," through the subsequent variations of Hofrat (court +councillor), Geheimer Hofrat (privy court councillor), Geheimrat (privy +councillor), Wirklicher Geheimrat (really truly privy councillor), to +the lofty dignity of Excellenz.</p> + +<p>Old-fashioned ladies used to employ the feminized version of their +husband's titles, and I once knew an old dame who insisted upon being +addressed as "<i>Frau Oberlandgerichtsräthin</i>." The bourgeoisie used to +copy the aristocracy in this respect, and at the afternoon +Kaffeeklatsch, Frau Hofcondittor Meyer would inquire about the health of +Herr Strassenbahnsinspektor Braun, from his wife the Frau +Strassenbahnsinspektorin (street car inspectoress). Modern life is too +crowded perhaps for such lengthy addresses,<a name="page_090" id="page_090"></a> but Frau Meyer and Herr +Braun are certainly less picturesque cognomens. Among the artistocracy +the proper titles and forms of address have many pitfalls for the +foreigner, though I used to dodge them fairly successfully by addressing +every woman older than myself as "<i>Gnädige Frau</i>" irrespective of her +"handle," and the men by no title at all, except in the case of a prince +not of royal blood, who has to be called by the mouth-filling courtesy +title of <i>Durchlaucht</i>.</p> + +<p>Of course in letter-writing this way round is not always possible, and +here the complications are simply terrifying. The salutation of a lady +without any title at all ranges all the way from "Wertes Fräulein" +(Worthy Miss), almost an insult to a person of any gentility, to the +punctilious "Hochvereherte und gnädige Frau" (Highly honoured and +gracious lady) of high society. Even the envelope provides a subtle form +of insult or of flattery. In Germany one is simply born, well-born, +highly well-born, or high born as the case may be. If you are rightly +entitled to the third, how irritating to be publicly branded on the +outside of a letter as only well-born. On the other hand, if you really +belong among the merely born, what a delicate attention to be +acknowledged "<i>Hochwohlgeborene</i>" for all the world, including the +<i>Portier's Frau</i> to see! Shops in writing to you (as long as your credit +is good) love to employ the latter<a name="page_091" id="page_091"></a> on the envelope, repeat it in the +body of the letter which always begins "Highly honoured and gracious +Miss" and sign themselves "Mit Vorzüglicher Hochachtung"—"with +magnificent respect." Friends, of course, call you just Fräulein +So-and-so, as we should say "Miss Brown," except if they are young men, +when they usually stick to the "gracious Miss." You must never inquire +for the members of a person's family without the Mr., Mrs., or Miss +being added: "How is your Frau Mother, Herr Father, or Fräulein Sister?" +There is a curious phrase for parents—"How are your <i>Herren</i> Parents?" +being the strictly correct form of question.</p> + +<p>Yes! Etiquette is very complicated in Germany and requires a great deal +of study from the "Out-lander."</p> + +<p>To return to the theatre—we expected that my sister would have the run +of my dressing-room, and that she might be present at the rehearsals. We +found on the contrary that the most rigorous rules were enforced to +forbid entrance to the theatre to any one not a regular member of the +staff. No one else was allowed to pass the porter's lodge. There were +regular dressers provided by the theatre, and my sister was present only +once or twice at rehearsals during my two seasons in Metz and then only +by special request.<a name="page_092" id="page_092"></a></p> + +<p>The rehearsals for the next day were posted at the stage door. They were +not printed or typed, but written in German script, with chalk on the +blackboard. They would be placed there at six o'clock every evening, and +my sister used to go over to find out for me what they were. She could +not read German script at all, neither could I, very well; so she used +to take paper and pencil and laboriously draw everything on the board, +chorus calls and all, for fear of missing something. Then, letter by +letter, we would puzzle it out, and find out the hours of my rehearsals, +as if they had been written in cipher. She was always present at my +performances.</p> + +<p>I had to write, "I beg in the most polite manner for a seat for my +sister for this evening's performance," and drop it into a special box +before half past eleven in the morning. Then in the evening, if there +were a vacant place in the orchestra chairs, she would have it. On +Sundays the house was often <i>ausverkauft</i>, sold out, so we generally +bought a seat if I were singing on that night, so as to be on the safe +side. The prices ranged from four marks for box seats, to five cents in +the gallery. The orchestra chairs cost three marks (75 cents), but +nearly every one had an <i>Abonnement</i>, or sort of season ticket, which +made them much cheaper. The rates for officers were very low indeed. The +chief cavalry regiments had the<a name="page_093" id="page_093"></a> boxes between them, and the less +important lieutenants of the infantry or the despised engineers had +seats in the first balcony. Years ago, in the old unregenerate days, +these boxes full of young cavalrymen furnished almost more entertainment +than the stage. The boxes had curtains to be drawn at will, and the +young rascals would order champagne served to them there, and drink +toasts loudly to their favourite singers in the midst of their +performances. Some of the frail fair ones of the town would visit them +behind the drawn curtains, and there were high times generally. This has +all come to an end, gone the road of other equally charming old customs, +and I saw very little misbehaviour among the lieutenants, except +sometimes when the provocation was really too strong for them. One +evening a very solemn young White Dragoon, over six feet tall, coming in +in the half darkness after the curtain was up, missed his chair and +plumped down, sabre and all, on the floor of the box instead, to the joy +of his comrades; and once in a Christmas pantomime, they all forgot +their military dignity at the spectacle of a very fat young chorus girl, +whom bad judgment on the part of the ballet mistress had costumed most +realistically for the part of a white rabbit.</p> + +<p>Sunday is usually chosen for the first night, as a larger proportion of +the inhabitants is at liberty on<a name="page_094" id="page_094"></a> that day. At our theatre, performances +of opera were given on Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday nights, with +plays or <i>Possen mit Gesang</i> (farces with singing) on alternate nights. +The bill changed every night, but each standard opera was repeated three +or four times in the season. New operettas like the "Merry Widow" were +also produced, and, if successful, ran eight or ten times during the +seven months of the season. There was a company of singers consisting of +a "high dramatic" soprano, a "young dramatic," a coloratura, and an +"opera soubrette," all sopranos. There was a leading contralto, a second +contralto to do the very small parts, who was usually a volunteer +without pay, and a "comic old woman," who also took part in the plays. +There was sometimes another volunteer soprano to do pages and the like. +Then there was the "heroic tenor," who is a sort of King and is treated +by the management with some of the ceremony used toward royalty, and the +lyric tenor, quite humble in comparison, and a tenor-buffo for "funny +parts," with sometimes a special operetta tenor when the theatre was +prospering. There were two baritones, "heroic" and "lyric," a "serious" +and a "comic" bass, and one or two other men of more or less anomalous +position who "fill in" and act in the plays. The only singers who never +did anything but sing, were the two "dramatic" sopranos, the<a name="page_095" id="page_095"></a> first +contralto, and the heroic tenor and baritone. There was a company of +actors besides and all of these, no matter what their standing, were +expected to appear in such operas as "Tannhäuser" in the singing +contest, in the church scene of "Lohengrin," and as <i>Flora's</i> guests in +"Traviata," to help "dress the stage."</p> + +<p>It is not the least of one's troubles as a beginner to stand on the +stage as <i>Ortrud</i>, perhaps, and see these supercilious real actresses +come filing out dressed as court beauties, cynically watching your +attempt at acting.</p> + +<p>Actors have their proper range of parts, called <i>Fach</i> in Germany, and +special designations like the singers. The chief of them are the +<i>Jugendlicher Held</i> or Young Hero, corresponding to the Heroic Tenor, +and his partner the <i>Erste Heldin</i>. Nearly as important, however, are +the <i>Erster Liebhaber</i>, or Young Lover, and the <i>Jugendliche Liebhaberin +und Erste Salondame</i>—Young Lovehaveress and First Drawingroom Lady. +There are the <i>Helden Vater</i> and <i>Heldin Mutter</i>, the <i>Intrigant</i> or +Villain, and the <i>Bon Vivant</i> (pronounced Bong Vivong) who is a sort of +general good fellow and occasional hero. The <i>Erster Komiker</i> is always +a popular figure with the public and has his subordinate funnyman, +usually much younger. There is a soubrette to do the saucy maid<a name="page_096" id="page_096"></a> parts, +a <i>Naive</i>, what we should call Ingenue, and a <i>Komische Alte</i>, or funny +old woman; several "drawingroom ladies" and "gentlemen" and minor +"<i>Chargen Spieler</i>" or character actors. The small parts are usually +filled by chorus men and women, and the opera soubrette or the operetta +tenor, have to double and do the cheeky maids or giggly school girls and +giddy young officers in the plays. Many of the minor actors were, or +were assumed to be, sufficiently musical to take small parts in operas +requiring a large cast, appearing as <i>Telramund's</i> four nobles, and as +<i>Meister</i> in the first act of "Meistersingers" or as competitors in the +<i>Preissingen</i> in "Tannhäuser." The opera gains very much by having these +experienced actors in the small rôles.</p> + +<p>Our chorus was composed of about thirty members, and the orchestra of +from forty to fifty, reinforced in the brass and wind instruments from +the local military bands. Three Kapellmeisters held sway over them: the +First Kapellmeister an autocrat with arbitrary power who directed the +important operas, the second who lead the old stagers like "Martha" and +"Trovatore" and the operettas, and the third who was usually a volunteer +learning his profession, and who acted as répétiteur for the soloists +and directed pantomimes, the songs in the farces, and "Haensel und +Gretel" once a year if he was good.<a name="page_097" id="page_097"></a> He was always on duty during +performances to direct any music behind the scenes. In good theatres +there are several of these young men, as in "Rheingold" for example each +Rhine daughter ought to have one to herself, and there is a special +répétiteur for the chorus or chorus master besides.</p> + +<p>Our ballet was composed of a solo dancer and about sixteen coryphées, +directed by a <i>Balletmeisterin</i> who also shared the leading parts with +the solo dancer. One of the girls,—Irene, was a big handsome creature +who usually danced the boy's parts. She had a little girl of about six, +who had apparently no father. During the second year I was told one day: +"This is Irene's wedding day; will you say something to her?" It +appeared she and her clown husband had been devoted to each other for +years, but had neglected the ceremony as they neither of them could earn +enough alone to support the two. The clown ("August," of course) could +not find an engagement in the theatre and so they had just waited. He +had just returned from a long world tour and now they were to be +married. Every one was delighted.</p> + +<p>Last but not least, came the supers, called in Germany <i>Statisten</i>, who +held spears in "Aida" and returned victorious in "Faust." They were +drawn from the infantry regiments and received thirty<a name="page_098" id="page_098"></a> pfennigs (7½c) +a night. They arrived with their <i>Unteroffizier</i> an hour before they +were wanted and were turned into a big room to be made into warriors, +captives, or happy peasantry. The result was sometimes amusing. In +"Aida" they used to put on their pink cotton tights over their +underwear, so that one saw the dark outline of socks and the garters +gleaming through, and they all kept on their elastic-sided military +boots, with the tabs to pull them on by, sticking out before and behind. +Fortunately the audience had but a brief glimpse of them before they +were ranked in a conglomerate mass at the back of the stage. Sometimes +on our walks we would meet these men on sentry duty, or in batches with +their <i>Unteroffizier</i>, who would call out, "<i>Au-gen rechts!"</i> (Eyes +right!) and give us the officers' salute with mighty grins of +recognition.</p> + +<p>The principals of the opera are usually talented young singers on the +way up, or older singers of some reputation on the way down, with +perhaps a sprinkling of those who have obtained their engagements by +influence. The contracts are usually for from two to three years, and +are not very often renewed. The talented ones go on to better +engagements, and it is "better business" for the theatre to have a +change of principals. Great favourites remain longer unless they get +something better. Many<a name="page_099" id="page_099"></a> of those who were engaged with me in Metz have +made careers. Two were at the Charlottenburg Opera House in Berlin at +the outbreak of the war, and one in Hamburg, both in leading positions. +One was a stage-manager at the Volksoper in Vienna, and one teacher in a +conservatory.<a name="page_100" id="page_100"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X</h3> + +<h4>MY DÉBUT AND BREAKING INTO HARNESS</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">I</span> HAD to sing <i>Azucena</i>, my first part on any stage, without rehearsal. +The reason for this dawned upon me afterwards. Though I sang German well +by this time, my conversational powers still left something to be +desired. I have explained that the present director had never heard my +voice; no one knew of what I was capable, and they quite expected that I +would prove incompetent, and had engaged a native born contralto to +provide for this contingency.</p> + +<p>When I heard one evening, that I should have to sing <i>Azucena</i> on the +next, I confess that something rather like panic assailed me for a few +minutes. The stage manager called me onto the stage, and spent half an +hour in showing me the entrances and exits, and giving me the merest +outline of the positions. That is all the preparation I had for my +so-called début. The other members of the cast had sung the opera +together many times the year before, which made the performance +possible. The lyric tenor was a decent enough colleague, though an +absolute<a name="page_101" id="page_101"></a> peasant in behaviour, with an extraordinary high voice which +was rapidly degenerating from misuse. The baritone was of the tried and +true type, and a great favourite, and the soprano was easy to get on +with. They were all nice enough to me, if somewhat uninterested and +indifferent, for I had had as yet so little to do with them that we +hardly knew each other. They thought me a rich dilettante at that time I +fancy. I was so horribly nervous all that day that I fainted whenever I +tried to stand up, and when I began to sing my sister did not recognize +my voice. However, I was very well received indeed, all the criticisms +the next day were favourable, and there was no question after that as to +who should sing the leading rôles.</p> + +<p>It was fortunate for me that I succeeded in pulling myself together +sufficiently to make a success, as at that time the old system of +<i>Kündigung</i> was still in force. I have said that a contract was not +valid until the singer had successfully completed the number of guest +performances stated therein. I had not been called upon for these +<i>Gastspiele</i> because I was a beginner, but they are almost invariably +included in the contract. Now-a-days your engagement is settled after +you have successfully made these trial appearances, and you then remain +in that engagement for a full season; and the management must let you<a name="page_102" id="page_102"></a> +know before February first (sometimes January first) whether you are to +be re-engaged or not. This is in order to give the singer time to make +arrangements for the coming season. When I was engaged in Metz the +management of a theatre had the right to dismiss any singer after three +weeks, whether he had made his guest appearances beforehand or not, if +he had failed in that time to make good with the public. He was also +liable to dismissal after his first appearance, if he proved quite +impossible. This was what they were expecting in my case. The +arrangement was most unfair to the poor singer, leaving him stranded +(with practically no chance of work that year) after he had moved all +his possessions and thought himself established for the season. The big +artists' society, the <i>Genossenschaft</i>, which is the only protective +institution for singers in Germany, has at last succeeded in abolishing +this unjust condition of affairs. There was a flagrant case of this kind +in the theatre during the first three weeks of my engagement. The "high +dramatic" soprano had finished the first three weeks of her engagement, +during which she had had to learn two new parts, providing costumes, at +her own expense, for a rôle which she had not expected to have to sing. +She had had a fair success and thought herself secure. In the meantime, +the management had had no idea of keeping<a name="page_103" id="page_103"></a> her on permanently, but had +merely engaged her to fill in the time, while they were waiting for +another singer, who was filling an out-of-season engagement elsewhere, +and could not report for three weeks. When she was free, they told the +first one that she had not pleased sufficiently and dismissed her. The +good theatres did not take advantage of this privilege of course, even +while it still existed.</p> + +<p>My second rôle was a very small one, one of the court ladies of "Les +Huguenots." A native first contralto would probably not have been asked +to do such a small part, but there being no regular part for my voice in +the opera, I think they were glad to use my good stage appearance, and +of course, as a beginner I made no protest, being glad of every chance +to become more used to the stage. The part was sprung upon me suddenly, +and I had no dress for it. The second contralto also had a court lady to +do, and the good creature offered to lend me a gorgeous Elizabethan +dress of white satin and silver (which, she told me, she also intended +to wear as <i>Amneris</i>!) and she would "go in black." I was touched, but I +could not deprive her of her splendour, so we arranged something out of +the pointed pink bodice of one of my other gowns, and the long white +skirt of a summer dress, with a ladder arrangement of pink velvet bands +sewn on up the front.<a name="page_104" id="page_104"></a></p> + +<p>I remember as I made my entrance, looking up suddenly and seeing the +sinister eyes of Carlhof the stage manager, fixed on me from the wings. +He proceeded to mock my walk, which was no doubt very American, and not +that of a court lady at all. I never forgot the mental jolt it gave me +and the sudden realization that every rôle should have a different walk.</p> + +<p>The range of parts that one is called upon to perform is astonishing. +Formerly the limits of a <i>Fach</i> (line of parts) were more rigidly +observed than at present, when the personality of a singer in relation +to a rôle is more often taken into consideration. Still, if a rôle +definitely belongs to the <i>Fach</i> of a certain singer, he is supposed to +have first right to it. Difficulties arise in apportioning the parts in +very modern operas, whose composers seem no longer disposed to write +definitely for a coloratura soprano or a serious bass, but mix up the +voice range and styles of singing indiscriminately in one part. My +second real part was <i>Fricka</i> in "Walkuere," in which I had a great +success vocally, but unfortunately looked a great deal younger than the +portly <i>Brünnhilde</i> and far more like her daughter than her stepmother. +Then came the <i>Third Lady</i> in "Magic Flute," the <i>Third Grace</i> in +"Tannhäuser," <i>Martha</i> in "Faust," <i>Orlofsky</i> in "Fledermaus," <i>Frau +Reich</i> in<a name="page_105" id="page_105"></a> the "Merry Wives of Windsor," the <i>Gräfin</i> in "Trompeter von +Säkkingen," <i>Pamela</i> in "Fra Diavolo," <i>Witch</i> in "Haensel und Gretel"; +and finally "Carmen." All these before Christmas of my first year. I did +not have one of them on my repertoire when I arrived in Metz, except +<i>Fricka</i> and <i>Carmen</i>, and the latter in French.</p> + +<p>The three graces in "Tannhäuser" were done by the beauties of the +theatre, two premières danseuses and myself! We were to dress in white +Greek draperies with jewels, and of course, as we were to be seductive, +pink roses. I wore my beautiful <i>Bergcrystal</i> necklace, made for me in +Paris. The ladies could not contain their jealousy and said of course, +"aufgedonnert" (thundered out) like that I naturally would stand out +from them. Annoyed at their pettiness I removed the diamonds and flowers +and all ornaments. They then said of course to go without any ornaments +was palpably the best way of all to make myself conspicuous. So I let it +go at that.</p> + +<p>I well remember the <i>Third Lady</i>, for there are spoken passages in this +opera, and I had to speak German for the first time before an audience +of critically listening natives, and Mozartian German at that! <i>Pamela</i> +nearly gave me nervous prostration. They were determined that I should +do it because she had to speak German with an English<a name="page_106" id="page_106"></a> accent, so they +said it was made for me. As a matter of fact, after the months I had +spent in carefully eradicating my English accent it was difficult +suddenly to exaggerate it to order. I had to learn, rehearse and play +the entire part in five days, and I thought I should go mad. I had never +seen the wretched thing, so the baritone who played my husband kindly +came over to help me with the business. Otherwise my sister and I hardly +left the piano to eat and sleep. The dialect part of the libretto was in +an ancient manuscript copy, torn, marked and dog's-eared, and written in +an almost illegible German script. I could not take time enough to +puzzle it out, so my sister spent hours poring over it, deciphering the +German letters literally one by one by aid of a key, and writing it +again in Latin script. I had no clothes for it, as it was not on my +repertoire and it plays in 1820, but they costumed it for me in modern +dress, so again my summer wardrobe was called into service.</p> + +<p>I learned it so quickly that the colleagues called me "Die +Notenfresserin" or note-eater, but the strain was awful. I remember when +I was studying <i>Pamela</i> the Kapellmeister told me at least ten times, +how the contralto who played the <i>Pamela</i> in his father's theatre and +who was also an English-speaking woman, had so caught his father's fancy +in that rôle, that from<a name="page_107" id="page_107"></a> then on he had a tremendous affair with her. +This he repeated to me again and again, but I never seemed to take the +hint.</p> + +<p>As <i>Erda</i> in "Siegfried" I had a most trying experience. The director +had been, as I have said, a well-known Bayreuth singer, and he thought +no one could sing Wagner but himself. Unfortunately he had a strong +tendency to "look upon the wine," and when he had a part to sing +nervousness attacked him to such an extent that he began drinking in +self-defence to enable him to stand the strain. Perhaps his beverages +were more potent than usual, but that night he was decidedly +irresponsible. He struggled through the <i>Wanderer's</i> first scene, and +conscious that he was doing it badly, he sent out for a bottle of +champagne as a bracer. The consequence was that in our scene in the +third act, he was utterly incapacitated. He sang all kinds of things not +in the text, bits from <i>Hunding</i> in "Walkuere," from <i>Daland</i> in +"Hollaender," from "Fidelio." He rolled about the stage and lurched in +my direction with his spear pointed at me, shouting <i>Pogner's</i> advice to +<i>Eva</i> while I was singing <i>Erda's</i> responses. It seemed to go on for +ages, but at last <i>Siegfried</i>, waiting for his cue in the wings, +realized that he must save the scene, entered and escorted his befuddled +relation from the stage. I had made up with a creamy white grease paint +and<a name="page_108" id="page_108"></a> no red. My sister said, "Why did you make up with rouge and not +have the pallor we agreed upon?" My cheeks were so scarlet from +mortification that no grease paint would have paled them.</p> + +<p>The audience took it splendidly, I must confess, and refrained from any +expression of disapproval or joy—though it <i>must</i> have been funny! The +next day there were announcements in all the papers that he had had a +temporary lapse of memory owing to grief over the sudden death of his +mother, who, as the stage manager cynically informed us, had reached out +a hand from the grave to save her son, she having been dead for ten +years! The director went to Berlin and stayed there for weeks. We +afterwards learned that it was a plot, deliberately planned and put +through by Carlhof to gain the direction of the theatre. I can see him +now stalking around, six foot four, chewing his rag of a dyed moustache, +his face pale and his eyes glittering with anxiety as to the success of +his plan to encourage the director to drink. The director once told me +the hours between the last meal and the time to go to one's dressing +room to begin making up are the dangerous ones. He said, "First one +takes a glass of wine to steady one's shaking nerves; later a glass is +not enough so it becomes a bottle, then two bottles and so on till +control is lost." It is easy for any singer to understand,<a name="page_109" id="page_109"></a> and the best +remedy is to omit that first glass.</p> + +<p>"Carmen" was the second opera which I had to do without rehearsal. The +soprano had failed in it and it was promised to me to keep if I could do +it <i>ohne probe</i> (without rehearsal). I sang it for the first time, +quaking with nerves, on Christmas Day, and my nick-name after that was +"Die schoene Carmen." After Christmas we produced the "Merry Widow" +which was new then, and I was cast for the <i>Dutiful Wife</i>. There was +plenty of variety in my work. I would sing <i>Carmen</i> on Sunday, +<i>Orlofsky</i> in "Fledermaus" on Tuesday, speaking German with a Russian +accent, <i>Pamela</i> on Thursday night with an English accent, and <i>Frau +Reich</i> on Friday night with no accent at all! I dressed <i>Frau Reich</i> in +a gown of the time of Henry V while the rest of the cast "went +Shakespearean." We were far too busy for dress rehearsals of an old +opera, and I supposed of course that it would be costumed in the real +period of the play. When I appeared on the stage, they all demanded "And +what, pray, are <i>you</i> supposed to represent?" "I am playing +Shakespeare's <i>Frau Reich</i>," I answered with dignity—"and I am the only +person on the stage who is properly dressed." But you have to know your +colleagues well before you can make an answer like that successfully, +without their hating you for it.<a name="page_110" id="page_110"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI</h3> + +<h4>SOME STAGE DELIGHTS</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">W</span>E had also what is known as <i>Abstecher</i>, on off nights. That is, +performances in a neighbouring and still smaller town about once a +month. We would travel altogether, taking our costumes and make-up with +us, principals second class and chorus third. Our fare was paid, and the +generous management allowed us two marks apiece (50c) extra for +expenses! As we left at five <span class="smcap">P.M.</span> returning at one or two in the +morning, this allowance was not excessive for food alone, but the +thrifty took black bread and sausage with them, and expended only +fifteen pfennigs (3½c) for beer. Our <i>Abstecher</i> was a village with a +cavalry barracks, a railroad station, and not much else. The theatre was +built over a sort of warehouse and stable combined, and we fell over +bales and packing cases at the entrance. The dressing rooms were tiny +boxes, with a shelf, one gas light in a wire globe, and a red-hot stove +in each room, and no window. We dressed three in a room. The stage was +so small that once, as<a name="page_111" id="page_111"></a> <i>Nancy</i>, I played a whole scene with the tail of +my train caught in the door by which I had entered, and never knew it! +We were always given a rapturous welcome. Sometimes one of the +principals would miss the train and be forced to come on by a later one, +and then the sequence of scenes in the opera would be changed quite +regardless of the plot, for we would play all the scenes, in which he +did not appear, first, and do his afterwards. After the opening chorus, +the soprano would go on for her aria, and while she was singing it, we +would decide what to give next. "I'll do my aria!" "Oh no! Not the two +arias together!" "Let's have the duet from the third act, and then the +soprano and tenor can just come in casually and we'll do the big +quartet, and then you can do your aria!" We would see the audience +hunting in a confused sort of way through their libretto, with +expressions rather like Bill the Lizard. This happened once in the +"Merry Wives," which is confusing at best.</p> + +<p>After the performance there was no place in which to wait but the café +of the station. I was looked upon as recklessly extravagant because I +would order a <i>Wiener Schnitzel mit Salat</i> for sixty pfennigs (15¢) and +when I took two cents' worth of butter too, they would raise their +eyebrows and murmur, "<i>Diese Amerikaner!</i>" Sometimes the Director came +with<a name="page_112" id="page_112"></a> us, and then the principals would be invited to his table and +treated to (German) champagne. But we were always glad when he stayed at +home, because we were much freer over our beer. There are always one or +two members of the company who are extremely amusing, and their antics, +imitations and reminiscences make the time fly. There was one little +chap, the son of a Rabbi, who lived on nothing a day and found himself, +and was an extraordinary mimic. His imitations of a director engaging +singers, the shy one, the bold one, the beginner; and his marvellous +take-off of the members of the company kept us in roars of laughter. He +could imitate anything—a horse, a worn-out piano—and is now one of the +most successful "entertainers" in Berlin. The ones in whose compartment +he travelled on the train thought themselves lucky and often arrived so +hoarse from laughing that they could hardly sing.</p> + +<p>All this experience is invaluable for the beginner, his +self-consciousness melts like snow in July, and it gives him, as nothing +else can, that poise and authority on the stage which are almost as +important as the voice itself. But the work, especially for a foreigner, +is killing. It is not so much the performances themselves, great as the +strain of these actually is, but the constant, never-ceasing learning by +heart, and the drag of continuous rehearsing. The "room rehearsals<a name="page_113" id="page_113"></a>" of +the music alone, take place, in a theatre of this kind, in one of the +dressing rooms where there is a piano. The room is almost always small +and very close, and there are eight or ten people packed into it, all +singing hard and exhausting the little air there is. The stage +rehearsals with the almost invariable and inevitable shouting and +excitement are very trying to the nerves, especially when one is making +two or three débuts a week, that is, singing a new part for the first +time almost every other night as I did, at the beginning of my career. +The better the theatre, of course, the greater the smoothness and lack +of confusion at stage rehearsals. The singers and orchestra men are more +experienced, and more competent, and the manners of the Kapellmeister +improve in ratio to the importance of the opera house. A little extra +excitement is permissible when a new production is being put on, but at +the rehearsals of repetitions undue exhibitions of "temperament" on +either side are discouraged, and the powers that be have to mind their +manners and stick to the conventional forms of address. The +<i>Heldentenor</i> may sometimes have to allow his artistic nature to get the +better of him for a moment, but no one else may claim such license.</p> + +<p>The stage during rehearsals is like a workshop—a certain amount of +noise and confusion is necessitated<a name="page_114" id="page_114"></a> by the labour going on in it, but +no one has time to spare from his share of the job in hand, and the +discipline in a good theatre is remarkable. The native German is +trained, of course, both to give and take orders well, the result of the +whole system of government, both of the family and of the nation. Stage +etiquette and the relationship between principals and chorus, <i>erste und +zweite Kräfte</i> (principals of first and second rank) singers and the +management, grows more conventional and regulated according to the class +of the theatre. Those in authority may exact perfect obedience, but they +must ask for it properly; and while an individual is entitled to proper +consideration, he must never forget that he is but a unit of the whole.</p> + +<p>The dressing-room arrangements in Metz were rather primitive. The +theatre was 100 years old, for one thing, and no one had ever had the +money to install new conveniences. In a good German theatre, the +dressing rooms are rarely used for rehearsing, and the principals dress +alone, at least when they have a big rôle to sing. In Metz I shared my +room with several other women and had only a corner of it which I could +call my own. Long shelves with lockers under them ran down two sides of +the room, with lights over them at intervals, and under every light a +singer "made up." There was a long glass<a name="page_115" id="page_115"></a> at one end of the room, but we +had to provide individual mirrors for ourselves. There was no running +water, only a couple of jugs and basins stood in one corner of the +shelf. Good routined dressers were provided by the theatre. Mine was an +Alsatian who loved to speak French with me, but whom I discouraged as I +wanted all the practise I could get in German. She used to call me +"Fräulein Miss"—pronouncing the latter like the German word <i>miess</i> +which means mediocre, but she meant to be particularly respectful. I +have always found that it pays a hundred fold to make friends of the +dressers, stage-doorkeeper, property-man, carpenter, head scene-shifter, +fireman and all the other workers whose co-operation is necessary for a +good <i>ensemble</i>. It is usually quite easy to be on good terms with them, +and they have unlimited opportunities for making things go smoothly for +you, or the reverse.</p> + +<p>Women's costumes are not kept in the theatre; as they are the personal +property of the singer they must be kept at home, and be sent over to +the theatre on the morning of a performance. A <i>Korbträger</i> (basket +carrier) is usually provided to whom you give from 75 cents to $1.00 a +month, and who performs this service for you—but many singers send +their maids. With the usual discrimination against our sex, men's +costumes are provided in opera houses<a name="page_116" id="page_116"></a> of all grades. In the largest +theatres the women's are furnished also, and you even have to have +special permission to wear your own.</p> + +<p>The scenery and costumes in Metz were often surprisingly good when one +considered that so few "sets" must do such varied things. Our property +man was an inventive genius at making something out of nothing. He +prided himself upon certain realistic details. If the piece called for +coffee, the real article, though of some dreadful variety unknown to +contemporary culinary science, was provided, and really poured into the +cups. If a meal were to be served on the stage, some sort of real food +was there for the actors to eat, even if it were only slices of bread +served elaborately as the most <i>recherché</i> French supper, though usually +it was ladyfingers. Eating scenes are usually confined to the drama, +though there are some operas in which a meal "comes before" as the +Germans say. In the "Merry Wives of Windsor" for example, the scene +containing <i>Anna's</i> letter aria opens with the company at supper in +<i>Frau Reich's</i> home. The wives are explaining their tricks and plotting +<i>Falstaff's</i> final discomfiture in spoken dialogue. One night when I was +singing <i>Frau Reich</i> in Metz there was a particularly attractive dish of +real apples on the stage supper table. The <i>Herr Reich</i> was the serious +bass, a thrifty individual who couldn't bear<a name="page_117" id="page_117"></a> to let a penny's worth of +anything escape him. As his guests rose to go he picked up the dish of +apples and pressed it upon them.</p> + +<p>"Here," he improvised, "take these home to the children. Oh! You have no +children—well, take them anyway—the children will come later."</p> + +<p>His hospitable wishes were received with bewilderment by the audience, +but as he made his exit with his guests and immediately began to eat the +apples, he bore his scolding from the <i>régisseur</i> very philosophically. +On some stages where the provisions are more elaborate, the actors in +certain plays make a regular practise of eating their suppers on the +stage. In "Divorçons" for example or in the "Anatol Cyclus" of +Schnitzler.</p> + +<p>Our property man in Metz, with the historic Shakespearean name of +Mondenschein, (Moonshine) was an ardent lover of drapery. An +artistocratic interior, to his mind, must be entirely filled with as +many different materials as possible, all hanging in folds. He had three +pairs of near-silk portières, bright pink, dull green, and pale yellow, +and the combinations that he made with those six curtains were endless. +Garlands of roses, too, were a great resource of his—draped round a +couch with a fur rug upon it, and a red light over all, they transformed +the scene into the bower of a Messalina. In a white<a name="page_118" id="page_118"></a> light festooned +upon a mantel-piece, or above a doorway, they could be depended upon to +supply the appropriate setting of the <i>Erste Naive's</i> most appealing +scene. The young lovehaveress and first salon lady, had to receive them, +wired together into a bunch, with the same delightful surprise, and put +them into the same Japanese jar without any water in it, in play after +play. But the property man always squandered a perfectly new, uncreased +piece of paper for every performance with which to make a cornucopia for +them, in the approved German style. He was quite a specialist in such +matters as the colour of telegrams in different countries, and in the +manner of folding newspapers, points which are sometimes neglected in +many better theatres. Of course his talents in this direction had a +better chance in the dramatic than in the operatic productions.</p> + +<p>It is a curious thing to note in this connection, how archaic the +arrangement of such details remains in operatic performances even on the +best stages. How in "Carmen" for example, the singers must pretend to +drink to <i>Escamillo</i> out of perfectly dry tin cups, instead of using +real wine and glasses, as a quite second-rate dramatic company would do. +How <i>Butterfly</i> and <i>Suzuki</i> are never given real tea to serve to the +<i>Consul</i> or <i>Yamadori</i>. Or how the girls in "Thais"<a name="page_119" id="page_119"></a> bring up their +water-jars out of the well with the outsides quite dry.</p> + +<p>Of course in theatres of the Metz class matters of costuming are +simplified, and historical accuracy is not one of the aims. For example, +everything before Christ is done in fur rugs and winged helmets for the +men, and flannel nightgowns and long hair for the women. Any period up +to the thirteenth century is costumed in mantles and gowns of furniture +brocade, after that it is <i>Alt-deutsch</i> (old German), or <i>Spanisch</i> +(Shakespearean—mostly black velvet and jet or white satin and silver), +until it turns safely into <i>Rococo</i>, which means white wigs. After that +it is all <i>Modern</i>, and even the chorus has to supply its own modern +clothes. The men principals have their historical costumes, with the +exception of wigs, tights, and shoes, supplied to them, but the women +must have their own. The collection of men's clothes in an old theatre +is sometimes quite remarkable, some of the suits of a hundred years ago +being actually of the period.</p> + +<p>They retain the smells of the period also, many of them; for in a +theatre like that of Metz I don't believe the men's clothes were ever +cleaned. Things which have been worn several times a week for seven +months a year during the past hundred years, accumulate<a name="page_120" id="page_120"></a> a richness and +variety of odours which must be sniffed to be appreciated—a very +ancient and fish-like smell indeed. I often wished at Metz that I had no +use of my nose, and I have wished it many times since. As <i>Amneris</i>, to +force your way for the entrance in the triumph scene, through an +Egyptian populace composed of German Infantrymen, is a squeamish +business at best; but when they are attired in clothes that haven't been +washed for years, it is a feat before which any one may quail, +especially if he belongs to the number of unfortunates, unluckily far +from rare among singers, whose stomach nerves are affected in any case +when they have a big part before them.</p> + +<p>Washing was not any too popular in Metz even among the principals. I +have dressed with leading women whose arms showed streaks of white where +the water had run down as they washed their hands, stopping +conscientiously at the wrists. Their make-up would be removed with the +same dirty rag night after night during the whole season; and their +personal garments under more or less smart outer raiment, had often done +overlong service. I must hasten to say, however, that this state of +affairs was the exception rather than the rule, and that in better +theatres, the women principals were always scrupulously cleanly.<a name="page_121" id="page_121"></a></p> + +<p>Over ornamentation or fineness in undergarments is usually looked upon +as rather questionable, among the solid middle classes in Germany. My +mother had made me a dainty supply of be-ribboned linen, and I was told +after I had been in Metz for some time, that at first, the Alsatian +woman who dressed me reported me to be "<i>beaucoup trop soignée de ne pas +avoir un amant</i>." However, she changed her mind later on, and put it +down to American extravagance—always a safe play. Some of the men were +much more careless than the women. Our operetta tenor played the whole +season in the same shirt, powdering the bosom freshly each evening with +a yellowish powder which he used for his face.</p> + +<p>At Carnival time, some of the Schauspieler remained for three days in +the clothes in which they had played on Saturday night, never going to +bed, or even removing their make-up till the fun came to an end early +Wednesday morning.</p> + +<p>Many of the older members dyed their hair, as it had begun to turn grey. +Of course they did not have it done by competent people, or nearly often +enough, and the shades of rusty brown, green, or purple it assumed were +quite startling. Our first Kapellmeister used to dye his hair a rich +black. He was a good-looking man and very vain. He was also portly and +easily became over-heated. Of course<a name="page_122" id="page_122"></a> when this happened, the +perspiration running down his neck was dyed black too, and he would be +intensely worried for fear we should see it. We knew his sensitiveness, +and took delight in sitting directly behind him at the piano, though he +would urge, beg, and finally command us to sit beside him. He was +kindhearted in his way, and I remember one instance of this. The stage +manager, in a vile humour, had come storming into the midst of a room +rehearsal one day, with some trivial complaint against me, and had +succeeded in making me cry, not a difficult matter at that time as I was +always in a state of nerve strain owing to continuous over-fatigue. The +Kapellmeister did his best to comfort me, telling me not to mind, +praising my work, and finally pressing upon me his huge, brand new silk +handkerchief—a real sacrifice, as he had probably intended to use it +for days! His fingertips used to split in the cold weather from much +piano pounding and I won his heart by prescribing collodion for them. He +continually praised my sight reading and quickness in learning and it +was he who gave me the nick-name of "Notenfresserin."<a name="page_123" id="page_123"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII</h3> + +<h4>MISPLACED MOISTURE AND THE STORY OF A COURT-LADY</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">T</span>HE Bohemian, Hungarian and Croatian singers nearly always add to one's +joy in work by eating garlic. The "high dramatic" soprano in my next +engagement was from Croatia. The first time I went to Prague to sing, on +alighting from the train I sniffed a strangely familiar odour. The +impression of familiarity grew stronger and stronger as I drove to the +hotel—but I couldn't place it. At last it came to me—the whole town +smelled like our soprano! I have often wished, while on the stage, for +temporary atrophy of the senses. In addition to the fustiness of much +worn clothes and infrequent bathing, you really have all kinds of +horrors to endure.</p> + +<p>Some terrible creatures with a passion for distinct enunciation and with +unfortunate dental formation, spray you copiously when uttering words +like <i>Mutter</i> <a name="page_124" id="page_124"></a>or <i>Freude</i>. This always seems to happen in some +impassioned scene when you simply can't get away from them, and have +absolutely no defence. Others have painfully hot and wet, or painfully +cold and wet hands with which they persistently paw you. I remember one +lyric tenor who was my bugbear because he had hands like a fresh, cold +fish. The soprano and I had a scene with him in one opera, in which she +had to say, "<i>Die Hand, so weich, so warm</i>" (the hand, so soft, so +warm), speaking of his clammy member. I dared her one night, to say +instead, "<i>Die Hand, so feucht, so kalt</i>" (The hand, so moist, so cold), +and when it came to the point, sure enough she did so, her voice so +shaky with suppressed laughter, that it came out in a tremulous +pianissimo. We both had to turn away from the front in silent +convulsions, but not a soul in the house was the wiser.</p> + +<p>This is a horrible subject and I might enlarge upon it endlessly, +recalling for example, the pleasures of being folded in the embrace of a +large, warm, damp tenor smelling at best of onions; or still worse the +large drops which rain upon you during the most touching love scene from +his manly brow, while you, though shuddering with disgust, daren't try +to dodge them, or even change the wistfully adoring expression of your +countenance. It may be honest sweat, but it is a demned moist unpleasant +kind of honesty in my opinion. Goritz told me that he once, as +<i>Kurwenal<a name="page_125" id="page_125"></a></i>, in the last act of "Tristan," dripped on a prostrate +<i>Tristan's</i> eye so long that the poor tenor was blind for days after. +This is German efficiency!</p> + +<p>Some of the colleagues at Metz were a great contrast to others in their +scrupulous care of their personal appearance. The lyric baritone, a +youngster from the Rhineland making his début in opera, attracted me at +the very first rehearsal by his groomed look and beautifully manicured +finger-nails. He came from quite ordinary people, and had been brought +up to be a "Tapizierer," curtain hanger, upholsterer, etc. He had never +met any Americans before and we grew to like him very much, and used to +let him go for walks with us, and come to us for tea. He was always +wanting to <i>tapizieren</i> for us and criticizing the hang of the curtains, +etc., in our rooms. We taught him to play Canfield, more to keep him +from talking than for any other reason, for my sister and I used to play +patience for hours, so that we should not be tempted to talk when I was +resting my voice in the brief intervals between rehearsals and +performances. We used to play with pretty little German patience cards +in a pocket size, and he was simply infatuated with the game. He showed +all his friends how to play, and dozens of packs of these cards were +imported from Frankfort where they are made.<a name="page_126" id="page_126"></a></p> + +<p>The craze spread rapidly; all the officers began to play in their +Casinos, and the principals in the theatre were always being roared at +for keeping the stage waiting during rehearsals, when they missed their +cues by being absorbed in the game of Canfield. It became the great +resource of those who had small parts in the first act of an opera, and +then had to wait in costume and make-up until the very end like the +<i>Meister</i> in "Meistersinger," or <i>Mary</i> in "Fliegender Holländer" who +has a seemingly interminable wait after her one scene at the beginning +of the second act, until at the very last of the third she has to rush +in for the single phrase "<i>Senta, Senta, wass willst du tun?</i>"</p> + +<p>In return for our tea, the little baritone would tell us amusing tales +of his experiences in a cavalry regiment while doing his military +service. His high spirits and his beautiful voice made him popular with +officers and men, but he was quite unamenable to discipline, and had +spent something like ninety days in prison during his first year, for +such offences as refusing to stop singing on the march, or for cheeking +an officer. He used to call us his goddesses, and speak to us as +"Fräuleinchen." Our rooms, through him, were the starting place of new +culinary ideas in Metz. We taught him to make and like such American +delicacies as salted almonds, chocolate fudge, and<a name="page_127" id="page_127"></a> hot chocolate +sauce for ice cream, an unheard of combination. We tried to make him +like fruit salad with mayonnaise; but the mixture of sweet with oil and +vinegar was too much for his burgher palate, and he used to quote to us +the Bavarian proverb, "<i>Was der Bauer net kennt frisst er net.</i>" (What +the peasant doesn't know he doesn't eat.)</p> + +<div class="centeredimage" style="width: 322px;"> +<a href="images/ill_126.jpg"> +<img src="images/ill_126_sml.jpg" width="322" height="500" alt="AMNERIS AS I USED TO DRESS IT" title="AMNERIS AS I USED TO DRESS IT" /></a><br /> +<span class="caption">AMNERIS AS I USED TO DRESS IT</span> +</div> + +<p>The country round Metz is rarely beautiful, in its half-French, +half-German character. It retains its typical French poplars, planted in +long lines, which turn pure gold in autumn. A placid river, the Moselle, +runs between hills covered with orchards and vineyards, with picturesque +villages of grey stone and red tiling, piled steeply up their sides. The +meadows in the fall are filled with lavender crocuses—the kind that +Meredith's Diana got up at four <span class="smcap">A.M.</span> to gather. Every village has of +course its "Gasthaus," some still absolutely French in the arrangement +of their marble topped tables, mirrors, and red upholstered benches +running round three sides of the room. We have drunk coffee in autumn, +and <i>Maibowle</i> in spring in every one of them, I think. I dare say many +of them are still using the same card board circles under their +customers' beer-glasses which we marked with our initials. Can you flip +them from the edge of the table into your own hand?</p> + +<p>The town of Metz itself is interesting enough, and<a name="page_128" id="page_128"></a> we explored it +thoroughly. It is very ancient ground indeed, and there are Roman walls +still to be seen, with characteristically beautiful brick-work; old +chapels, a Gothic cathedral, and the remains of the mediaeval wall and +moat which once surrounded the town, with great arched fortified gates +at its east and west entrances.</p> + +<p>On returning once from a long walk with the little baritone we entered +by the eastern gate, and as he was doing a small part that evening, and +it was getting unpleasantly near the hour of the performance, we took a +short cut through an unfamiliar part of the town. We soon found +ourselves in a narrow street of respectable enough looking houses, but +as we passed, out of nearly every window on both sides, a female head +was thrust, all in varying degrees of frowsiness, and remarks and +comments in half unintelligible dialect were yelled at us with shrieks +of hideous laughter. Our little escort grew purple with confusion, +walking faster and faster, and when we reached an open square he broke +into the most fervent apologies for unwittingly leading us into such a +street. It was a curious and unpleasant little experience and reminded +me of certain quarters in oriental cities of which I had heard tales. We +named it "the street of queer women" and avoided the eastern gateway in +our walks thereafter.<a name="page_129" id="page_129"></a></p> + +<p>Later in the season another colleague sometimes joined our tea parties +and walking expeditions. This was an immensely talented youth, attached +to the theatre in an anomalous position of third Kapellmeister, in +reality a volunteer without pay, hoping to pick up an occasional chance +to gain experience in conducting an orchestra. He was a Frenchman of +excellent family who had studied in one of the great conservatories and +thought he spoke the German language. Such German I have never heard +before or since. His French inability to aspirate an "h," a pronounced +stutter, and the most nonchalant disregard of gender, formed a +combination which was enough to upset the gravity of a German customs +house official himself! It was his business among other things, to +"<i>einstudieren</i>" the new members of the chorus in any opera which they +did not know, but of course his version of their language rendered any +authority he might have had over them quite ineffectual, and his +position was anything but enviable. At the same time he was a really +magnificent pianist, a composer of promise, and a thorough musician; but +if ever a creature was out of his element he was that creature as +Kapellmeister in Metz. And yet what is a young fellow in his position to +do? The desire to conduct, the longing to interpret the great masters +through the medium of an orchestra, possessed<a name="page_130" id="page_130"></a> him to the point of +obsession; but where to find an orchestra to conduct was a problem. The +barrier "no experience" was erected across his path as it had been +across mine, though he must serve an apprenticeship somewhere.</p> + +<p>The musical life of Germany attracted him for the same reasons as it had +attracted me, and so he endured a veritable martyrdom in the pursuance +of his dream. He was a pupil of Nikisch and told us Nikisch had told him +he made half his career with his cuffs. Whoever has watched him shoot +them gently out as he begins to conduct will know what he meant.</p> + +<p>Our rooms were a sort of haven for this boy, I think, where he could +talk of the things that absorbed him in a language that was his servant +instead of his master. In return he would play so gorgeously for us, +that our little upright piano rocked under the strain. He could suggest +a whole orchestra in his playing. Strauss' "Salome" was brand new then +and he revelled in it, and adopted the motif of <i>Jochanaan</i> as a signal +which he and the baritone would whistle under our windows. Sometimes he +would get lost at the piano and play for hours, till our supper time was +past, and our good friend Emma Seebold, the "<i>Hoch Dramatische</i>," would +rush in and urge us to hurry and get ready for some mythical dinner to<a name="page_131" id="page_131"></a> +which we were invited. This was always successful, owing to Seebold's +talent.</p> + +<p>We grew very fond of her and often spent our evenings together. She had +a lovely voice and would put her head back on her chair sometimes in the +evening and sing us languorous Austrian peasant songs with her +fascinating Viennese accent. Her passion was remnants, and she would +send home boxes of scraps of passementerie and odds and ends of silk +trimmings which she would sew all over her costumes. The richness she +saw in it was pathetic. Bargain gloves were also irresistible, and she +had green ones and purple ones, spotted and mildewed ones, and loved +them all because they were cheap.</p> + +<p>The pianist and the baritone often met at our rooms and got on +surprisingly well considering their utter lack of points of contact and +the natural contempt that they felt for each other. The Frenchman was +certainly mildly crazy. He believed that his astral body, or psychic +envelope, or something was visible as an aura of light around his hand, +and he would hold it up and look at it and say, "<i>Ah, oui, elle est +là—je vais bien aujourd'hui</i>," or shake his head and say, "<i>Non, pas là +aujourd'hui—je ne suis rien!</i>" He was good looking, bearing a strong +resemblance to the portraits of Oscar Wilde. He dressed well, and his +washing bills—amounting as<a name="page_132" id="page_132"></a> we were told, with bated breath, to ten and +fifteen marks a week—were the scandal of the theatre! Since those days +he has gone back to his piano, though he persevered in the theatre long +enough to obtain a second Kapellmeister position in a good opera house. +I have met him casually all over Europe, and he is one of the very few +of the old <i>Kollegen</i> from Metz whom I have ever seen again.</p> + +<p>These three were the only ones that season whom we cared about, though +we were friendly enough with all of them after Christmas, and as I have +said, we dined at the hotel with a group of them every day. They were +all types in their way. First the director—a survival of the old +school, with rather long dyed hair and enormous dyed moustache, always +in <i>Gehrock</i> (frock coat) with a large tie in which reposed a royal +monogram in pearls and diamonds presented to him by the Hereditary Grand +Duke of Glumphenbergen-Schlimmerheim or something, during his career as +<i>Heldenbariton</i>. In the street he wore a soft black felt hat which would +have done for the <i>Wanderer</i> in "Siegfried," and of course a fur-lined +coat whenever the weather gave the least excuse for one. Champagne was +his universal panacea—his very present help in trouble. If he had a +disagreement with a singer for any cause and wished to make it right +again, he would always send a bottle of <i>Sekt</i><a name="page_133" id="page_133"></a> if it were a woman, or +present the money to buy one if it were a man. He had been a famous +singer in his day, and known others far more so, and his reminiscences +could be interesting enough. His stories of Bayreuth under the old +régime, were really interesting, with the prescribed position of every +finger, every gesture studied to an inch, every tone closed, opened, +coloured according to strictest rule, every syllable enunciated with +minutest care, and the effect of all this schooling on the singer—the +strained and broken nerves, the wrecked voices that were the result of +it. Diction—<i>Aussprache</i>—was naturally enough his hobby, but his ideas +were absurdly exaggerated and caused much more or less hidden amusement +among the <i>Personal</i>. He insisted, for example, upon so much "t" in a +phrase like Mignon's "<i>Dahin, dahin, moecht ich mit dir</i>," that it +sounded like "<i>Moecht tich mit tier</i>." Anything of that sort among +colleagues is looked upon as a tremendous joke, especially when it is on +the director.</p> + +<p>One result of his former glory was that famous people came to this +theatre to <i>gastieren</i> and it also seemed to us as if every former +singer or actor in Germany of any pretension to fame, who had a son or +daughter to launch in either profession, sent them to our director for a +début. This was looked upon by us as a bore; but the famous guests were +rather<a name="page_134" id="page_134"></a> amusing, because when they had gone, the director used to relate +all kinds of derogatory stories about them. Possart—— Ritter, Ernst +von—— was perhaps the most renowned. He came to recite Manfred at a +special performance with our soloists and chorus. The director told us +how, during the most impassioned speeches of Goethe or Shakespeare his +eye would be on the upper gallery, counting empty places, and how after +the performance when the box office sheet showed an <i>ausverkauftes Haus</i> +he would demand, "What about those three empty seats in the second row +of the top gallery, at the left?"</p> + +<p>He told a similar tale of a famous Austrian guest-artist, the leading +Teutonic exponent of his day of the negative side in the never-ending +argument of stage technique "to feel or not to feel." He had mechanical +as well as histrionic genius, and his dramatic art had become so +mechanical too, towards the end of his career, that he could utilize +such places in his great parts as Hamlet's soliloquy for thinking out +scientific puzzles, although his power over the emotions of his audience +never lost its effect.</p> + +<div class="centeredimage" style="width: 291px;"> +<a href="images/ill_134.jpg"> +<img src="images/ill_134_sml.jpg" width="291" height="500" alt="AMNERIS AS I NOW DRESS IT" title="AMNERIS AS I NOW DRESS IT" /></a><br /> +<span class="caption">AMNERIS AS I NOW DRESS IT</span> +</div> + +<p>The director's own story was a real romance. While still on the upward +side of the hill of fame, he had met and loved the wife of a nobleman, +the scion of an ancient house. She had been maid-of-honour at the most +exclusive court in Europe, the confidante<a name="page_135" id="page_135"></a> of the royal family, and +was said to know the true story of many of the mysterious incidents in +court history. In fact she was supposed to have been married off +hurriedly to her much older husband to get her away from the royal +circle of whose secrets she knew altogether too many. The infatuation of +the singer for the lady was mutual, and in course of time a boy was born +to them, who reached the age of six years before the noble husband +consented to divorce his wife, or rather, I think, his lawyers consented +for him, as by that time dissipation had quite softened whatever brain +he may have had to begin with. This mental condition of his gave her the +care of their children, and in Metz their youngest son, their daughter a +girl of about twenty, and the director's little boy all lived together. +At holiday times another of her sons, a most charming young fellow, a +lieutenant in a crack cavalry regiment, used to visit them too. She +invited my sister and me to meet him, and the whole family often +attended the opera together. He liked me in several rôles and used to +send me wonderful flowers. I still have a huge green bowl which he sent +me filled with violets, in return for the photograph for which he had +begged. He was an example of the most elegant type of young officer, the +aristocrat of <i>Uradlige Familie</i>, fair, with delicate features; his six +feet of slimness, with long slender limbs and very little body,<a name="page_136" id="page_136"></a> clothed +in his glove-fitting uniform. He had the fashionable three creases +across the front of his smart Hussar jacket where his tummy should have +been. His poor little story turned into tragedy. He contracted +consumption and did not tell his people, but used their influence to get +himself transferred to German West Africa, on the plea of wanting to see +service. Arrived there, he quietly shot himself one evening as the +easiest way out of a life that promised him nothing but misery. A sort +of malignant fate seemed to pursue the children of that first marriage, +for the charming young daughter also came to a sudden and most tragic +end, as I shall tell later on.</p> + +<p>The director's wife was very nice to us. She often invited us to visit +her although we did so but seldom. Her rooms were filled with relics of +her former life—portraits of herself as lady-in-waiting to the Empress +of Austria, in court dress, portraits of her Empress, old photographs of +groups on terraces and at castle gates, almost every person in them a +"personage." She herself still wore her hair as her Empress had done, in +a coronet of narrow braids set round her head. She said that they were +sewn together with the same coloured silk as the hair every morning +after being braided, to make them stand up. With us she always played +the <i>grande dame</i>, apparently quite without effort, but there were +stories about her<a name="page_137" id="page_137"></a> which seemed to show that she could be something very +different.</p> + +<p>She certainly could talk most interestingly of her former grandeur. One +of her tales was of a lady of the court who owned the smallest dog that +any one had ever seen. It was so tiny that she used to carry it, when in +evening dress, in the front of her décolletage. One night at dinner as +she leaned forward to eat her soup, the dog fell into the plate. There +was vermicelli in the soup, and before she could fish it out of this +entanglement, the poor little thing was drowned! Another time the Frau +Direktor showed us a photograph of a very slim and shapely young dragoon +in full regalia, cloak and all, holding a letter up to hide his face. As +there was evidently a story we begged her to tell it to us. She said +that there had been a certain young married Countess of the court, who +was known as a great prude and was always boasting of her exaggerated +wifely devotion. Her airs became, said the Frau Direktor, quite +insufferable, and so she herself resolved to put such armour-plate +virtue to the test. At Carnival time, therefore, she dressed herself as +a young officer for a ball at which the <i>Hofgesellschaft</i> was to be +present, and a very dashing figure she made, according to the picture. +In this disguise she then proceeded to give the Countess the rush of her +life. The gallant pursued<a name="page_138" id="page_138"></a> the virtuous Countess all the evening, and +was rewarded by being asked to escort her ladyship to her home. In the +carriage the "Lieutenant's" attentions became still more pressing, when +to his secret dismay, the fair creature suddenly melted entirely, cast +herself into his arms, and swore she adored him. Arrived at her house, +the "Lieutenant" beat a hasty retreat vowing all sorts of things for +their next meeting, which naturally never took place. But the vanished +Lieutenant did not resemble the gentlemen of Virginia who kiss and never +tell, for the Countess' share in the story leaked out, and her +reputation for unassailable devotion was irreparably damaged, to the +great satisfaction of all her acquaintance.<a name="page_139" id="page_139"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII</h3> + +<h4>HUMAN PASSIONS AND SMALLPOX</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">A</span>T the beginning of the season, the director's family was still in the +country, where they remained until the opera had been running for some +time. We met his wife and daughter for the first time at a luncheon +given by him at the hotel where we had arranged to take our two o'clock +dinner, after trying all sorts of unsuccessful ways of dining in +private. The stage manager of the drama, the first and second +Kapellmeister, the "Bureau Chef," the Heldentenor, Heldenbariton, High +Dramatic, Coloratura, my sister and myself were all invited. Just as we +were seating ourselves, the <i>Schauspiel Regisseur</i>, Herr S——, noticed +that there were thirteen at table. He turned as white as a sheet, jumped +up, and scarcely stopping to apologize, hurriedly left the room, nor +could he be prevailed upon to return, although the director followed him +into the hall to remonstrate. He protested that one of our number was +certain to die within the year as it was, and he wished to insure its +not being himself by refusing to sit<a name="page_140" id="page_140"></a> down at all. Curiously enough, his +prophecy came true, for the Director's young step-daughter died very +suddenly soon after.</p> + +<p>Herr S—— was a most unpleasant person, as I discovered later, and I +was always thankful that my identification with the <i>Opern-Personal</i> +kept me out of his way. He had a sort of spurious veneer and +ingratiating manner, which was at variance with his hard, square, +passion-scarred countenance. He pretended an enormous admiration for the +American woman, and that very day before luncheon, he showed me with +great pride a small American-made patent-leather shoe, which he took out +of the tail pocket of his frock-coat, telling me with a leer that it +belonged to a girl of <i>my</i> country, where the women had the most +beautiful feet in the world, and that it was his talisman and never left +him! He bore a bad name among the women players in the company. One of +the little actresses, a girl of good family, in her first season, used +to tell me unpleasant tales of him in her rapid, ungrammatical French, +whenever I met her; and she always referred to him as "That beast!"</p> + +<p>Our Heldentenor of that season was an uninteresting personage, a quite +elderly man of enormous routine and mediocre equipment, who had sung in +all sorts of opera houses and was on the last lap of a long career. He +was said to be nearly sixty, and<a name="page_141" id="page_141"></a> was quite bald, but he managed to make +a surprisingly youthful appearance on the stage. He had been at it so +long that he could make an attempt at acting almost anything—even +youth. His sprightly legs in "Fra Diavolo" were quite adolescent. He +kept himself discreetly to himself, and was never seen in the cafés, nor +on the streets with his colleagues.</p> + +<p>His greatest joy was a tiny dog, whose tricks he delighted to show off +to every one. The little thing would whine for a soprano, growl for a +bass, howl for a tenor, bark when told "The Direktor's coming," and sit +up and beg at the word <i>Gage</i> (salary,) in a very amusing way, and his +master was intensely proud of his accomplishments.</p> + +<p>The lyric tenor of the first season was a peasant from Swabia, with a +droll accent and a lovely voice which he forced in a most agonizing +manner. He would shake all over when he sang a high note, and yet his +natural voice ranged easily to high D sharp—I have even heard him sing +an E. His dialect and his ignorance made him the butt of the company, +but he was very goodnatured and took it all in good part. He used to +say: "Yes, I know—my wife is a French woman and she tells me to say +<i>Mignon</i>, but I'm a peasant—I say <i>Mischnong</i>." She was years older +than he and of better class. She had helped him to the little study that +he had had, and out of gratitude<a name="page_142" id="page_142"></a> he had married her, but they were said +to disagree very consistently.</p> + +<p>The Heldenbariton was quite a nice fellow, big and burly with a good +voice; he was a great favourite with the public, whom he had pleased by +marrying, out of the chorus, a townswoman who adored him.</p> + +<p>The second Kapellmeister was a vague, weak creature, henpecked by his +vain little wife who was never happy unless she was the centre of some +one's admiration. She was inordinately proud of her small feet, and our +little friend the lyric baritone used to make her furious, by insisting +that mine were smaller! Her dream was to go on the stage too, if only to +sing pages in "Lohengrin" and "Tannhäuser," and later her hope was +realized, I heard, when several of them went off together in April to a +"Monatsoper" on the <i>Russische Grenze</i> (Russian Frontier). The +coloratura soprano was a Dutch woman, speaking German with more accent +than I did. She was very fair, very fat, and very lazy, and she had a +capacity for food that I have seen equalled but never surpassed. She +dined with us daily, and woe to the person who had to serve himself from +a dish that had been passed to her! Eat until you could hold no more was +a part of the creed of all my colleagues. Anything short of absolute +repletion, and the meal was considered a failure. "<i>Sind Sie satt?</i>" +They would<a name="page_143" id="page_143"></a> ask each other gravely—"<i>Ich bin nicht satt!</i>" Meaning +literally, "Are you full?" "<i>I</i> am <i>not</i> full." And this was a grave +cause of resentment against the hotel management. I must say that most +of them reached this desirable consummation long before the coloratura +soprano, for she continued placidly as long as there was any food in +sight. She would even finish anything left on another's plate, and our +table always looked as if a horde of locusts had visited it.</p> + +<p>Those colleagues of my first engagement are stamped upon my +memory—representing as they did so much that was new to me,—a new +nationality, a new profession, and in many cases a new social class. +Take them all together they were a pretty decent lot considering their +antecedents and surroundings. As a general rule, I think the actors are +apt to be of a somewhat higher social class than the singers, as a +remarkable voice occurs when and where it will, while a vocation for the +acting stage presupposes a certain amount of education and refinement of +surroundings, although there have been, of course, some notable +exceptions.</p> + +<p>They wanted us to meet the officers of the different smart regiments. +The Red Dragoons in particular were supposed to be all-powerful in +deciding the success or failure of a singer, and the colleagues kindly<a name="page_144" id="page_144"></a> +thought we ought all to have the advantage of this. One or two of the +women of course had affairs with them, and as Marjorie and I did not +care to meet the officers in just that society, we were sometimes hard +put to it to find a good excuse. Once my sister went to bed, though +perfectly well, for several days, to avoid a particularly pressing +invitation. Later we met these officers through letters from our +relatives, and liked some of them tremendously. Even their affairs were +the outcome of the system, and did no particular harm to any one.</p> + +<p>The opera soubrette had one of years' standing with a tall ungainly +White Dragoon. He was a harmless idiot, and she a smart German-Polish +Jewess, a nice little thing. We each had a "Benefiz" before leaving the +Metz engagement, when we were showered with flowers and gifts from our +friends and admirers, also sharing in the box-office receipts. R——, +the soubrette, told us the day after hers, still breathless from rage, +that "<i>Er</i>"—she never called him anything but "He"—had sent her an +umbrella, bound in the middle of a huge sheaf of roses. He had not +passed it over the footlights, so that every one might see its +splendour, but had left it at her rooms. When he called on her expecting +soft thanks, she berated him soundly, and succeeded in so enraging his +usually<a name="page_145" id="page_145"></a> placid self that he threw his big sabre through the window, +sending it crashing into the court below.</p> + +<p>One handsome Red Dragoon, a notorious connoisseur of music and women, +and believed absolutely irresistible, always sat in a box at our right +from the stage. His one reputable passion was music. He had at that time +an affair with a Dutch woman, who had been handsome and distinguée—she +was pitifully his slave. Going to the theatre one evening we saw her +approaching from one direction in the big court in front of the theatre, +as he approached from another. She smiled infatuatedly at him but he +passed her without a look—perhaps his idea of a tribute to my sister +and me. I felt sorry for her as the joy left her face.</p> + +<p>Several years after, while touring in Holland, in a charming little +place where we went to pass a free afternoon, we saw this same woman. +She had found the strength to shake off her German master, had married a +countryman and looked prosperous and happy.</p> + +<p>Neither Marjorie nor I ever received an offensive word or look from an +officer. They used sometimes to send me postcards after a <i>Carmen</i> or +<i>Amneris</i> night, closely scribbled over with signatures and greetings +and phrases of admiration, all highly respectful.<a name="page_146" id="page_146"></a> It always pleased me +very much to receive these cards.</p> + +<p>The <i>Genossenschaft</i> members of most theatres organize a <i>fête</i> every +year for the benefit of their society, and that spring we had a fancy +dress ball. A lady is chosen at these balls by popular vote to be Rose +Queen. I was chosen that time and had to parade around the room on the +arm of a portly Major, who often sent me flowers and books of his own +poems. I wore my <i>Carmen</i> dress of black satin, with gold flowers, and +my scarlet Spanish shawl. There was much cheap champagne drunk to the +popular toast of "General Quenousamong." This was originally "<i>Que nous +aimons</i>" (To those we love), and the "general" meant that every one was +to join in. The French touch was considered elegant, just as <i>Couzank</i> +was the polite word for cousin, and <i>Satank</i> for satin. Balls of this +kind are highly popular and a great contrast to the usually simple lives +of these small-town people.</p> + +<p>One form of simplicity I never adopted was the quite general one of +eating their evening supper, consisting usually of a bit of sausage, and +black bread and butter, out of bits of paper casually put down amongst +the objects on the table in their bedrooms. When you had finished, you +simply rolled up and threw away the greasy papers and the thing was +over.<a name="page_147" id="page_147"></a></p> + +<p>Sometimes a meal may be captured free. One of our "comics" in Metz had +to fish at the back of the stage in an operetta. He was always furnished +with a salt herring by the property man, which he would suspend solemnly +out of sight of the audience for a while, then slowly draw up, and +proceed to eat. A clean picked spine was all that remained by the end of +the act, and he had had his supper.</p> + +<p>Often the performances supplied me with welcome comic relief behind the +scenes. I learned for instance, that the text of the Anvil chorus sung +round me, as I lay on the canvas rock couch of <i>Azucena</i>, in +"Trovatore," was: "<i>Ich habe Dir schon laengst gesagt, die Wurst sie +schmeckt nach Seife</i>"—"I told you long ago, the sausage tastes of +soap." Also the soldiers in "Faust" made their rollicking return from +the wars to the words: "<i>He—ring und Apfel—Kartoffelnsalat.</i>" "Herring +and apple—potato salad." <i>Siegmund</i> grows woefully vulgar, and the +opening bars of his love song to his sister always say now to me: +"<i>Winter Struempfe riechen im Monat Mai.</i>"</p> + +<p>Once in "Tiefland" the old man in the first act was presented with a +large lump of Limburger cheese, which he had to sniff and hold +gratefully for a long time, while his rejoicing colleagues slapped their +knees with glee in the wings. Sometimes the humour was replaced by other +less agreeable emotions. For<a name="page_148" id="page_148"></a> my <i>Benefiz</i>, the last year of my +engagement, I was to sing <i>Carmen</i>. I wanted a popular guest tenor from +a neighbouring <i>Hoftheater</i> to be my <i>José</i>, and he finally agreed to +come. He would not come in time for rehearsal and I did not see him +until I turn my head in the first recitative and see him making his +sword chain. From then on, he directed me in lordly tones throughout the +first act. I had often sung <i>Carmen</i> in Metz and the audience knew most +of my business and expected it; also as I had prepared the rôle in Paris +and spent months of study on it I did not see why all of my business +should be changed on my own festive night. Therefore in our short talk +before the second act, I told him my positions as nicely as I could, he +saying to everything, "<i>Aber warum? Warum?</i>" (But why, why?). I stood +this as long as I could and told him all the warums, till finally I said +"Because I want to!" At this he lost his temper and left the stage. I +was surprised, but supposed he was nervous. From then on, things went +from bad to worse. Everything <i>Carmen</i> said to <i>José</i>, he thought Howard +was saying to him. I tried to whisper that I meant nothing by it—that +that was the way I played it, but he grew blacker and blacker. Finally +in the last act I struck him with my fan, my usual business to make +<i>José</i> let <i>Carmen</i> pass. He rushed at me and caught my wrists and +shouted, "<i>Was faellt Ihnen denn<a name="page_149" id="page_149"></a> ein</i>" ("What's the matter with you?") +I was frightfully upset and nearly crying by then, but had to go on. At +the last as I lay on the floor and he stood over me, he deliberately +threw his heavy dagger in my face, and I, a corpse, had to move my head +to avoid being hurt. He rushed to his dressing room and cried and +shouted for a half hour before his wife dared to go in and calm him. I +believe it was all jealousy. He had been most popular in the town, and +could not bear to share a performance with any one. The next day I could +hardly hobble; all my bones seemed wrenched; but every one was most +sympathetic and kind.</p> + +<p>The bells in Metz were most numerous and depressing. The cathedral near +us chimed all day an out-of-tune singsong, which the natives said was, +"<i>Ich bin todt und komm' nicht wieder!</i>" ("I am dead and shall not come +again!")</p> + +<p>The depression of the first year culminated in a smallpox epidemic, +which broke out shortly before the theatre closed. Marjorie dreamed of +it just before it happened, and that I died of it, which, of course, +haunted her all through the outbreak. It was frightfully mismanaged by +the authorities. The suspects were called for by policemen and carried +from the houses to an open wagon, (this in February and March,) and +driven to the hospitals. The <i>Kaserne</i><a name="page_150" id="page_150"></a> or barracks where cases +occurred, were isolated; but in our daily walks we passed them with +shudders. We were both so tired and had had so many shocks and +eye-openers as to what life really is, that this last nightmare +completely obsessed and unnerved us. Our policeman neighbour carried +suspects, and of course his uniform was never even fumigated and we knew +it.</p> + +<p>The dear little daughter of the director's wife was taken away from home +one night, in spite of her parents' remonstrances. She was ill of +rheumatic fever, and the authorities heard of it, pronounced it +smallpox, and took her away in the open carriage. She died in a few +days, and no one ever knew whether it was smallpox or not. Her mother +never quite got over it; the child was so sweet and young.</p> + +<p>The wagon used to stand in the street before a suspect house, with +children playing around it. The police seemed to run the whole thing, +and would carry bedding out of the houses and leave it to be burned in +the street. We were told that the very poor used to steal this bedding +at night. Of course we were vaccinated, but it did not take. The last +performances of the season were abandoned, as every one was afraid of +crowded places, and I left for Berlin on business. While there my throat +became<a name="page_151" id="page_151"></a> frightfully sore, and of course I thought, "Aha! I have it!" And +of course I didn't have it. I returned worn out to Paris and rested +there.</p> + +<p>About this time I went first to Jean de Reszke. His beautiful house, +near the <i>Bois</i>, with its little theatre, was the scene of much +nervousness and struggles to become <i>prime donne</i>. The master opened my +eyes to the beauties of style. His Wagner, better than the best +Wagnerian singer I have ever heard, his French style, the wonderfully +Italian and yet manly interpretations he gave the Puccini and Verdi +rôles, were all a marvellous inspiration to me. With a pupil he +considered intelligent he would take no end of trouble, and a "<i>Bien</i>" +from him was a jewel above price. The tales de Reszke pupils sometimes +tell me of the wonderful things he told them and predicted for them have +always amused me, because in all the time I have been in his studio I +have never heard anything like it.</p> + +<p>I was so infatuated by my work with him, and so humbled at the vista of +endless effort it opened before me, before his ideas could be carried +out in every tone one sang, that I asked him one day if I should not +spend the next winter in his studio, and leave the stage for a year. He +thought it over seriously, and advised me to go on with the stage work, +for the routine<a name="page_152" id="page_152"></a> I was getting was as valuable a teacher as he was. It +would have been a great privilege to have spent an entire year with him, +and if I could have afforded it, I should have done so.<a name="page_153" id="page_153"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV</h3> + +<h4>DISCOURAGEMENTS THAT LEAD TO A COURT THEATRE</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">T</span>HE second year of my first engagement was drawing to a close, and I was +much exercised over the next step. I wanted to try for one of the +<i>Hoftheaters</i>, not the very largest and most famous, but a place with a +good orchestra and carefully prepared productions. There seemed to be no +vacancy in just such a theatre, and my agent offered me a contract for a +great <i>Stadttheater</i>, probably the first municipal opera house in +Germany. Their contralto, who was a great favourite, had a contract for +a big Royal Opera, and they felt sure she would be engaged. With some +misgivings, I signed the <i>Vertrag</i>, and then began the long dickering to +arrange the guest performances which should decide my fate. They finally +asked me to sing <i>Azucena</i> at an afternoon performance. It had taken so +long to find a date which suited us both, that a good deal of time had +elapsed between the signing of the contract and their letter. I, of +course, refused to sing an afternoon<a name="page_154" id="page_154"></a> performance, and it was finally +arranged that I should sing <i>Carmen</i> on a certain date. There is a sort +of unwritten law that they shall choose one part, and you another, but +it is not always observed. This difficulty over the rôle should have +warned me that there was something wrong. Such a disagreement is a +pretty good indication that your contract will not be made <i>perfekt</i>.</p> + +<p>I travelled all night, and arrived to find a rehearsal on the same day +as the performance. It was what is called an <i>Arrangier Probe fuer den +Gast</i>, rehearsal without orchestra, of the scenes in which the "Guest" +takes part. All the colleagues were nice to me, but I saw the contralto +watching from the wings, and she gave me a dagger glare; so I thought +that there was "something rotten in the state of Denmark," as she was +supposed to be leaving voluntarily. I sang well that night, and had a +real success with the audience, and with my colleagues. They all said to +me, "Oh, you are certainly engaged after a hit like that." But I felt a +premonition which increased to a certainty when I heard that the +Director had not troubled to watch my performance, but had left the +theatre in the middle of the first act.</p> + +<p>I left the next morning, and in a day I received a letter from the +Director saying that I had not had quite enough experience to sing their +repertoire. I<a name="page_155" id="page_155"></a> learned some time afterwards that their contralto had +sung one of her guest-performances before I went there, had failed to +make a sufficient impression, and had decided to remain where she was. +This had been settled between her and the Direction before I sang at +all; still they had let me sing with no prospect of an engagement, and +allowed it to appear to be my fault that I was not engaged. Legally, of +course, they were quite within their rights, as I could have sued them +if they had not given me a chance to sing the <i>Gastspiel</i> called for in +my contract. But any singer, in such circumstances, would infinitely +prefer to be told the facts. Later, I once begged a director to tell me +if it were really worth while to <i>gastieren</i> in his opera house. He +said, certainly, they were not considering any one else and really +wanted to hear me. I sang there with one of the biggest personal +successes I have ever made, the <i>Bürgermeister</i> and all the Committee +(it was a municipal theatre managed by a Committee with the Mayor at the +head) came on the stage to congratulate me, and I had to take nine +curtain calls alone after the last act. I was not engaged, however, and +found out that they had already decided to engage a contralto who had +sung one <i>Gastspiel</i> before me and the other directly afterwards. This +sort of thing happens even to the most experienced native-born singer. +One tenor in D. sang<a name="page_156" id="page_156"></a> a guest performance <i>auf Engagement</i>, and learned +that he was the seventh who had tried for that position in the same +part, and they kept on their original one after all! Of course, these +performances are paid, but the fact that one has sung without being +engaged becomes known everywhere through the weekly theatrical paper, +which gives the repertoire and singers in each opera, of all the +reputable opera houses in Germany. But the fact that the management +never intended to engage you is not generally known. If you have bad +luck like this three or four times, it injures your standing as an +artist. The <i>Genossenschaft</i> or stage society is trying to make each +theatre confine itself to issuing only one contract at a time to fill +any vacancy they may have, which will largely prevent this evil.</p> + +<p>A second disappointment followed right on the heels of the first one. I +had a second string to my bow, as there was a vacancy in a very good +<i>Stadttheater</i> for which I was anxious to try. I opened negotiations +with them through my agent, and after the usual delay arranged the +<i>Gastspiels</i>. Their contralto was also leaving voluntarily. I was to +sing the two <i>Erdas</i> and <i>Ulrica</i> in the "Masked Ball." When I got +there, I found this changed to the <i>Erdas</i> and <i>Fricka</i>, which I had not +sung for a year. Then they demanded <i>Frau Reich</i> in "Merry Wives" +without a<a name="page_157" id="page_157"></a> rehearsal instead of the "Siegfried" <i>Erda</i>. I was very +unhappy, for I knew from this that things were going badly, and that +they had no intention of engaging me, no matter how or what I sang. The +Direction wrote me that, in spite of my great talents, my voice was not +quite large enough for their house. The truth was that their contralto, +who was a Jewess and therefore of the same religion as most of the +committee, had been offered an increase of salary to remain, and had +accepted. The Direction themselves felt badly over the way they had +treated me, and the <i>Intendant</i> telephoned to a <i>Hoftheater</i>, not far +off, where he knew there was going to be a vacancy, to recommend me to +their Director in the highest terms.</p> + +<p>This was Darmstadt, the capital of a small principality, famous for its +opera house, which had existed for a hundred years. It is a town of +about 100,000 inhabitants, and the residence of the reigning Grand Duke, +Ernst Ludwig. His mother had been the Princess Alice of England, +daughter of Queen Victoria. He and his second wife, Eleanore, lived with +their two little sons at the palace Princess Alice's money had built for +them. It was really not a palace at all, but a large, roomy, comfortable +house. His beautiful sister, Alexandra, married the Czar of Russia; +another sister married the Kaiser's brother, Prince Henry of Prussia.<a name="page_158" id="page_158"></a></p> + +<p>The opera house, called <i>Hoftheater</i>, stood high in the second class. In +the first class are Berlin, Vienna, Dresden and Münich, with possibly +Hamburg. Then come Cologne, Frankfurt and Leipsic, and the <i>Hoftheaters</i> +Hanover, Stuttgart, Mannheim, Wiesbaden, Darmstadt, etc. In the third +class are the smaller <i>Hoftheaters</i> like Coburg, and the <i>Stadttheaters</i> +like Mainz. In the fourth, are the smallest <i>Stadttheaters</i>, and last of +all come the little towns which have <i>Monatsoper</i>, or a one month season +of opera in the year, after the seven month theatres are closed. The +first class houses are open all the year, with a four or six weeks' +vacation for the singers at different times, so that they shall not all +be away together. The next class has a nine months' season, but in the +<i>Hoftheaters</i> the salary is paid in monthly instalments for twelve +months in the year.</p> + +<p>I took the train for the town, not caring much whether they wanted me or +not. Perhaps that was the right attitude, for after hearing one song +with piano accompaniment, the <i>Intendant</i> offered me a five-year +contract. I asked them to make it three; the town seemed so small and +quiet that I did not like the sound of five years in it. The salary was +the highest they had ever paid a contralto. The Director said at once, +"How much did they offer you in——?" and agreed to pay me only 500 +marks a year less. I arranged<a name="page_159" id="page_159"></a> to <i>gastieren</i> very soon in <i>Carmen</i>, +with <i>Nancy</i> and one other part to follow. I sang only the <i>Carmen</i> on +trial, however, as the Grand Duke, who had come in especially from his +country place to hear me, engaged me personally after the first act. I +had a wonderful and rare chance to "be grand" when the Director told me +this. He asked me if I would be willing to sing my other <i>Gastspiel</i> of +<i>Nancy</i>. I replied loftily that I really could not do so, as I must +return to Paris.</p> + +<p>Six days before the opening of the season, according to contract, I +arrived with my sister in the town which was to be my home for the next +three years. It is surrounded by forests and looked very pretty; but oh! +so quiet! The <i>Hoftheater</i> stands in a park, and is a classic-looking +structure seating 1,400 persons. It has been there for a hundred years, +and runs by clockwork. A building behind it, more than half as large as +the theatre itself, contains the ballet school and scene-painting lofts +and a complete dressmaking and tailoring establishment, with the +wardrobe mistress and master at the head, where all costumes are made. +They are also kept here, and the collection is a very complete one, with +endless sets of uniforms, armour and historical costumes of all kinds. +Men's dress is supplied; women who have a salary of more than 3600 marks +($900) are supposed to supply their<a name="page_160" id="page_160"></a> own, but if you are nice to the +wardrobe mistress she will usually contrive to find what you want, +though you must get permission from the Direction to wear it. Excellent +dressers are provided for the principals, and a hair-dresser to put on +your wig. There is a small charge if it requires dressing. The theatre +pays these people, but you are supposed to tip them on New Year's Day, +also the stage doorkeeper, the man who brings you the scores of your +parts, and any one else you like, though only the first four expect it; +and 10 marks ($2.50) is a liberal tip. You are expected to keep your +costumes at home, and send them over in a basket-trunk on the morning of +the performance for your dresser to unpack, press and hang up. You pay a +man $1.00 a month to do this, though many singers send their servant.</p> + +<p>There are four Kapellmeisters, the first one who rejoiced in the title +of <i>Hofrat</i> (Court councillor), the second, and third, and a fourth for +the chorus. Felix Weingartner is now first conductor there. The +orchestra consists of sixty musicians, and is really good. They have +played together so long, that they can play almost anything, and they +excel in Mozart, whom, with Wagner, they adore, while they look with +condescension upon the works of Puccini. The scenery of this particular +opera house used to be famous. They were the first to have moons which +really rose<a name="page_161" id="page_161"></a> about as slowly as the real one, and they are still unique +in possessing a wonderful clock-work sun, which contracts as it rises. +The <i>Ring</i> dramas, with their complicated settings, are given without a +single hitch; the "Magic Flute" is presented with some nineteen scenes, +all dark changes; and this is one of the four theatres in the world +where Goethe's "Faust" is given entire, on four consecutive evenings. +The artist, Kempin, who is responsible for all new scenery, is a man of +considerable reputation, outside the town as well as in it, as a +painter. He does excellent things when he is allowed a free hand, as he +inclines very strongly toward modern <i>styliziert</i> (conventionalized) +scenery <i>à la Reinhardt</i>. His production of "La Belle Hélène" was worth +seeing, and his "<i>Gretchen's</i> room" in "Faust" is one of the most +charming stage settings I have ever seen.</p> + +<p>There is a large, thoroughly trained chorus, each with a repertoire of +over fifty operas, whose members are paid, as a rule, about 125 marks a +month ($26), everything but modern dress supplied. None receives more, +except those who fill small "speaking parts." In a ballet of forty the +dancers receive from 75 to 80 marks apiece with all costumes furnished. +Knowing these figures, as I do, it is hard for me to credit those I once +saw quoted in a music journal from a German book on the subject. The +author<a name="page_162" id="page_162"></a> stated that the ballet girls in Hanover receive only 10 marks +($2.50) a month. Hanover, being a larger city and affiliated with Berlin +pays better salaries than this opera house of which I am writing. He +also said that the "leading lady" in Eisenach had only 15 marks a month! +As I, as a beginner and foreigner, in Metz, received $35 a month, I +cannot but think that he had forgotten to add the cipher and meant 150 +marks! The costume expenses that he spoke of, are certainly a great tax +upon the German <i>actresses</i> in smaller theatres; but I think I have +shown how greatly the wardrobe of a <i>singer</i> in such a theatre may be +simplified, especially by a thrifty German woman, up to all the dodges +of different pairs of sleeves for the same gown. After all, costume +expenses are as high or as low as one makes them. None of our American +girls thinks of becoming an actress on the European stage, so these +costume expenses need not trouble her personally, and the majority of +German actresses manage to live on their earnings. The principals in my +theatre received from $900 to $3500 a year, which last named sum is paid +to the <i>Heldentenor</i>, and on which he is rich. The rent of a good flat +is 700-800 marks a year ($180-$200). I paid 1100 marks ($275) for mine +because it was situated on the best street, near the palace. It +contained four rooms, with kitchen, bath, maid's room and two balconies. +A<a name="page_163" id="page_163"></a> good general servant receives 25 marks a month ($6.24). Her wages and +everything about her are regulated by police inspection. The <i>Polizei</i>, +in fact, regulates the whole town, even the closing of the theatre, +which can only be shut in case of destruction by fire, serious epidemic +or martial law.</p> + +<p>The same system of alternating plays with opera obtains in all but the +very largest German cities. We had some splendid actors in our cast, +some of whom are now in leading positions in the greatest theatres. The +repertoire, for a town of 100,000 people, is extraordinary. The German +classics, Goethe and Schiller, alternate with Shakespeare; the modern +poetic dramas, the plays of Hebbel, Grillpartzer, the sparkling comedies +of Schnitzler are interchanged with translations of Ibsen, Bernard Shaw, +Pinero, etc. Sudermann and Hauptmann may follow the latest French salon +comedy, or a new farce; and the good old ones that everybody knows like +"Kyritz Pyritz," and "Charley's Aunt" are not allowed to die. Then there +are peasant plays in dialect and fairy plays for the children at +Christmas.<a name="page_164" id="page_164"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV</h3> + +<h4>SALARIES AND A TENOR'S GENIUS</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">I</span>F you make a hit with the audience your residence in the town is made +very pleasant. Even the conductors and motormen of the street cars used +to greet me as they passed and all the policemen were my friends. I had +letters to some of the people in the town through relations, and took as +much part as I had time for in the really charming, if slightly narrow, +social life of the place. The centre of everything was, of course, the +Court. The Grand Duke took a great interest in the theatre, and used to +watch the productions notebook in hand. Any detail which did not please +him was immediately noted and sent then and there to the stage manager +to be changed. We had some special privileges as we were classed as +<i>Beamten</i> or official servants of the government. One was the right to +wine from the ducal cellars at cost price, or duty free. Another was a +10 per cent. discount at all the shops.</p> + +<p>Extra money is often to be picked up by a <i>Gastspiel aushilfsweise</i>, +that is, an emergency call from a<a name="page_165" id="page_165"></a> neighbouring theatre. Our opera +soubrette once received a hurry call to another <i>Hofoper</i> one hour's +journey away. The train would have made her too late, so she took an +automobile and her costume with her, and drove at breakneck speed +through the woods to the town. She was to sing <i>Cherubino</i> in "Figaro" +and, as she dressed in the auto to save time, the surprise of the +chauffeur may be imagined when, instead of a brunette girl, a blond boy +emerged from his car!</p> + +<p>I made my first appearance as a regular member of the company as +<i>Dalila</i>. The only comment afterwards of the first Kapellmeister, who +directed the performance, was, "Why did you make the eighth note in such +and such a phrase a sixteenth?" I repeat this, in order to give an idea +of the standard of thoroughness with which the musical part of the opera +was prepared. When we were rehearsing <i>Dalila</i> on the stage, I, having +studied the rôle in Paris and being imbued with the spirit of the French +performers, occasionally gave that swing from the hips on a particularly +luscious phrase, using as faithfully as I could remember it de Reszke's +masterly interpretation and flow of line. The <i>Hofrat</i> rapped on his +desk, and half patronizingly, half contemptuously, with a pitying smile, +bade me not indulge in <i>franzoesische Manniere</i>—French mannerisms. As +many room rehearsals<a name="page_166" id="page_166"></a> were held as were necessary before the singers +could sing their parts, giving every note its exact value. A singer +might make mistakes during the performance, but the <i>Hofrat</i> always +mentioned it afterwards. My <i>Samson</i> was, of course, the <i>Heldentenor</i>, +and he was a character; a tall, good-looking man, with an immense, +ill-used voice, but a wonderful actor. He had a great success with the +ladies, and his adventures, matrimonial and otherwise, were the +principal source of gossip of the town. His lady-love at this time was a +certain Baroness, whom he afterwards married. Their great amusement was +rushing about the country together in a white automobile filled with +flowers. She used to hang fascinated over the edge of her box, high +above the stage, watching his every look and gesture, her large bust on +the edge of the box. When he left the stage she would sink back in her +chair, really exhausted, and rub her eyes with her hand. He was the only +person who was allowed to disturb the orderly rehearsals. Every one was +afraid of him when he lost his temper and raged up and down the stage, +shouting what he would do to his enemy when he caught him. One day, I +remember, he was furious with the <i>Intendant</i> because birthday honours +had been distributed by the Grand Duke, in the form of decorations, and +he had received none. He made sure that it was the <i>Intendant's</i> spite +against<a name="page_167" id="page_167"></a> him, but it was in reality, of course, his notorious way of +living that prevented his being decorated. He shouted that he would "buy +himself two cents' worth of soft soap and grease his back with it and +make the <i>Intendant</i> climb up it!" Then that he would get him in the +woods and run his auto over him, and run it back and forth, and back and +forth, until there was nothing left but apple sauce! Finally the +Direction could stand him no longer, great actor as he was, and his +contract was broken on the pretext of his having been absent from the +town without leave. You are supposed not to go further than a certain +stated distance from the theatre without due notification and +permission. He left the place with his Baroness, and his return to it +was characteristic. The first time that Zeppelin's airship passed over +the town, he was in it, hanging out of the car, shouting and throwing +down postcards!</p> + +<p>As <i>Siegfried</i> in "Goetterdaemmerung," he left an ineffaceable +impression on me. I have never seen it equalled by any tenor. When he +gazes at <i>Brünnhilde's</i> ring, and his memory fails to recall just what +it means to him, his puzzled look of baffled memory, the ray of +understanding that almost pierced his forgetfulness, all were suggested +in so tremendous a way that one saw inside his brain,—and all this +utterly without exaggerated mannerisms.<a name="page_168" id="page_168"></a></p> + +<p>I seemed to find favour in his sight, and during the <i>Dalila</i> rehearsals +he made hot love to me. In the performance, when <i>Dalila</i> sinks into his +arms on the couch, he nearly upset me by saying fervently out loud: +"<i>Ach! endlich weiss man was est ist ein schoenes Weib im Arm zu +haben?</i>" ("Ah! at last one knows what it is to have a beautiful woman in +one's arms.") I considered this a distinct reflection on his adoring +Baroness, and withheld the signs of delight he no doubt expected. He +told me once, one only wish he had,—just to see my <i>Spinne</i>, or +<i>lingerie</i> closet. One day, as we were all in the greenroom, during a +rehearsal, waiting our turn to be called to the stage, I saw S——'s +eyes transfixed with horror. Looking in the direction he pointed I saw +the opera soubrette Z——, putting on her rubbers and crossing her legs +in doing so. This action revealed to our delighted gaze trouserettes of +red striped canton flannel, shirred into a band half way between calf +and ankle, and there adorned with a blanket-stitched frill of the same +material. S—— was too sickened by the sight to do more than helplessly +gasp, "Typical!" to me. A curious person; fastidious, sensual, +unquestionably endowed with genius, he just couldn't behave.</p> + +<p>He was asked to sing <i>Siegfried</i> once, at a neighbouring opera house, on +very short notice. He had<a name="page_169" id="page_169"></a> to dress in the train in order to be there on +time when the curtain went up. Fellow travellers, who saw him enter the +train dressed in the ordinary way, were rather horrified to see a +half-naked savage emerge at the journey's end; but S—— was quite +impervious to the sensation he created. He never wore the hideous tights +most <i>Siegfrieds</i> try to make you think are skin, but his splendid +shoulders rose naked from his bearskin, and his bare legs were bound +with furry thongs.</p> + +<p>The <i>Heldenbariton</i> was of another type. He had been twenty-five years +on the stage, and twenty in this theatre. Opera singing for him was like +going to his office. He had his house with a charming garden, his +family, and a circle of friends and acquaintances, which included nearly +the whole population. There are many cases like his in this class of +theatre, and a pleasant life they lead. After eight years in the same +<i>Hoftheater</i> they are eligible for a pension, a certain proportion of +their salary, which increases with their years of service, up to a fixed +point. Only certain <i>Hoftheaters</i> have this pension fund; it is very +nice for some singers, but a great hardship for others. If you leave +that theatre before your eight years are up, you lose all that you have +paid during your engagement. Contribution to the pension fund is +compulsory for all singers and actors in that theatre. One singer whom<a name="page_170" id="page_170"></a> +I knew had spent sixteen years in different theatres, always paying a +pension tax, and never receiving the benefit of one penny from the +money, as her engagement in each place came to an end before the +stipulated eight years. Unscrupulous directors take advantage of this to +fail to renew a singer's contract when it gets near the eighth year. The +invaluable <i>Genossenschaft</i> is also trying to remedy this abuse.</p> + +<p>Some of the regular members of a <i>Hoftheater</i> have enviable concert +reputations as well, though in Germany the two professions are quite +separate, and concert singing is generally looked upon as the higher +branch of art. The critics are suspicious of the opera singer in +concert, to such an extent that I was advised, at my first Berlin +recital, to keep my real standing in the profession dark and present +myself without my title of <i>Hofopernsängerin</i>. I suggested to my agent +that, as I was quite unknown in Berlin, it might be well to spend a +little money in extra advertising. "Advertising?" said he, "they will +think you are a soap!" So I sang unheralded except by the usual +half-inch in the daily papers. In contrast to the publicity campaigns +and press-agents of this country, let me give another instance of how +they did things in Germany before the war. On being engaged at this +<i>Hoftheater</i>, I thought I ought to let the public know it. I wrote my +agent, Herr Harder, asking him to<a name="page_171" id="page_171"></a> spend 1000 marks ($250) for me in +judicious advertising of my engagement. He answered that there was no +way in which he could place the money to further my interests, and +returned it! The first contract which was offered me for a concert tour +in America, provided for $2,000 to be paid down for advertising before +the tour began.<a name="page_172" id="page_172"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI</h3> + +<h4>THE ART OF MARIE MUELLE</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">O</span>NE factor in my success was the beautiful wardrobe I was enabled to +have through the kindness of Mr. and Mrs. Frank S. Jones. The first +clothes I ordered from Marie Muelle in Paris, the summer before I went +to Metz, I left entirely to her. She showed me designs and had bolts of +wonderful shimmering silks unrolled for my inspection, and brought out +boxes of curious embroideries, which she kept for her special friends. +The <i>Amneris</i> and <i>Dalila</i> costumes she made me were very French of that +period of the <i>Comique</i>; pale pinks and greens and everything in long +wigs. I wore them a few seasons, but as I grew more in knowledge I did +not feel at all Egyptian in pink <i>crêpe de Chine</i>, nor Syrian in pale +green. My brother Cecil and I love the Egyptian part of the Louvre, and +have spent hours there together. We found a fascinating bronze princess +of the right period, which we proceeded to try and copy for me for +<i>Amneris</i>.</p> + +<div class="centeredimage" style="width: 321px;"> +<a href="images/ill_172.jpg"> +<img src="images/ill_172_sml.jpg" width="321" height="500" alt="DALILA AS I USED TO DRESS IT" title="DALILA AS I USED TO DRESS IT" /></a><br /> +<span class="caption">DALILA AS I USED TO DRESS IT</span> +</div> + +<p>We were staying out of town at Giverny, the artist<a name="page_173" id="page_173"></a> colony made famous by +Monet, Macmonnies, Friesieke, the A. B. Frost family and many artist +friends. I had a big studio with my brother, and he made huge designs of +the wings the princess used for her skirt, pinning them on the wall of +the studio, then colouring them in the tones of the mummy cases, +allowing for their fading through the ages. These designs we took to +Muelle, who was most enthusiastic. We worked hard and long on that +costume, getting the headdress just right, and making it practical as +well as correct. The jewelry I made myself, from wooden beads painted +the right colour and in the rue de Rivoli I found just the right +Egyptian charms and figures of blue earthenware to hang on the necklace. +My wig maker could not seem to satisfy me, so I finally took a +short-haired black wig, and braided into it one hundred strands, made of +lustreless wool. The dress seemed to lack something when on, so I +twisted ropes of turquoise beads round the wrists and the blue accented +the whole.</p> + +<p>The <i>Dalila</i> clothes I had been wearing then seemed hopelessly pale, +washy and conventional, so we hunted the shops of Berlin and Paris for +vivid embroideries and searched museums for Syrian women. They did not +seem at all popular, though we found magnificent reliefs of men. Taking +these as a basis, we built some barbaric robes of scarlet and purple,<a name="page_174" id="page_174"></a> +added a fuzzy short black wig, and I felt much more "like it." I found a +necklace of silver chains with clumps of turquoise matrix, in Darmstadt, +and had a headdress made to match it. A comparison of the <i>Amneris</i> and +<i>Dalila</i> photos will show how one's sense of costuming develops.</p> + +<p>We bought all the books on the subject we could find, and studied them +for hours. We cut out reproductions of historic portraits and invested +largely in photos in the different art galleries we haunted, and pasted +them into scrap books. Caps and headdresses have always interested me +intensely. The one I wear in "Meistersinger" I copied from a portrait in +Antwerp. The Norwegian one I wear as <i>Mary</i> in "Fliegender Hollaender" I +bought in Norway, together with the rest of my costume.</p> + +<p>Nothing gives such character to a silhouette as a characteristic head, +and having to do endless old women, I could give them all just as +endless changes of headgear. A comparison of the photos will also show +how one grows into the rôle with years of playing, and how one's eyes +"come to," how one develops histrionically—how the silhouette acquires +snap and vim and carrying power at a distance, and outlines become crisp +and authoritative.</p> + +<p>My first <i>Carmen</i> clothes were very <i>Opéra Comique</i> and not at all +Spanish gipsy. I studied the Spanish<a name="page_175" id="page_175"></a> cigarette girls and those of gipsy +blood as carefully as possible, and my idea of the rôle changed +naturally. I went to Muelle one summer, and told her that I was no +longer happy in satin princess dresses. She said that Zuloaga had just +designed and superintended the making of Breval's clothes for the +<i>Comique's</i> real Spanish revival of <i>Carmen</i>. She could duplicate these +for me as she knew just where to send in Spain for the flowered cottons +in garish colours, and the shot silk scarfs that Zuloaga had imported +for Breval. I was delighted at this and adapted the costumes to my +needs, using the last one exactly as Zuloaga had intended, with the huge +red comb, made specially in Spain.</p> + +<p>When I sang <i>Carmen</i> before Prince Henry of Prussia in Darmstadt, he +sent word to me that my skirts were too long, no Spanish woman wore them +so long. I knew, however, that they were the right length, and any one +can see by studying Zuloaga's paintings that the soubrette length skirt +is not worn on the proud, swinging hips of the Spanish girl. I have been +told by Spaniards that I am an exact reproduction of a Spanish gipsy as +<i>Carmen</i>, which shows my studies were not in vain. People have said that +Merimée's and Bizet's <i>Carmen</i> is not Spanish, and perhaps they are +right; but in aiming to portray a Spaniard, what model can one take but +a real one?<a name="page_176" id="page_176"></a></p> + +<p>My <i>Orfeo</i> clothes I have never changed. The <i>crêpe de chine</i> for them +was imported by Mounet-Sully for one of his characters, and Muelle gave +me the piece that was left over. Its beautiful creamy colour and thick +softness cannot be improved upon, to my mind.</p> + +<p>Marie Muelle is now the first operatic costumer of the world. This +reputation she has built unaided through her own unfailing energy. +Through her rooms pass the most fabulous-priced opera singers, the +greatest actors, the stage beauties, famous managers, producers, and +designers, the ladies of the great world seeking costumes for wonderful +private <i>fêtes</i>—and gentlemen seeking the ladies—all the varied crowd +of many nationalities to whom the old childish pastime of "dressing up" +is a business or a pleasure. The present establishment in the rue de la +Victoire is quite impressive. The hall is usually half-filled with the +trunks of "Muelle artists" engaged in America, who bring their things +into New York in bond to avoid paying the ruinous customs charges, and +are therefore forced to go through the weary round of dispatching the +same old stage wardrobe out of the country and bringing it back again +every season. Even when the clothes are quite reduced to shreds and +patches the rags have to be elaborately packed, identified by lynx-eyed +officials, and sent at least outside<a name="page_177" id="page_177"></a> the three-mile limit of the +American Continent to be thrown away!</p> + +<p>The first big white reception room of the Maison contains a long table +usually littered with samples, some chairs, and a large mirror lit like +that of a star's dressing room. There is a mantelpiece covered with +photographs of singers of all grades of celebrity, each dedicated with a +message of admiring affection to Marie Muelle. Around the wall are +various <i>armoires</i>, one containing a library of works on costume, +another a glittering collection of stage jewelry, a third many +portfolios of water-colour designs for every sort and kind of theatrical +garment for every rôle.</p> + +<p>Oh! those designs! A young soprano has won an engagement in Monte Carlo +and wants a stage wardrobe for her repertoire. Out comes the "Modern +French" portfolio with a bewildering series of blonde and sinuous +<i>Thaises</i>, Moyen-Age <i>Mélisandes</i>, a scintillating <i>Ariane</i> in contrast +to a demure little work-a-day <i>Louise</i>; and the lady spends a delightful +afternoon in selecting her favourites.</p> + +<p>Then Muelle sends for an armful of samples—</p> + +<p>"<i>Crêpe de chine</i>, of course, for the <i>Thais</i>. Yes, in flesh pink with +plenty of embroidery. Here is an <i>échantillon</i>"—and she pins it to the +drawing.<a name="page_178" id="page_178"></a></p> + +<p>The singer picks out a scrap of heavy, lustrous crêpe—</p> + +<p>"No, not that quality. That is something special, and there is no more +to be had for love or money."</p> + +<p>Colours and fabrics are decided upon, all tested for becomingness under +the bunched electric lights, which mimic the strong light of the stage. +Each design has an assortment of tags of material pinned where many +others have been pinned before. Muelle is an expert in colours for the +stage. She doesn't talk learnedly of synthetic dyes, processes, or +German competition, but she can give you a bright blue that is warranted +to stay blue, no matter what vagaries of lighting a stage manager may +indulge in.</p> + +<p>Her pale colours never turn insipid, nor her dark ones muddy. She keeps +a special dyeing establishment busy with her orders alone, and +twenty-four hours seems time enough to obtain any shade known to the +palette.</p> + +<p>The textiles once chosen, Camille is called to "take measures" and +arrange for the fittings.</p> + +<p>"And now, one question," says Mademoiselle, "Is your stage level, or +does it slope towards the back? Very well, that is all."</p> + +<p>When the singer arrives for her first trying-on, the fitting room is +filled with lengths of material, and Mademoiselle herself stands in the +midst, brandishing<a name="page_179" id="page_179"></a> a huge pair of shears. She throws a length of silk +over one of your shoulders, puts in two pins, and bunching the material +in her left hand, gives a slash with the scissors in her right, with a +recklessness that makes you shudder. A pull here, a fold there, two more +pins—and the stuff hangs as almost no one else can make it hang, +accentuating a good figure and disguising a poor one.</p> + +<p>Occasionally in filling a regular order she will stumble upon an unusual +effect. One day they were making Moyen-Age sleeves for the dress of a +well-known singer whom Mlle. Muelle has gowned for years, but who has +never been included in the list of her special favourites. The sleeve +was of slashed silvery grey, lined with cerise, the lining showing on +the edges. She picked up a bit of cloth of silver and pulled it through +the slashes. The effect charmed her.</p> + +<p>"<i>Tenez!</i>" she said, "That is too good for her. We'll keep that for La +Belle Geraldine."</p> + +<p>"La Belle Geraldine," as Miss Farrar is known in Paris, is one of +Muelle's most constant patrons. Ever since her Berlin days she has been +costumed by the Maison Muelle, and she stands very high in the list of +Mademoiselle's favourites.</p> + +<p>The outer room may contain the photographs of celebrities great and +small, but in the inner room there<a name="page_180" id="page_180"></a> are just two—a portrait of Miss +Farrar as <i>Elizabeth</i> and one of myself as <i>Carmen</i>.</p> + +<p>Opening off the main reception and fitting rooms are others lined with +<i>armoires</i> and stacks of boxes running to the ceiling. Then come the +rooms for cutting and sewing, and the embroidery rooms. Muelle uses +quantities of solid embroidery and <i>appliqué</i> work, where other +costumers are content with stenciling and gilding. She has the secret of +a metal thread that does not tarnish. Her idea is that the use of +first-class materials, good silks and satins, real velvets is a +necessity in these days of electric lighting, which is as revealing as +sunlight; that the substitution of imitation fabrics went out with the +use of gas in the theatre, and that the superior wearing qualities alone +of the best materials justify the greater expense.</p> + +<p>The capacity of her <i>armoires</i> and the size of the accumulated +collections they contain were tested some years ago by the special +production of Strauss's "Salome" at the Châtelet Theatre in Paris, when +Muelle was called upon, at ridiculously short notice, to furnish all +costumes for a cast of 150 people. There was a royal ransacking of +cupboards and jewel cabinets, but everything was ready on time for the +dress rehearsal.</p> + +<div class="centeredimage" style="width: 318px;"> +<a href="images/ill_180.jpg"> +<img src="images/ill_180_sml.jpg" width="318" height="500" alt="DALILA AS I NOW DRESS IT" title="DALILA AS I NOW DRESS IT" /></a><br /> +<span class="caption">DALILA AS I NOW DRESS IT</span> +</div> + +<p>A greater feather in her cap was the order to costume the new +productions of the Russian Ballet, from<a name="page_181" id="page_181"></a> designs by no less a +personage than the great Leon Bakst himself. Then ensued a dyeing of +silks and a printing of chiffons, a stringing of beads and knotting of +fringes which set the whole establishment humming like a beehive.</p> + +<p>For all their thousand problems, the costumes were finished and +delivered at the appointed time.</p> + +<p>Since that triumph there has been hardly an important costume event in +all Paris in which Muelle has not had a share, if not entire charge. She +costumed Astruc's first season in the Théâtre des Champs Elysées. She +has been responsible for the costuming of many productions of the +Russian Ballet, and for great spectacles like Debussy's "St. Sebastien" +and "La Pisanelle" of D'Annunzio. Society knows her as well as the +stage, for she has been the presiding genius at many an exquisite fête, +Greek, Roman, or Persian, held in lovely gardens behind the prosaic +exteriors of exclusive Parisian homes.</p> + +<p>But all this has not turned her head, nor changed her toward her old +friends. She still loves a good gossip. Many a note have we had from +her—"I am delighted that Mademoiselle is returning to Paris, and hope +that she will come to see me. I have quantities of stories to tell her, +and we shall die of laughing."</p> + +<p>But though she enjoys a choice tidbit, she will <a name="page_182" id="page_182"></a>tolerate no malicious +tale-bearing. She refused an order, tactfully and firmly, from one +singer because the lady tried to tell tales out of school against one of +Muelle's chosen favourites. Her revenge in this case was typical. She +knows that advancing age is the enemy <i>par excellence</i> of popularity for +stage people, so she makes a point of always referring to the delinquent +as "La Mère So-and-So!"</p> + +<p>The list of her kindnesses to artists is unending. One case that I know +of personally is typical. A girl with an unusually beautiful voice had +arranged a début, leading to a first engagement, and she ordered her +wardrobe from Muelle. She failed to be engaged after her début, however, +and one disappointment after another came to her, so that it seemed +impossible for her to make a start at all. But Muelle had faith in her, +and kept the beautiful clothes, unpaid for, hanging in her presses for +several years. At last the girl made a great hit in Russia, and is now a +well-known singer, and, needless to say, a faithful adherent of the +Maison Muelle. This is only one instance of the kind, and, of course, +there are many, many more in which Mademoiselle's kindness does not find +a monetary reward.</p> + +<p>Often have I heard her suggesting economy to those whose salaries are +not in the "fabulous" class. She will show a girl how to costume two +rôles, with the<a name="page_183" id="page_183"></a> same dresses, by combinations and changes so cleverly +thought out that the keenest public won't detect them. <i>Elizabeth</i> and +<i>Elsa</i> may wear the same mantle, right side out in one rôle and wrong +side out in the other. An extra tabard of brocade or embroidery will +allow an <i>Ophelia</i> to wear the gowns of <i>Marguerite</i>—all tricks of the +trade, and well understood in the Maison Muelle.</p> + +<p>Brilliantly clever, immensely capable, good-natured, and big-hearted, a +splendid organizer and the faithfulest of friends, Marie Muelle has +earned by the hardest of hard work, and now justly enjoys her title of +"First Theatrical Costumer," not only of Paris, but of the world.<a name="page_184" id="page_184"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII</h3> + +<h4>THE NON-MILITARY SIDE OF A GERMAN OFFICER'S LIFE</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">O</span>NE of the first things you do on arriving at a new residence in Germany +is to acquaint the police of your presence. This is called <i>Anmeldung</i>. +It is a fearsome experience and admits of no trifling. You go to the +appointed stuffy office, and tell your nationality, birthplace with date +of birth, your parents' names, their profession if any, and your own, +their birthplaces and ages, if they are dead and what they died of, +whether you are married or single, number, names and ages of your +children, and any little extra detail that may occur to the official in +Prussian blue who holds the inquisition. If you have an unusual name, he +won't believe you when you claim it. A girl I knew was christened Jean, +but she is down in the police records of Berlin as Johanna, because her +policeman said that Jean was a man's name, and French at that!</p> + +<p>Every servant maid has a book, which must be signed by the police when +you engage her, and when<a name="page_185" id="page_185"></a> she leaves you, before she may take another +place. When you engage her she must be <i>angemeldet</i> too, in order that +she may be charged with her proper insurance tax. This amounts to about +five dollars a year; the employer pays one-half, the servant the other. +Many employers pay it all. This entitles the servant to treatment at the +dispensary or in the hospital if she is ill. The police are very careful +of her comfort, and pay a visit to the house in which she is employed to +see that her room is big enough, airy enough, warmed in winter, and that +her bed is comfortable! She has a long list of "rights" including so +many loaves of black bread and so many bottles of beer per week; and she +dare not be offended if you keep everything under lock and key.</p> + +<p>You have not yet finished your <i>Anmeldung</i> if you keep a dog, for he +must be registered, too, and you pay highly for the luxury. The +<i>Polizei</i> decides when you may and may not play on your piano or sing. +Before nine in the morning, after nine at night, all musical instruments +are taboo. The sacred sleeping hour after dinner, from two to four, must +also be observed in silence in Berlin. Nothing dare interfere with the +after-dinner nap; even the banks are closed from one to two, or even +three. You write to the <i>Polizei</i> in Germany where the Englishman writes +to the <i>Times</i>. I remember a perfect avalanche of<a name="page_186" id="page_186"></a> anonymous cards in +Darmstadt because a child in our house would practise with her windows +open and neighbours thought it was the <i>Hofopernsaengerin</i> Howard.</p> + +<p>The intricacies of paying your taxes take some study. Foreigners must +pay taxes on money earned in the country; town and county taxes are +payable every three months, on alternate months, in two different parts +of the town. You arrive at the <i>Staedtische Halle</i> to pay your town +taxes, and you are very lucky if, after picking out the right month, you +succeed in hitting the day when the place is open. A small sign on the +locked door may greet you: "Closed on the ninth and fifteenth of every +month." If day and month are right, you may easily strike the wrong +hour, for town taxes are payable, say, from eight to ten <span class="smcap">A. M.</span>, and two +to five <span class="smcap">P. M.</span>, while county ones are from nine to twelve, and four to +seven. There are church taxes besides, very small if you are Catholic +and larger if you are Evangelical. I succeeded in getting out of these +by declaring myself neither. Unfortunately I did not know the word for +undenominational and so had to say that we were "heathen." My sister was +asked in a rasping official voice, filled with the large contempt for +women which a certain type of German official always reeks with, "<i>Sind +Sie ledig?</i>" She, poor dear, had never heard "<i>ledig</i>"<a name="page_187" id="page_187"></a> before, and +stammered "<i>Was?</i>" The question was rapped out again, and she said, +"<i>Ich—weiss nicht.</i>" When she got home and looked up <i>ledig</i>, she found +the man had been asking if she were married or single. What he made of +her answer we never knew.</p> + +<p>All these little things are very amusing in Germany. The way everything +seems <i>verboten</i>, at first is annoying, but later amusing. The paths in +the Tiergarten in Berlin always used to tempt me to be bad. I always +wanted to walk on the path reserved for bicyclists, or horses, or sit on +the benches reserved for children only. The letter boxes say to you, +"<i>Aufschrift und Marke nicht vergessen!</i>" ("Address and stamp not to be +forgotten!") The door mat shrieks at you, "<i>Bitte, Fuesse Reinigen!</i>" +("Please wipe your feet.") Towels, brushes, etc., all say "<i>Bitte</i>" at +you. I believe one could travel all through Germany with just "<i>Bitte</i>," +and get an insight into the different phases of German character through +the intonations of this word.</p> + +<p>A rather annoying custom in Darmstadt was the way the bakers +over-celebrated every holiday. They had usually the "<i>Erster, Zweiter, +und Dritter Feiertag</i>"—first, second and third holiday, and they toiled +not on those three days. All the bread you could get, if you had +neglected to provide enough, was square pretzels, baked exceptionally +large and hard. This<a name="page_188" id="page_188"></a> may have been a Darmstadt custom only, as they +vary so all over Germany, that what holds good in the north may be quite +unknown in the south. For instance, cream is <i>Sahne</i> in Berlin, <i>Rahm</i> +in Darmstadt, and has even a third name in other parts of Germany, which +I have forgotten. You can get a wonderful <i>Sandtorte</i>—a firm, delicious +cake, in Berlin, but I never succeeded in getting it just right in +Southern or Middle Germany.</p> + +<p>A quaint old custom in Darmstadt was always observed on the first Sunday +in Advent. The Grand Duke always did his shopping for Christmas on that +day, and the country people thronged into the town. A band used to play +before the shop in which the Grand Duke was, and move as he moved. We +gave an extra long performance at the opera, "Goetterdaemmerung," or +some such serious business, but the Grand Duke never could honour us +with his presence, as every one in town would have felt cheated if he +had.</p> + +<p>The shopping in Darmstadt was really quite remarkable. We always thought +it an excellent thing that after eleven o'clock in the morning not a +scrap of meat was visible in the white-tiled butcher shops, everything +being put away on ice.</p> + +<p>Food is taken very seriously, of course, and asparagus is honoured above +any other vegetable by<a name="page_189" id="page_189"></a> having its own subscription season. That is, you +subscribe at the beginning of the season, so much a day, and asparagus +is delivered to you daily while it lasts at that price, the sum not +varying with the fluctuations of the market.</p> + +<p>The old market place was a delight on full market days. The grumpy old +women would sit in the middle of their piles of fruit and vegetables, +while you threaded your way along the uneven cobblestone lanes they had +left in between their stalls. Brilliant awning umbrellas have been +adopted and glow in the sun, against the darkly moist, old walls of the +frowning castle just behind. The old Dames call out to you, "Well, +Madamsche', nothing from me today? Aren't my things good enough for +you?" "Madamsche'" is a left-over from ancient French times, and the +final "n" is left off, as are all "n's" in Hessen dialect.</p> + +<p>This dialect also lacks "r's." They tell a tale of the Railroad +conductors calling out "Station Daaaaamstadt!" so loudly and +persistently as to annoy Grand Ducal ears, and they were ordered to pay +more attention to their "r's." Now they call out in a superior tone +"Starrrr-rtion—Damstadt!" and feel sure every one is satisfied.</p> + +<p>We had exceptional opportunities of knowing Germans of all classes, from +the cleaning women in the<a name="page_190" id="page_190"></a> theatre to royalty. The military types are +most varied, ranging from the Prussian Junker to the <i>gemuetlicher +Bayer</i>, with his easy South German ways. We met many officers and their +families, both in Metz and Darmstadt. In Metz, during the last year, we +grew to know and be fond of a young Bavarian lieutenant. With him we +drove and picnicked in the lovely Metz country. It was early spring, and +we would take the train to some little village near by, and have our tea +in the woods or at one of the thousands of <i>Gasthäuse</i> that dot Germany. +I remember one Sunday afternoon in a still, steep-sided ravine, the +walls of it rising sharply on either side, thickly wooded with giant +beeches; the sun-flecked grass aquiver with myriads of white ethereal +wind-flowers. A shrine, with a blue-robed Virgin looked down on us, and +the wood-hush was only broken by the songs of birds, twittering and +gurgling high above us in the branches. Suddenly far off the sound of +singing; and slowly a procession of children came into view, singing in +well-harmonized parts as they walked. They all genuflected before the +Virgin and wound off into the woods, their voices dying away in the +distance.</p> + +<p>We often studied the old battlefields, so fiercely contested in 1870, +and F—— would point out to us just where the different regiments +advanced and fell.<a name="page_191" id="page_191"></a> A long way off seemed the horrors of war, and we +never dreamed what much greater horrors were soon to descend on us.</p> + +<p>We loved the Bavarians with their kind artistic souls in those days, and +yet they tell me they were among the worst in the early days in Belgium.</p> + +<p>The military spirit was rampant in Metz, of course, and we got to know +that side of it well, as some of the officers had English wives, who +were very good to us. The delightful manners of the officers always +charmed us; we were told they are trained to social manners by their +superior officers. The cavalry regiments were the smartest ones, both in +Metz and Darmstadt, the Infantry being solidly aristocratic, but less +dashing. The <i>Pioniere</i> (Engineers) were rather despised socially, while +the poor <i>Train</i> or Commissariat, was utterly looked down upon and +hardly bowed to. The Bavarian infantry has its special social standing, +because the old nobility is largely represented in it. What they lack in +riches they make up in pride. All the other German infantry regiments +wear dark blue trousers, no matter what colour their tunics; the +Bavarians, however, have stuck to their light blue trousers, in spite of +all attempts to change them. The Prince Regent was famous for wearing +his much too long, and very wrinkled over badly fitting boots. The +smartest officers wore the<a name="page_192" id="page_192"></a> <i>Ballon Muetze</i> (balloon cap) introduced by +the Crown Prince and ineffectually forbidden by his father. It is called +"balloon" because it is much higher than the ones worn by less smart +officers. The height of the collar is the other important thing. In a +sterling officer of the old school, it is low and comfy; the smarter you +are the higher your collar. If they are fat, the two or three creases at +the back of the neck above the collar, always look to me +unmistakably—German.</p> + +<p>The life they lead is in general very simple, according to our ideas. +Their Casino is their meeting place in the evening, like an officers' +club. Some of them are tremendously hard workers, most ambitious, and +showing real interest in their men. F—— used to teach his more +illiterate ones to read and write, and many were the stories he told of +the thick-headed Bavarian peasants. The difference in these men, when we +saw them arriving in the fall, as rookies, and after a year's training, +was absolutely amazing; slumped shoulders had straightened, lower jaws +had decided to connect with upper ones, and eyes focused intelligently. +Each officer has his <i>Bursch</i> or private servant, who usually chooses to +be one. These are treated as friends by their masters, if the latter +<a name="page_193" id="page_193"></a>happen to be non-Prussian in character. I said once to F——, "Is Karl +your servant?" "No, he is <i>mein Freund</i>" he said.</p> + +<p>An officer in Diedenhofen where we occasionally sang while I was with +the Metz opera, used to send me gorgeous flowers. He had a way of +sitting near the stage and applauding by flapping his handkerchief +against the palm of his white kid glove, which so enraged me that I +never acknowledged the flowers. One night, an ugly old contralto took my +part, as I was laid up, and that was the night the officer had selected +to present me with a huge basket of white azaleas and blue satin ribbon. +The old dame rewarded the house in general with a false-teeth smile on +receiving them over the footlights, which must have discouraged my +admirer as the flowers stopped abruptly.</p> + +<p>We quite often saw young officers very drunk on the streets in Metz, at +about five in the afternoon. Asking F—— about this, we were told that +it was only the young ones, if we would notice, and that they were +obliged to empty their glasses, when toasted by superior officers at +regimental dinners. If these gentlemen caught their eyes, as they raised +their glasses, many times during the two o'clock dinner, the silly young +fellows' heads naturally grew befuddled, but it was not etiquette to +refuse to empty their glass.<a name="page_194" id="page_194"></a> This custom was very hard on a <i>Faehnrich</i> +or Ensign, and was later done away with.</p> + +<p>The smartest officers had English dogcarts, and were certainly most +dashing. Many clever ones in the cavalry made money out of horses, +buying and selling them amongst themselves. In Darmstadt they introduced +the English hunt, and wore the pink. We used to go up to Frankfort for +the "gentlemen races," and often saw our own Northern cousins, whose +names we knew, but whom we never had the opportunity of meeting, riding +with great skill and daring. These races were much encouraged by the +Kaiser, and sometimes giant Eitel-Fritz would come and look on, or the +dandy Prince Schaumberg-Lippe would make his horse mince round the ring. +He was a great beau and ladies' favourite and the horrible accident that +has deprived him of his beauty in the battlefield, seems an impossible +thing to have happened to just him.</p> + +<p>Our friend F—— was known in his regiment as "Revolver mouth." This +title he earned through his witty tongue and his habit of hitting the +bull's-eye in his table conversation. His great friend, a smart young +<i>nouveau riche</i>, in the most exclusive cavalry regiment, who had much +more money than brains, was <a name="page_195" id="page_195"></a>the butt of much goodnatured chaff from +F——. One evening F—— recounted to a group of brother officers how +S——, who was notorious for his absent-mindedness and poor memory, was +seen miles away from home, galloping down a dusty road. F—— hailed him +and said, "But where's your horse?" "That's true," said S—— looking +down in utter astonishment, "I must have forgotten to get on him."</p> + +<p>S—— was famous for his sharpness in choosing and trading horseflesh, +and F—— used to call him on the 'phone, saying "Is this Herr S——? +<i>Guten tag!</i> I am Graf Pumpernickel." Then he would elaborately arrange +a rendezvous in some very public spot in Metz, at which S—— was to +appear with the horse he wished to trade. Of course when poor S—— kept +the appointment, only a group of jeering young rascals greeted him, and +S—— never discovered who Graf Pumpernickel was, though the joke was +often repeated.</p> + +<p>The money question of the poorer officers, often proves very serious. +They are forbidden to earn money in any way except by writing. They +cannot marry the girl they choose unless between them they have a +certain sum, a minimum; this keeps many fine young officers and charming +girls from matrimony; and frequently results on the man's side in +far-reaching evils of entangling affairs, and illegitimate children. An +officer said to me once, he <i>thought</i> he had no children, but a pretty +woman who kept a<a name="page_196" id="page_196"></a> shop in the Kathedral Plate once sent him a baby's +pillow and he never was quite sure just what that meant. The Berlin +demi-mondaines are certainly fascinating creatures, dressed in the most +exquisite Paris clothes, and it is easy to understand how some penniless +Graf may become hopelessly involved in an affair with one of them. +Officially such things are frowned on. Talking of officers' troubles one +day, F—— told me that suicide was often the <i>only</i> possible solution, +and for the honour of one's regiment one was sometimes expected to end +one's life. An acquaintance of his had had a revolver sent him by his +commanding officer as a gentle hint, on finding himself involved in a +scandalous affair.</p> + +<p>In one Bavarian regiment, if you had debts, you were liable to be +summoned at literally a moment's notice before your Colonel, and ordered +to pay your debts in so many days, or leave the regiment. The usual +thing was then to obtain the hand in marriage of the most attractive +girl you knew with the most attractive bank-account. Sometimes they +disappeared to America. Frau Seebold told us once, while she was singing +in New York one winter, with an Austrian prima donna, that a man applied +at the door for work during a heavy fall of snow. She told him to clear +it away, and then come in for his money. He came, and noticing her +strong accent, asked if<a name="page_197" id="page_197"></a> she had long left the Fatherland. On her +replying "no," he burst into a flood of German, and told her his pitiful +story, while she made him hot coffee and tried to comfort him. He had +been a lieutenant in a smart regiment, had gotten into trouble through a +brother officer betraying his trust in him, and had had to disappear to +America for the honour of the regiment. The poor fellow put his head on +the kitchen table and sobbed as he told her how he sank lower and lower, +till finally he shovelled snow. He also told her there was a club in New +York where ex-officers who were coachmen, truck drivers, or waiters by +day, could be gentlemen and comrades by night. He said their crests were +carved above their places on the wall, and no one could belong except +those of high birth. All this was years ago, and I have no idea whether +such a place still exists.</p> + +<p>When a sudden silence falls on a party in Germany they say, "A +Lieutenant pays his debts." Promotion is very slow, and to arrive at a +decent income takes years. A Bavarian Colonel has only eight thousand +marks a year. The equipment of an officer is very expensive; their +Parade uniforms must always be spotless, and though you may wear tricot +cloth every day, your parade uniform must be of finest broadcloth, and +your sword knots of shining silver though a dash of rain ruins both. The +scarlet<a name="page_198" id="page_198"></a> collars are more extravagant even than the white cloth ones, as +white may be cleaned at least once with gasoline, but scarlet is too +delicate, and the slightest perspiration makes a lasting stain. This was +all before the war, though, and perhaps the dazzling uniforms have given +place for ever to dull khaki. If so Germany is the drabber, for the +colour was a thing to make one's heart leap. In Darmstadt the first four +rows in the orchestra were reserved for officers at reduced rates, and +that beautiful border of colour always framed the stage in a brilliant +band on opera nights.</p> + +<p>In Metz the rule against appearing in "Civil" on the street was very +strict, and F—— used to come to see us in a full set of tennis +flannels brandishing a racket, though he had never played in his life! +In Darmstadt the same strictness prevailed. A friend of ours, a Major +holding a very high position, had to dodge round corners, when he was +out of uniform, in case the terrible General Plueskow should see him, +and order him twenty-four hours' room arrest! By the way, when General +Plueskow, who was about six feet seven, was in France as a young man, +the French made a quip about him, "Who is the tallest officer in the +German army?" was the question, and the answer was "Plueskow, because he +is <i>Plus que haut</i>."<a name="page_199" id="page_199"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII" id="CHAPTER_XVIII"></a>CHAPTER XVIII</h3> + +<h4>GEESE AND GUESTS</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">I</span> WAS on the whole very happy in Darmstadt. All the leading contralto +work came to me by right, and it was brightened by an occasional rôle in +operetta. They found they could use me for smart ladies in such things +as "Dollar Prinzessin," and I greatly enjoyed the dancing and gaiety of +those performances. We had many operas in the repertoire that are seldom +or never heard of in this country, "Evangelimann," "Hans Heiling," +"Sieben Schwaben," all the Lortzings, "Undine," "Wildschuetz," "Zar und +Zimmermann," "Weisse Dame," etc. Such things as "Fra Diavolo," and +"Lustige Weiber," were always delightful to play.</p> + +<p>We gave "Koenigskinder" the first year it was brought out in Germany. +Our clever Kempin designed charming sets for it, lit in the modern way, +and the soprano, though a plain little thing, had a heavenly sympathetic +voice, with a floating quality most appealing in the high part. During +the <i>Première</i> at the end of the last act, just as we were<a name="page_200" id="page_200"></a> taking our +calls from an enthusiastic public, a strange bearded man stepped out of +the wings and joined us. Humperdinck, of course, whom I recognized in a +minute from his photos. He said nothing to any of us, and we often +speculated as to why he did not. He must have been pleased with the +production, or he would not have shown himself; indeed we heard he was +pleased, but no word was vouchsafed us.</p> + +<p>For our geese we had grey Pomeranian beauties and immense white birds +from Italy. The Italians, besides being bigger were more numerous; they +saw their opportunity to bully the Teutons within an inch of their +lives, and they took it. There was a tank of real water on the stage, in +which they loved to splash, but do you suppose a German goose was ever +allowed to go near it? Ominous hisses kept them away, and they hated +hissing as all actors do. The foreigners gobbled up all the food, before +the others could get it, and the only time that there was any unanimity +among them was when they were doing something they should not. One night +the largest Italian stepped into a depression near the footlights, +caught his foot, squawked loudly and passed on. The second largest +immediately followed suit; there were eleven of them, and they all in +turn caught a foot, squawked and waddled on, to the great delight<a name="page_201" id="page_201"></a> of +the audience. It was agonizing for us on the stage, waiting for each +squawk.</p> + +<p>Animals were always a trial to the performers, though considered to lend +a sure magnificence from the manager's point of view. We used to have a +pack of hounds in the first act finale of "Tannhäuser." They always +behaved beautifully and were allowed to run without leashes. One night, +however, our little round <i>Souffleuse</i>, as the prompter is called, named +"Bobberle" by the tenor as she was as broad as she was long, had taken +her bread and sausages into her tiny pen. The dogs suddenly winded this, +made a dive for the <i>Souffler Kasten</i> (prompter's box), scratched out +the package, devoured the contents and then politely left their cards on +the box; poor Bobberle in helpless rage prompting the while. Since that +night the dogs have been chained two and two.</p> + +<p>We often had famous guests. Edith Walker sang several times with us, and +Knote quite as often. Schumann-Heink, a great friend of the Grand Duke's +(she told me she would go through fire for him), sang <i>Azucena</i>. She had +always been my girlhood's idol, and my ideal of an artist, so I embraced +the opportunity to send her a wreath. They said she was much pleased by +the attention from a contralto! She used some of my <i>Schmink</i> to make up +with, and I proudly have the stubs to this day. She made us<a name="page_202" id="page_202"></a> all laugh +in rehearsal. When she says in the last act that they will find only a +skeleton when they come to drag her from her prison, she passed her +hands over her ample contours and emitted a spontaneous chuckle that was +irresistibly infectious. Bahr Mildenburg came to us also and revealed to +me what <i>Ortrud</i> might be. Especially in the first act is she +overwhelming. In playing the part later I always felt her influence, and +many things I do in that act were inspired by thoughts she gave me. +Watch most <i>Ortruds</i> in that scene. They simply stand in what they +consider mantled inscrutability, trying to portray evil in a heavy, +unsubtle manner; and then see Bahr Mildenburg, if you can. All the +really great people I have ever met are unpretentious and absolutely +charming to work with. Only the near-great seem to consider it necessary +to remind you all the time that they are other than you. The greater the +man the simpler his manner, I have always found, and I think many will +agree with me.</p> + +<p>There was an excellent store of men's costumes to call on; beautiful +embroidered coats and waistcoats from the eighteenth century, real +uniforms of many regiments of bygone days, and the best Wagnerian +barbaric stuff I have ever seen, with the exception of van Rooy's.</p> + +<p>One of the principal men singers was a tall dark<a name="page_203" id="page_203"></a> fellow, with a most +passionate disposition. We played together often and he fell very much +in love with me. One day when we were all together at a wood coffee +house, his wife asked him how he had broken his watch which she found +smashed on the floor one morning. He said he had dropped it while +reading the night before, but he told me he had been sitting thinking of +me long after his wife had retired, and suddenly saw his watch shattered +in a thousand pieces on the floor across the room, where he had hurled +it. He was devoted to his little son, a charming sunny little chap, with +the dark colouring of his mother.</p> + +<p>When I think of these good comrades of mine I cannot but wonder what the +war has done to them. The Hun element seemed to be in very few of them, +but I can remember it in one. This impossible person, frightfully +conceited, lacking absolutely in humour, annoyed and goaded me through +two long years with his boorish manners, low ideas of American life, +loudly expressed, and crass ignorance of all ideals of living. I came to +rehearsal one day and found the colleagues assembled in the green room +looking very grave over something. This man H—— said "Ah, here she +is!" Then he proceeded to hand round to every one a clipping, which +seemed to hurt and annoy them all. He would not show it to me,<a name="page_204" id="page_204"></a> +insinuating that I knew all about it. This I stood for an hour and a +half; finally I insisted on seeing the clipping which was from the +leading paper of a neighbouring city. The critic reviewed a <i>première</i> +we had just given, slating every one but myself, and saying that I +belonged on the world-stage. This had been sufficient grounds for my +persecutor to explain the bad criticisms of my other colleagues to them, +by telling them that I had an affair with this to me of course, utterly +unknown, unheard of critic. When I realized just what he meant, I saw +black, seized a property crook stick that lay on the table, and struck +him violently on the arm. I then came to, and rushed to the window to +cool off. He took the blow without a word, and when I finally turned +back from the window ready in a revulsion of feeling to tell him that I +was sorry to have hurt him, I found the others all smiling broadly, in +relief that I had cleared the matter up. Of course none of them had +believed for a second what he had tried to make them believe.</p> + +<p>We gave the whole of Goethe's "Faust" in four evenings. We had Lassens' +music and I sang two angels and an archangel, a sphinx and a siren +during the performances. The mechanical part of the production with its +flying witches, flying swings for <i>Faust</i> and the devil, traps, dark +changes, built-up effects reaching from the footlights to almost the top +of<a name="page_205" id="page_205"></a> the proscenium arch at the back of the stage, and a thousand and one +details were managed without a hitch.</p> + +<p>"Butterfly" we gave for the first time while I was there, and the Grand +Duke took a great interest in the performance. He sent down some +beautiful kimonos from his private collection for the <i>Butterfly</i> to +wear, but paid me the compliment of letting me get my own. I had +searched costumers and Japanese shops in vain, in London, Paris and +Berlin, for a plain coloured kimono such as servants wear, and finally +got one direct from Japan. The <i>Suzukis</i> I have always seen have been +attired like second editions of <i>Butterfly</i> not realizing in the least +the value of the contrast to them if they look like a real servant. I +have had letters from people who knew the East intimately, who have said +very flattering things about my portrayal of the manner of a Japanese, +after they have seen my performance, in company with real Japanese. +This, considering my height, has always pleased me immensely. If you can +feel in a vast audience that even one person knows, understands and +appreciates the study you have put upon a rôle to make it true to life, +you are rewarded for your pains.<a name="page_206" id="page_206"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XIX" id="CHAPTER_XIX"></a>CHAPTER XIX</h3> + +<h4>RUSSIANS, COMMON AND PREFERRED</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">T</span>HE Grand Duke was always very good to me. He liked talking English with +my sister and me, and always referred to the Germans as "they," never as +"we." He asked me to the palace one evening to dinner. We dined in a +room hung with portraits of his beautiful sisters. They looked like fair +angels, the portraits having been painted when both the Czarina of +Russia and her sisters were quite young girls. We were told by friends +that the Czarina used to be perfectly exquisite as a young woman, +usually gowned in pale grey with a huge bunch of violets. After dinner +we went up to the Grand Duke's own private music room where guests were +seldom invited. The piano was set high, on a hollow inlaid sounding box, +an idea of His Royal Highness's which improved the tone immensely. +Behind it on the wall was a life size painting of a Buddha-like female +figure. This was in creamy brown and gold, inlaid with chrysophrases, +and lit<a name="page_207" id="page_207"></a> mysteriously at will from either side, on top, or bottom. The +lighting he preferred, and which he told me he used when he played for +hours—he knew not what—was provided by four rings of glass, suspended +horizontally from the ceiling, through which a radiant sapphire light +poured. I don't know how it was managed, but it was very beautiful. In +one corner of the room was a grotto, also blue lit with a charming, +quiet, nude figure, and a fountain that drip-dripped as you listened.</p> + +<p>I sat down at the piano and played and sang all the negro melodies my +father had collected in the Bahamas years before. I think the guests +were rather bewildered by the swift pattering English, but the Grand +Duke and his cousin, the Princess Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein were +charmed with them. Princess Victoria and her mother, Princess Christian, +King Edward's sister, were afterwards good enough to be patronesses at +my first recital in London.</p> + +<p>The Grand Duke loved beautiful Oriental effects, and never seemed to me +to be in the least German. He came to a supper-dance once, given by a +Baronin O——, dressed as an oriental potentate of sorts. He kept the +several hundred guests, and the good dinner waiting over an hour, +because he insisted on making up the whole court himself. His wife wore +a wonderful headdress she made herself, copied from<a name="page_208" id="page_208"></a> the fresco in his +music room. It was all gold beads and emeralds. Round her neck was a +huge pear-shaped green stone. I was thinking of the chrysophrases I had +seen inset in the wall of the music room, and said: "What wonderful +chrysophrases, Your Royal Highness." "Not chrysophrases, emeralds," she +gently corrected me.</p> + +<p>The Baroness had engaged some people to entertain the Grand Duke at +supper, served in the huge new ball-room, but two days before the ball, +she telephoned she was in despair as the people had <i>abgesagt</i>, and she +could get no one else. Would I be so awfully kind as I was coming +anyway, to help her out? Every one in town knew all my intimate songs as +I had sung them at various functions where the court was invited, so +Marjorie and I had to put on our thinking caps to find a new "stunt." +Marjorie played the <i>Laute</i>, that big, graceful instrument so popular +with the love-sick girl in Germany, and I knew some old French songs +like "Claire de Lune," that I sang to her accompaniment. I went to the +theatre and borrowed the tenor's Pagliacci costume, whitened my face and +dressed Marjorie as a <i>Pierrette</i>. At a given signal I sprang from +between purple curtains, put my finger to my lips, turned and beckoned +to <i>Pierrette</i> and led her to the little stage the Baroness had built. +The songs went off very well, and the day<a name="page_209" id="page_209"></a> was saved. Later I changed to +a <i>Dalila</i> costume, and danced with the Grand Duke, dances he invented +as we went along, a favourite amusement of his. He always held his +partner to the side, with one arm about her waist, and I must say it was +very practical and comfortable. He danced beautifully and his favourite +partner was a tall Fräulein von B—— a friend of ours. Once returning +from a concert in a little town in the Bergstrasse where I had been +singing, and which had been attended by part of the court, this same +Hofdame and a famous violinist happened to be with us. We took +fourth-class tickets which entitle you to travel with the peasants in +large wooden box-cars, with benches running round the walls. We all +danced to the violinist's playing, while the peasants looked solemnly on +from their benches. I collected <i>pfennige</i> in a hat which the violinist +then put on his head, <i>pfennigs</i> and all. It was a lovely trip.</p> + +<p>We heard some of the formal court balls were most amusing. We never went +to them as we had not had ourselves presented formally, though this +could have been easily arranged. The supper usually consisted largely of +ham and spinach, typical of the German Royal simplicity. The dancing was +conducted under difficulties. Reversing was not allowed, and all the +dancers had to go in the same direction.<a name="page_210" id="page_210"></a> When the Grand Duke wished to +dance, his Chamberlain went in front of him to clear the way, as it was +always dreadfully crowded. The women were not permitted to pick up their +gowns, although trains were <i>de rigueur</i> and no short skirts allowed. As +nearly all the men are in uniform, including spurs, the ladies have to +make frequent trips to the dressing room to repair damages. And yet it +is fatal to wear an old gown, as the Grand Duke has a terrific memory +and will say: "Oh, that is the charming gown you wore at Kiel two years +ago, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>All the officers and their wives above the rank of Major must be invited +to the court balls, and, in a small principality like this, those of +lower rank receive invitations too. One Lieutenant, a member of one of +the oldest and poorest Darmstadt families, brought his bride to her +first court ball. She was pretty, but beneath him in social position, +and he had forgotten to tell her the rule about the trains. She lifted +her bridal finery out of the way of the devastating spurs, and was +politely requested by a messenger from Royalty to drop it again. Alas! +She forgot the warning and again switched her train up from the floor, +upon which the oldest <i>Ehrendame</i> (Maid of honour), requested her to +leave the dancing floor. The poor husband felt it so keenly that<a name="page_211" id="page_211"></a> he +asked to be transferred to a regiment in another town, and his request +was granted.</p> + +<p>They have a custom of choosing an <i>erster Taenzer</i> for every big ball. +He is usually one of the young officers of the highest birth, and his +duties are to assist the hostess in every possible way, and lead all the +dances.</p> + +<p>Court etiquette is really a most hampering institution. In talking to +the Grand Duke for instance, I might not introduce a topic, he had to +give all the leads. This naturally has a deadening effect on the +conversation. At first the tongue-paralyzing "Yes, Your Royal Highness," +"No, Your Royal Highness," even more paralyzing in German, "<i>Ja wohl, +Koenigliche Hoheit</i>," "<i>Nein, Koenigliche Hoheit</i>," had to be gone +through with, but after a few minutes' conversation I might follow the +simple English custom in talking with Royalty, and say "Yes, Sir," or +"No, Sir." When the Grand Duchess left a crowded ball-room it was +painful both for her and for us. As she advanced, modest and +self-conscious, one made a low <i>Knix</i>; to one lady she would give her +hand, always bristling with rings, and you had to kiss the back of it, +risking cutting your lip on the rings; to another merely a glance of the +eye, or a nod of the head, and so the slow, tortuous exit was made. In +the town on muddy days, you might come on the<a name="page_212" id="page_212"></a> Grand Duke suddenly in a +narrow street and you had to back up against the wall to let him pass, +at the same time dragging your best skirt in the dirt in the +knee-straining curtsey.</p> + +<p>I often thought how immensely popular would be the Prince or Grand Duke +or King, who would one day say, "Oh, stop it, all of you, and give me +your hands and your eyes like human beings." But <i>what</i> would the Kaiser +say?</p> + +<p>Before we went to Darmstadt the Grand Duke had had a tragedy from which +they said he had never recovered. His adored little daughter Elisabeth +was the idol of every one, and the town children's fairy princess. She +was asked to visit her aunt, the Czarina, at Petrograd. While there she +died very suddenly, though in perfect health when she left Darmstadt. +She is believed to have eaten some poisoned food prepared for the Czar's +own children. A monument to her in the <i>Herren Garten</i> at Darmstadt, +shows a glass coffin of the fairytale type; in it lies sleeping +"Snow-White," with the gnomes around her. Above, a weeping willow +brushes soft fingers over the sleeping princess.</p> + +<p>We had several <i>Backfisch</i> admirers; the English "Flapper" comes nearer +to translating this strange word than anything I know. These girls +followed us closely in the streets for a year and finally met us.<a name="page_213" id="page_213"></a> At +first my sister had her band and I had mine. Finally they dwindled to +just two, very sweet, charming young girls, of whom we became very fond. +Marjorie's was the daughter of a colonel, a count, who was very strict +and military with his delicate flower of a girl.</p> + +<p>As I have said, strange revealing glimpses of the Hun element came to us +now and then, the spirit which now seems to engulf all the better German +people. Two of our girl friends were daughters of a famous noble house. +Their father was a very old General who lived in great seclusion. His +pretty, fair daughters L—— and E——, were often at our house, and +were very fond of my mother who lived with us then. The old General +finally died, and the girls were worn and bent with grief from his long +illness and the trials of nursing him. Their brother was with his +regiment, and for some reason could not get to them in time to make +arrangements for the funeral. The girls were left badly off, and could +not afford a pretentious ceremony. When they tried to explain this to +the undertaker, he was incredulous, but finally said with a brutal +sneering laugh: "Of course you can have a <i>pauper's</i> funeral if you want +one." Everything was done in a way to make it all as hard as possible +for the poor girls by these brutes, and they used to come and tell us +with floods of tears<a name="page_214" id="page_214"></a> of the insults they had to swallow. At last the +brother arrived, and of course as soon as he appeared in <i>uniform</i> he +was bowed down to and served as only a uniform is served in Germany by +such brutal types.</p> + +<p>During the second year in October word came to us that the Czar of +Russia was coming to rest with his family at the Grand Duke's hunting +lodge, just outside Darmstadt. We were nervous at the thought of all the +Russian students who always throng the Technical School at Darmstadt. It +seemed such an easy thing to bomb a man in such a small quiet town. They +took great precautions, however, and nothing happened.</p> + +<p>I sang many times for the Czar, in "command performances" of <i>Dalila</i>, +etc. When he left he was good enough to send me a brooch "as a +remembrance of his wife." It is the Imperial crown, with sapphire eyes, +surrounded by a laurel wreath. He used to sit in a box nearest the stage +with the Grand Duke. In the next box were the little Grand Duchesses, +Olga, Tatiana and Marie, and sometimes Anastasia, the littlest one of +all. They would call in the intervals, "Papa, come in here; <i>do</i> Papa +dear." They always spoke English together. He would go to them and they +would climb all over him, petting him and playing with his hair. It was +rather charming to watch.<a name="page_215" id="page_215"></a></p> + +<p>Prince Henry of Prussia was there too, as these three, the Grand Duke, +Czar, and Prince Henry are, or were, fast friends. When they left the +theatre a curious crowd always gathered to see them, but we never had so +much as a glimpse of them, for five black, mysterious motors, closely +hooded, left in a procession, and no one ever knew which one the Czar +was in. The Czarina never came to the theatre; she was intensely nervous +just then, and went nowhere.</p> + +<p>The Czar was to leave Darmstadt on the Monday, and on Sunday we were to +sing "Meistersinger" for him. The day before I had felt frightfully ill, +and suffered as I had been doing for several weeks with pains in my +side. Sunday morning I sent for a doctor, the pain being so bad I was +afraid I would not be able to get through the performance that night. +The doctor in turn sent for the surgeon, who packed me off in an hour to +the hospital for an appendicitis operation. The next morning I was +operated upon, and they told me the Grand Duke had sent to ask how I +was, as the Czar wished to know if the operation was successful before +he left town. I thought it showed a charming, kindly thoughtfulness of +others.</p> + +<p>The nurses were all most kind to me in the hospital, but the surgeon was +utterly uninterested in anything but the healing of the wound itself, +and paid absolutely<a name="page_216" id="page_216"></a> no attention to the other rather distressing +occurrences of my illness. One could see that a highly strung, nervous +American woman would have fared badly with him.</p> + +<p>Sazonoff was with the Czar's suite, and I remember the Darmstadtites +were much insulted because he always took the train to Frankfurt half an +hour away, or to Wiesbaden (one hour), for luncheon or dinner, as he +said there was nothing fit to eat at the local hotels. I secretly quite +agreed with him.</p> + +<p>We often went ourselves to Frankfurt for tea, or a wild American craving +would come over me for lobster or chicken salad, and we would up and +away to Wiesbaden for supper. Darmstadt was very conveniently situated +for short trips, surrounded as it is by interesting towns—Heidelberg +only a short distance south of us, or Mannheim close enough for a day's +visit. I sang <i>Niklaus</i> in "Hoffmann" in Mannheim for the first time +without a rehearsal, having learnt the part in my room at the piano +without a Kapellmeister to give me the <i>tempi</i>, and never having seen +the opera. That was a trying experience, not helped by the tenor +knocking me flat down in the Venetian scene as I rushed on to tell him +that the watch was coming. He weighed about two hundred and fifty +pounds, and colliding with him in midcareer,<a name="page_217" id="page_217"></a> I gave him right of way by +going down flat on my back.</p> + +<p>At Frankfurt we heard a wonderful performance of "Elektra" with Richard +Strauss conducting and Bahr-Mildenburg as <i>Klytemnestra</i>. I shall never +forget her in it, nor the orchestral effects Strauss produced. I felt at +the end as if I had been watching an insane woman, so marvellous was +Bahr-Mildenburg's portrayal of the half-demented creature. Her large +face, pale, with haunting, sick eyes, her scarlet, gold-embroidered +draperies, the clutching, bony fingers on her jewelled staff, the +swaying body she seemed barely able to keep erect, the psychology of the +queen's character, all this together combined to give the exact effect +she wanted, and to convey it strongly and clearly to the farthest seat +in the big theatre.</p> + +<p>We grew to know very well a Russian boy, whose family had interests in +Darmstadt. He told us much of Russia and he and his sister seemed +creatures of a different world to us. She was frail and exotic looking, +with very curly, bronze hair, a skin like a gardenia petal, and the +tiniest full-lipped, blood-red mouth I have ever seen. At home she spent +most of her time in the saddle or in the stables. She had men's uniforms +made, and rode out with the officers dressed as they were. They could +both drink enormous<a name="page_218" id="page_218"></a> quantities of <i>Bowle</i> and follow it up with +champagne and Swedish punch, and never even flush pink. Only S—— used +to become very talkative and spout Greek verses by the hour. At that +time we lived in a pension, and every Saturday night or after a big +performance of mine, say "Carmen," he would arrange an elaborate fête. +Sometimes we all had to appear dressed as Romans in sheets and wreaths, +before he was satisfied. One night I remember I grew tired of our all +being so monotonously beautiful, and came down dressed as a Suffragette, +with the false nose I wear as the <i>Witch</i> in "Haensel und Gretel," +flowing grey locks, spectacles, and some ridiculous costume, half Greek +and half witch. S—— was so horrified that he never once looked at me +during the evening and I finally saw that he was so genuinely unhappy +that I changed to something more esthetic.</p> + +<p>He had as much spending money apparently as he desired, but his sister +never had a cent. She had no evening gown and only shabby clothes. She +seemed blissfully unaware of any shortcomings of her wardrobe, however, +and only once felt the lack of a party dress. We arranged something for +her that time, as she had no money to spend, and her brother did not +seem to think it necessary to give her any. After a particularly +successful fête, S—— would wander the deserted streets and kneel +before<a name="page_219" id="page_219"></a> fountains in the public squares, dipping water from them with +his derby hat, and pouring it on the earth as libations to Pallas +Athene, as he always called me. And he was not in the least drunk, if +you will believe me, only fearfully Russian.</p> + +<p>When they left the pension their luggage at the station consisted of a +pile of shabby hand-baggage, mostly newspaper parcels. The girl had no +purse but a soldier's little coin case of goatskin, so Frau von A—— +emptied her own bag, and stuffed L——'s possessions into it. Their +indifference to all these things which would all have been regulated and +in keeping with their position if they had belonged to any other country +than Russia, I believe was quite typical and seemed to me rather +sublime.</p> + +<p>S—— afterwards made a trip round the world. Goodness knows how he +found out whether I was singing or not, but some night after singing one +of my big rôles I would receive a monstrous basket of red roses, or an +armful of orchids, cabled for from Honolulu or China. He even remembered +my <i>Dachshund's</i> birthday, and cabled the baker to send Peter a +wonderful <i>Torte</i> with birthday candles.<a name="page_220" id="page_220"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XX" id="CHAPTER_XX"></a>CHAPTER XX</h3> + +<h4>THE GRANDMOTHERS' BALLET</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">A</span>LL this time I was working very hard at the opera. Our repertoire was +very large, including nearly all the Italian operas, from Verdi to +Wolf-Ferrari, and the German operas from the time of Weber and Mozart up +to Humperdinck. Everything was given in German, some of the translations +good and some poor. At first it had seemed terribly difficult to +accustom myself to the German sounds in <i>Dalila</i> or <i>Carmen,</i> after the +sonorous French, but latterly German came to seem quite as natural, +though never so beautiful nor singable. Every one in the audience, +however, understood the text, and surely this is the important thing. +How can they enter into the spirit of an opera when they are guessing +whether that is a love phrase or an insult that the tenor is singing? +The prejudice against translating into the vernacular has had to be +overcome in nearly all European countries and will, I suppose, be only a +question of time with us. In Russia, operatic composers flowered and +reached their world<a name="page_221" id="page_221"></a> prominence only after the Russian language was used +for the libretto. In Germany Italian was discarded for the language of +the singers only after a long struggle, but the great abundance of +German operas came after it was adopted, not before. In France also +Italian libretti were used for generations, but can any one imagine a +Debussy composing a "Pelléas et Mélisande" to an Italian libretto? Each +school must find itself in its own tongue, and I question whether these +matters can be hurried.</p> + +<p>I have always thought a good English translation would contribute more +to the general pleasure of the audience than a misunderstood gabble of +words, even though English is perhaps lacking in the subtle charm worked +upon us by foreign speech.</p> + +<p>My colleagues by this time accepted me almost as a German, and I did the +routine work as though I were a German. Surely this experience is more +profitable than an occasional appearance on a more famous stage, such as +many of my own country-women aimed at. I often heard of their struggles +against intrigue, and long pauses between rôles, while they waited +hoping for a chance. We all worked steadily through the season and +rehearsed every day. The scheme of rehearsals was worked out and given +to us every two weeks on a printed <i>Spielplan</i>. This showed us exactly +which operas and plays were<a name="page_222" id="page_222"></a> scheduled for the next fortnight, and all +the rehearsals we should have to attend, beginning with the room +rehearsals for the soloists alone, then the stage rehearsals without +chorus, the stage rehearsal with chorus and piano, and finally the +<i>General Probe</i>, or last orchestra rehearsal on the stage, with +everything as at a performance. At the side of the <i>Spielplan</i> was a +tentative list of works in preparation with their probable dates of +appearance. All this made the work very systematic, and I knew exactly +what time I should have for study and what for myself. If a rare week +passed without my singing at least once I grew restless and unhappy. My +constant aim was to learn and develop, and every rôle taught me +something. Versatility is a most useful attribute on the operatic stage, +and if you play all the way from <i>Fides</i> to soubrette parts in operetta, +and the audience sticks to you, you may be considered fairly versatile.</p> + +<p>I remember one strenuous week in particular. I had to sing <i>Dalila</i> in +Prague on Wednesday evening. "Zauberfloete" was scheduled for Tuesday in +Darmstadt, and by taking a late train I could arrive in Prague in time +to dress for <i>Dalila</i>. I had to sing the last bit of the <i>Third Lady</i> in +"Zauberfloete" in travelling dress with a black cloak thrown over me and +then rush straight to the train. We travelled all night, changing at +Dresden in the middle of the<a name="page_223" id="page_223"></a> night, and waiting at the noisy station +for some time. Arrived at Prague I went straight to the theatre, the old +one with gas lamps for footlights. "Don Giovanni" of Mozart was given +for the first time in this very theatre they told me, and was, I +believe, directed by Mozart himself. I duly sang my <i>Dalila</i> and sped +back to Darmstadt, where I had to sing <i>Frau Reich</i> Thursday night; and +this tiring lady has to have a certain lightness of touch no matter how +much train smoke you have swallowed. My troubles were not over yet as I +had to take the train that night for Edinboro, Scotland, where I was to +appear with the orchestra, and on the following night in Glasgow. The +journey was long and tedious, and the only bright spot I can remember +was while we crossed a bit of Belgium. We had had a lunch basket handed +in with the typical bottle of <i>vin rouge</i>, and neither Marjorie nor I +wanted it. The next time our train slowed down we happened to have an +engine beside us, and I handed the wine through the window to the +driver, who received it with true Belgian imperturbability.</p> + +<p>I was very tired and very sick crossing the channel. We arrived in +London in a terrible storm, feeling absolutely exhausted. Marjorie said, +"The only thing that hasn't happened is, that we have not yet lost our +baggage." We waited on the cold platform—it was November,—till all the +luggage had been<a name="page_224" id="page_224"></a> taken out of the vans—no familiar trunks for us. I +went worn out to the hotel, leaving poor Marjorie to struggle. She made +the round of the stations where possible trains from the coast might be +met—all of no avail. The next day was Sunday and we could not possibly +have found a gown for me to use at the concert. We slept that night in +towels and underclothes, and if you've ever done it you know what sort +of an all-night funeral <i>that</i> is. The next morning early the missing +trunks were found and we continued our journey. We were much amused when +we found that no trains left for Scotland during the day on Sunday, and +that they had to wait for the friendly cover of the night before they +dared nefariously to slip out and break the Sabbath calm. Monday night I +almost broke down on the platform during the concert, in one of the +hugest halls in the world. Marjorie comforted me and sent for some +whiskey which I gulped down between songs. Gradually the chilled blood +in me thawed, and my voice with it, my nerve came back and I scored a +success, as I did the following night in Glasgow. We then went back to +Darmstadt the quickest possible way, having been in six countries in as +many days.</p> + +<p>We walked a great deal in the beautiful country round Darmstadt, and I +sometimes rode over the miles <a name="page_225" id="page_225"></a>of charming bridle paths. We made +expeditions into the beautiful Taunus country, all gold and scarlet in +autumn. The delightful custom of having <i>Wald Haeuse</i> at convenient +distances in every direction round the city, makes these expeditions a +great pleasure. The coffee is usually good, and the cakes always so.</p> + +<p>Darmstadt is on the Bergstrasse, almost a highway through that part of +Germany, and we were pestered one year with a constant stream of +beggars. They were usually ex-theatre people they said, and I found they +only came to me and not to my colleagues, so word must have been passed +round that an "easy" and extremely rich American lived in the town, who +was good for at least a mark.</p> + +<p>The strangest stories circulated about us, and why we should choose +Germany to live in. One was that I was the illegitimate daughter of King +Edward, therefore a cousin of the Grand Duke, which explained a likeness +to him which I could see myself. They said my sister and mother were +really no relation to me, but simply paid to take care of me.</p> + +<p>As I have said we had several picturesque privileges because I was a +<i>Grossherzogliche Beamtin</i>—an employée of the Royal house. I used to go +on certain days to the old Schloss near the theatre, no longer the +residence of the reigning family as it was too old to be comfortable. I +passed under shadowy arches<a name="page_226" id="page_226"></a> and through cobblestone courts, surrounded +by aged windows, till I came to where the <i>Schloss Kellermann</i> lived. I +went down a steep old stone stair into the bowels of the earth, where I +was greeted by the Head Cellarman, who wore a white apron and took +orders at a candle-lit table. I told him just how much Rotwein I wanted, +or perhaps a bottle of champagne for a treat, and paid a ridiculously +small sum for it all. The Grand Duke got it duty free and at special +rates, and we, as his employés were entitled to this rate too. For a +small fee two large flunkies in <i>Grossherzogliche</i> uniforms would +deliver it to my apartment later in the day. I believe the cellars were +very wonderful, but I never was asked to investigate.</p> + +<p>I think only the principals had this privilege, neither the chorus nor +the ballet sharing it, but I may be mistaken.</p> + +<p>Our ballet was rather pitiful. Kind-hearted directors hesitated to +dismiss faithful servants of years' standing, and the result was a +phalanx of grandmothers at the back of the stage. I used to give my old +clothes to the chorus and ballet women, and one family in particular I +almost adopted. The poor mother was a handsome creature of about +forty-five. Her eldest son was twenty-four and a carpenter, and two +babies were born while I was in Darmstadt. Children of all ages came in +between. The father drank<a name="page_227" id="page_227"></a> and used to ill-treat the mother, who had to +dance gaily as a peasant boy or gypsy, and then go home to all that +misery. Little by little I told the officers' wives I knew about these +things and they were very kind about sending their worn clothing to me +to distribute amongst the women. I believe it amused them very much to +see their old evening gowns washed, always washed, and refurbished, +doing duty as "Empire" gowns, or as the latest thing in Paris creations +on the backs of the walk-on ladies in the French comedies. Eighty marks +a month is not much, even if it is paid all the year round, and somebody +has got to help.</p> + +<p>We had a school of forestry in the town, largely attended by American +boys. It was in the period when our Western boys padded their shoulders +tremendously and wore hump-toed boots. These boys were all husky +specimens, who dressed in the most foresty of forest clothes, boots +laced to the knee, wide western hats and flannel shirts. The woods round +Darmstadt are all most tame and well looked after, but the boys seemed +to think they were dressing the part correctly. When left to themselves +these boys were quite well behaved, but the German students tried to +bully them. The beer-drinking type of student, with his ridiculous +little coloured cap stuck on one side of his head, thinks he owns his +own particular<a name="page_228" id="page_228"></a> café where his <i>Stamm-Tisch</i> may happen to be. They +objected to various mannerisms of the American boys who visited these +cafés, and the American boys replied in their own western way by +knocking the Germans down. This method of fist fighting was quite +unknown to the Germans, who replied by sending a challenge to duel +according to their custom. The American boys in turn knew nothing of +duelling and refused to fight except with fists. I think a good many fat +Germans bit the dust and got up swearing vengeance. Finally, we heard, +the American boys wired to their fellow countrymen who were students in +Frankfort, "Come over tonight and clean up." Exactly what happened we +never heard, but as both sides grew to understand and respect each other +more, the trouble gradually subsided. The Russian element, usually +rather undesirable in Darmstadt, contributed largely to the +disturbances.</p> + +<p>There were several duelling corps in town, and an American friend of +ours, a student at the technical college, told us of witnessing their +extremely bloody combats. Part of the glory is to have yourself sewed up +without an anesthetic, and go on fighting, and we heard sickening +details. It is supposed to make your nerve tremendously steady, and the +ones who go through the stated number of duels, fighting their way +slowly through a regular course of progression, always<a name="page_229" id="page_229"></a> the winner, must +indeed be shock and disgust proof. The authorities frowned on the +practice but it existed in force nevertheless. One boy killed another +while we were there; he was imprisoned, but on his return was treated as +a conquering hero by the members of his corps. That surely belongs to +Hun training.<a name="page_230" id="page_230"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XXI" id="CHAPTER_XXI"></a>CHAPTER XXI</h3> + +<h4>STAGE FASHIONS AND THE GLORY OF COLOUR</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">W</span>E played continuously nine months from September to June, and then +scattered for the holidays. I often went to Munich for the Wagnerian +<i>Festspiel</i>. We have many German relatives (though not a drop of German +blood), as three of my grandfather's sisters married German officers. +Through remote ancestors we also have dozens of cousins in the north of +Germany. The Munich relations I dearly loved. The son of the famous +court architect, von Klenze, who built nearly all the noble buildings in +Munich for the old King Ludwig of Bavaria, who abdicated his +throne—married my mother's aunt, and their descendants were always very +charming to me. The northern cousins who lived in East and North Prussia +we always heard were quite different, cold, critical, and not warm, and +artistic, and friendly, as I found our southern relations. In Darmstadt +they seem between the two peoples in character, and of course in the +theatre one meets all sorts.<a name="page_231" id="page_231"></a></p> + +<p>Our <i>Souffleuse</i>, "Bobberle," was from Schwabia, and her sister was a +character. She proved her elegance by wearing the most brilliant colours +on her fat little body, and plastering the family jewelry all over +herself. She screamed remarks about the members of the company to her +friends between the acts, and the remarks were not as undiscerning as +you might think.</p> + +<p>The top box on the right side of the house, was reserved for the humble +hangers-on of the <i>Personal</i>. My sister used often to sit up there as +she could just walk in without my having to ask for a seat, while my +mother sat in state in a specially reserved seat in the orchestra, for +which I had to ask each time. The oldest mothers and the <i>Souffleuse's</i> +sister used to be an unending joy to my sister, in their comments. The +order of their seats was theirs by divine right, they thought, and woe +betide some comparatively new-comer who would venture to take one-eyed +Frau S——'s or fat Frau W——'s chair. It was called the <i>Raben's +Nest</i> (the raven's nest), and we felt its influence hanging over us on +the stage. I was quite familiar with the remarks that were made nightly:</p> + +<p>"<i>Ach! unsere Kaethe spielt ja Heute!</i>" ("Oh! our little Katy plays +tonight"), the mother of Katy would announce rapturously, and settle +down with her chin on the rail, and her back bent like a <a name="page_232" id="page_232"></a>jack-knife, +for three hours of proud but critical joy. She had probably toiled most +of the night with her little seamstress to turn out the marvels Kaethe +wore.</p> + +<p>There are certain props that lend an unfailing air of gorgeousness to +the provincial German mind, whether viewed from in front of, or behind +the footlights. An aigrette does duty for years and has a sure-fire +elegance; pinned on a winter hat of black velvet, or a summer leghorn, +or worn with a bow in an evening coiffure, you know its wearer belongs +to the most exclusive social set. Our coiffeur had only one eye, but +used to bring that one as close as possible to the head of her victim +and make it do duty for two. She turned out wonderful puffs and curls. +In "Dollar Prinzessin" I introduced a new style of hair dressing from +Paris: the hair parted, and a multitude of close curls at the back of +the head, the whole surrounded by a rather broad band of ribbon of the +shade one desired. This took Darmstadt by storm, and was repeated for +two years in every conceivable version. The curls I am sorry to say, +turned into tight sausages, but how much more <i>praktisch</i>! Couldn't the +curls then be worn at least three times without being re-dressed?</p> + +<p>A lorgnon is of course "Hoch elegant," also quite irresistibly snorty, +if you are playing an elderly Duchess type of person. If you read that +tunics<a name="page_233" id="page_233"></a> are worn in Paris you put them on all your gowns, though they +may be hideously unbecoming to you. Even the time-honoured +hat-on-the-back-of-the-head outline had to be renounced one season, and +every one peered out at you from a hat or toque brim almost down on the +bridge of the nose in front, and cocked up in the back. Unbecoming—it +was admitted—, but "man" did it in Paris and should Darmstadt lag +behind?</p> + +<p>The problem of clothes for the actress is a terrific one, and I think +almost every one in town knows and makes allowances for this. The men go +further astray in the quest of fashion, or perhaps it is that the +slightest lapse from rigid formality is so noticeable in their dress of +today. In Metz dickeys, or small false fronts, were worn as a matter of +course in the place of evening shirts. If you were long and the dickey +was short you stuck a jaunty, flaming silk handkerchief in your vest in +front, to hide dangerous glimpses of Jaegers. And then why stick +slavishly to the bow tie of white cotton? A black or scarlet string tie +was distinctly more novel, and attracted attention at once if worn with +an otherwise conventional evening coat.</p> + +<p>In Darmstadt the men knew better, but some of them tried to ape the +officers in walk, monocle, or hair brushing, to the huge delight of the +officers. One<a name="page_234" id="page_234"></a> clever actor always made his greatest climax by suddenly +throwing back his coat edge as he finished a "There, what do you say to +that?" speech, and so revealing the gorgeous black satin lining. This of +course was unanswerable, and never failed of its effect. You knew at +once you had a man of the world before you, a man familiar with the most +exclusive club life, valeted, perfumed and manicured irreproachably, and +you succumbed accordingly.</p> + +<p>The Grand Duke would sit, lynx-eyed, up in his box, and take this all +in. I always felt he never missed anything, and it was inspiring to play +to him. When his box was empty I always missed this scrutiny.</p> + +<p>Sometimes one gets messages that well-known people have been out in +front, and this knowledge, and the thought that some wandering +<i>Intendant</i> in search of talent may be watching you, always spurs you on +if you are tired. Once a famous Dutch painter saw me as <i>Amneris</i>. He +was of course quite unknown to me, but sent me word later to say what +pleasure I had given him by recreating in his mind the Egyptian +silhouettes and colouring he loved. I had striven so hard to do this, it +was a great pleasure to know that I had succeeded in suggesting it.</p> + +<p>A dear old gentleman in town, who had travelled much, sent me many +postcards from Spain, because my <i>Carmen</i> brought back to him his happy +days<a name="page_235" id="page_235"></a> there. He sent me a real Russian "Order" for my <i>Orlofsky</i> in +"Fledermaus," which I always afterwards wore with that gentleman's +severe court dress. Laurel wreaths and wreaths of heavy silvered leaves +were sent to me, with gold lettered inscriptions, and I kept them for +ages in my music room.</p> + +<p>During the last winter in Darmstadt I went up to Berlin to give a +try-out recital. It was managed by the great Wolf Bureau, and my friend +Mr. Fernow at once took an interest in me, which continued as long as I +was in Germany. I heard of Coenraad von Bos, and wanted to have him play +for me. We rehearsed the day before the concert, and I soon found I had +made another real friend in Bos. He said afterwards, when he was told I +wanted just one rehearsal for a Berlin recital, he thought to himself I +must be either very bad or very good. The truth was I could not get a +longer leave of absence from the opera and so more than one rehearsal +was impossible. I have always adored rehearsing, especially for a +concert, with such an artist as Bos to play for me, and one of the +greatest joys of my life was preparing a program with Erich Wolf for a +later Berlin recital. To go back to my concert—Bos worked very hard +that evening to make it a success, calling up all of his musical friends +to tell them of his new find. It <i>was</i> a great success and I have never +read such notices as<a name="page_236" id="page_236"></a> I received from all the papers. They told me no +foreigner had ever had such unanimous and extraordinary praise for a +first recital, and Papa Fernow kissed me in the green room.</p> + +<p>I should have immediately followed up that concert with two or three +more, but I was obliged to return to my duties, and so lost the +opportunity of reaping the reward of an unusual beginning.</p> + +<p>They wanted me to sign on in Darmstadt, but I felt that I had sung the +repertoire faithfully for three years, and that I wanted more worlds to +conquer, and a bigger town to criticize my work.</p> + +<p>I went to Munich to sing for Baron S——, who liked me and offered me a +contract, depending on the outcome of two <i>Gastspiele</i>, or guest +performances, to be absolved the following October, my contract then to +go into effect.</p> + +<p>My farewell in Darmstadt was "Carmen" and the people <i>were</i> good to me. +After the last curtain I left the stage for a minute, and when I came +back to take my calls the stage was filled from side to side with +flowers; they were banked and grouped all round me. The curtain then +went up and down innumerable times, till I felt like weeping at leaving +all these kind friends. For some reason my cab did not come for me and +when I left the theatre the crowd waiting at the stage door followed me +home, calling<a name="page_237" id="page_237"></a> out "Come back soon," "Auf Wiedersehen," and many kind +things. These are not perhaps great triumphs, but they make an artist's +life very happy, and the life I led for those three years, comes very +near being the ideal one for an opera singer.</p> + +<p>I think it was two years before this, on returning to Paris, that I took +part in Strauss' "Salome." We gave six performances at the Châtelet. I +took the page's small part, just for the fun of it, and so as to study +the opera. The stage manager was a German of course, and spoke very +little French. The singers were all Germans, and the "figurants," +supers, all French. Things did not go well at rehearsals. Burrian, as +the King would cry for wine or grapes, and no one moved to get what he +wished, as no one understood what he was saying, and so could not get +the musical cue. I was the only person able to speak the two languages +fluently, and finally the stage manager asked me to take charge of all +the business on my side of the stage. "<i>Suivez Madame!</i>" he would yell. +So I said "Remove throne." "Bring golden vessels." "Clear stage," etc., +to the intelligent crowd of supers, many of whom were young actors, who +wanted as I did to study the opera. I remember one hideous little girl, +who had an unattractive sore lip. Some one told her that it did not +matter much, trying to comfort her, as she seemed so depressed about +it,<a name="page_238" id="page_238"></a> but she was inconsolable, and replied darkly, "it was always seven +days lost." This brave effort to create the impression of an otherwise +lurid existence deceived no one however, though they were too polite to +show their doubt.</p> + +<p>Destinn's voice rose thrillingly in the love phrases that <i>Salome</i> pours +at <i>John</i>; and though she wore a costume that my young French friends +considered consisted chiefly of <i>chats enragés</i>,—mad cats,—as it had +two huge animal heads of gold, where such types of stage villainesses +are always heavily protected, the tense quality of her voice, and the +simple strength of her acting suited the character as Strauss had +painted it with his music, and she achieved results that no other singer +I know of could have done.</p> + +<p>I had gone back as usual to de Reszke to have my voice put in order, and +was having, at the same time, my taste put in order by my sculptor +brother Cecil, in our walks and talks about Paris and its museums. My +brother's wonderfully clear vision of art and beauty is never clouded, +and I owe much to my association with him. We used to go to all the +Salons, and I remember vividly the first time we stumbled on a specimen +of the modern Spanish school, then quite new to us. We had looked at +dreary wastes of raspberry jam Venuses, resting on the crests of most +solid waves, dozens of canvases still in the Louis XVI<a name="page_239" id="page_239"></a> era, and much +pastel-coloured mediocrity, when suddenly I called out "Look, Cec, +something new!" It was a big square of flaming colour—women and a child +in red checked cotton, picking scarlet tomatoes from high-trained vines, +in the brilliant sun. It glowed and fairly zizzed with colour, and had +that radiating, vibrating quality that things have in the hot sunshine. +We had had the "confetti" and "spot" types of work for some years, but +this canvas dwarfed anything modern I had seen in Paris. We have never +found another one by the same man, and have often wondered what became +of his work.</p> + +<p>I think that was when I first fell in love with colour <i>per se</i>, though +I had flirted with it before. We had loved Monet and the opalescent, +shimmering lights in his water-garden series, but never had I been so +stirred and thrilled by mere paint on canvas as I was by this Spaniard's +work. It seems that a man only rarely can put colours together that will +have the living dazzling look that one sees in nature. Matisse was a +past master of it, and even though one might not agree with him +otherwise, his colour was a joy.</p> + +<p>Later the Cubists and Futurists invaded Paris. When I am with Cecil and +he talks to me of their work, I see their aims quite clearly, and +understand what they are trying to express, for their "line of talk" is<a name="page_240" id="page_240"></a> +much more lucid than their work: but when I am not with my brother I +must confess my understanding is dimmed, and I forget the arguments he +used.</p> + +<p>We lived very simply in Paris, having our meals sometimes at the +<i>quartier</i> restaurants, and sometimes getting <i>filets</i> of fresh +mushrooms, peas, and delicious Paris potatoes, with big strawberries +shaped like little whisk-brooms, and <i>crême d' Isigny</i> in its stubby +little earthen pots, and preparing them at home. I had a small apartment +in the same house as my mother, and my brother had his studio some +blocks from us.</p> + +<p>We met Spaniards, Norwegians, French, anything but Americans, of whom we +knew but few—we learnt so much more through talking with people of +other nationalities than our own. Paris is such a marvellous place for +development. As my brother said, he never knew when some one whose +opinion he must respect might not drop into the studio, and give his +work a searching inspection. The atmosphere of having to keep constantly +at your very best because of the rigid intellectual criticism you +encounter at every turn, is most stimulating.</p> + +<p>Rembrandt Bugatti was a great friend of my brother's, of whom I think he +was really fond, and this was a priceless association for a young +student. Bugatti was a genius, unrivalled by any other man of his age, +and very few of any other age, and his tragic<a name="page_241" id="page_241"></a> death is a great loss to +the art world. His growing deafness and his acute sensitiveness must +have made life impossible for him. His recollection of the happy years +spent in Antwerp, when he and my brother were well-known figures +there—wearing long, swinging, dark blue, Italian cavalry capes, smoking +eternal pipes and working all day in the open air in the Zoo—compared +to what the Germans have made of Belgium, proved too great a spiritual +burden for him.<a name="page_242" id="page_242"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XXII" id="CHAPTER_XXII"></a>CHAPTER XXII</h3> + +<h4>ROYAL HUMOUR</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">D</span>URING that summer Baron S—— died in Munich. This of course was a +great blow to me and I did not know what I could do about my contract. I +went to Berlin to see Herr Harder, who told me I must <i>gastieren</i> +according to contract in October, but as the new <i>Intendant</i> was not to +come into office till November, no one could really engage me, +especially as a very exacting new musical director was coming from +Vienna later in the season, and they would both undoubtedly want to +choose their own first contralto.</p> + +<p>However, I went and sang under trying circumstances, with a very sore +throat and a sinking heart. The colleagues thought I would be engaged, +but I did not see who was to do it, and as it turned out I was +right—and there <i>was</i> no one to do it. This depressed me extremely, but +I resolved to return to Berlin, and devote the year to following up my +previous recital. As a matter of fact, this apparent blow turned out to +be all for the best, as so often<a name="page_243" id="page_243"></a> happens, for otherwise I should have +been caught in Germany at the beginning of the war, and my career upset, +which happened to several other girls.</p> + +<p>The concert field is a rich one in Europe and I had made a good +beginning. I booked a tour in Holland, through the kindly offices of +Bos, where I was as well received as I had been in Berlin. The critics +wrote such eulogies that I almost blush to read them. People quite +unknown to me would go from town to town to hear me, and I would see +them at Rotterdam or Utrecht smiling up at me. I have never sung to such +adorable audiences. They seem to understand all languages, and a "Claire +de Lune" sung in French seems to please them as much as Schubert's +magnificent "Allmacht."</p> + +<p>The "coffee pause" half way down the program, was quite a shock to me +the first night, but I soon grew to look for it, and enjoyed the smell +of the strong smoking coffee the waiters used to carry round on trays to +the audience. It was rather disturbing, however, to have to watch the +waiters finish up the contents of the pots, at the back of the hall, +while I began on the second half of the program. Evidently to them the +coffee, and the audience, were of first importance, and the mere singer +quite secondary; all of which is point of view.</p> + +<p>My sister and I lived at The Hague, and Holland<a name="page_244" id="page_244"></a> is so delightfully +small that we could nearly always return there, after the evening's +concert in another town. I went back in the spring for another series of +recitals and felt that I was returning to old friends. I was offered a +tour to Java, and would love to have undertaken it, but could not see my +way clear just then.</p> + +<p>In December I was in Berlin for a week or two, and Harder sent me word +to come and sing for Mr. Percy Pitt of Covent Garden. The two contracts +I had held so far had been closed with a minimum of delay and trouble, +and now I was to make the biggest one of my career in the same simple +way. I was not in the best of voice when I sang for Mr. Pitt, but I sang +the Siegfried <i>Erda</i>, and was disgusted with myself for singing so +badly. He asked me if I were ready to sing the list of leading rôles +which he read to me, and on my answering in the affirmative engaged me +on the spot; proving, to me at least, that successful or unsuccessful +<i>Vorsingen</i> and even <i>Gastspiele</i> have very little to do with most +engagements. In the case of a singer of any reputation at all, the +Director has usually made up his mind pretty well beforehand what he is +going to do. If he wants you he takes you, even if you have sung badly +that particular time, and if he does not want you, nothing that I have +heard of can make him engage you.<a name="page_245" id="page_245"></a></p> + +<p>This contract was for the following spring. We were to give the "Ring" +of Wagner, three times, and Arthur Nikisch was to conduct. Also +"Koenigskinder" was to be given for the first time at Covent Garden, and +I was one of the few who had sung the <i>Witch</i> at that time. "The Flying +Dutchman" completed the list of operas I was to sing in.</p> + +<p>After closing the contract we left for Bergen, Norway, where I had a +concert engagement. One great advantage of having my dear friends, the +Jones, back of me, was, that I could take a big journey like this; and +though it might eat up all of my profit I did not have to refuse it on +that account.</p> + +<p>We were fascinated by Scandinavia, and though I went to sing with the +orchestra in one concert only, I remained in Bergen to give three +recitals by myself. The trip across the Finse railway, over the snowy +glaciers, I shall never forget. The line had only recently been opened, +and very few passengers shared the trip with us. We saw a herd of +reindeer, and I fed some of them with coarse salt at one of the +stations. Bergen itself was warm and muggy and smelt of fish. Everything +in the place smelt of fish, even the hotel towels. Two kindly women +managers took charge of my concerts, and I felt far away from America +till I saw a portrait of Miss Emma Thursby in their music shop.<a name="page_246" id="page_246"></a></p> + +<p>The warm-hearted Norwegians were delightful to us, and we met many of +Grieg's relations, and heard tales of him. One of his cousins, I think, +came all the way to Berlin to study with me, but to my great regret I +had no time to give her.</p> + +<p>I was interviewed on my first day by a nice little fellow, who could +hardly speak German, and no English nor French. Our conversation was +conducted under difficulties, but was most enjoyable none the less. The +next day I received a request for a photo from him, with a card saying: +"<i>Seit ich Ihnen sah bin ich sterblich verliebt.</i>"—This bad German +means approximately, "Since I saw you I am mortally in love."</p> + +<p>We loved our stay in Scandinavia. I remember when we first arrived in +Christiania we could not make out why the streets were thronged with +good looking men and women, from two o'clock till three in the +afternoon, and quite empty after that. We walked through the snowy, +glittering avenues, and met all these healthy red-cheeked pedestrians +talking and laughing and having a wonderful social time. We then +discovered their meal times are quite different from ours. You have an +early cup of coffee, then a light breakfast at eleven o'clock, then +dinner at three or four, preceded sometimes by this walk. Supper is +served at eight-thirty or nine, and is usually laid out<a name="page_247" id="page_247"></a> on a long table +in the centre of the room. There are cold meats and salads; cold fish +and pickled fish; queer breads; and, of course, you go first for the +wonderful <i>hors d'œuvres</i> of countless varieties, for this is where +they grow.</p> + +<p>A Swede once told me you could always tell a German travelling in +Sweden, because when the <i>Schwedische Platte</i> or <i>hors d'œuvres</i> were +passed to him, he made a meal of the dainty mayonnaise and savoury +morsels, instead of eating them as an appetizer, as is intended. In the +beautiful station of Copenhagen, decorated in the old Norse style, with +scarlet-painted wooden carved beams, we were served with all we could +eat of these dainties with bread and butter, for about forty cents—and +I wished I were a German!</p> + +<p>On the way home, we were storm-bound at Copenhagen, and I at once fell +in love with that city, and its wonderful blond race of big men and +women. We heard stories of divorces and passionate love affairs, that +made other nations pale by contrast. One delightful man told us he had +had no objection to his wife having <i>one</i> lover, but when he found she +had seven, he thought it time to get a divorce! He still quite often saw +her, and said they were the best friends in the world. He liked to take +her out to dinner and the theatre and tell her all about everything. He +called us "The Misses Chickens Howard," and was<a name="page_248" id="page_248"></a> only restrained by +business engagements from following us from place to place. That was a +hobby of his, he said, when he found a sympathetic artist.</p> + +<p>We crossed back to Germany, and I sang with Nickisch for the first time, +in Hamburg. His room behind the stage swarmed with ladies, in the +<i>entr'acte</i>, and the concert master told me it was always so. A valet +looked him over carefully before he went on the stage, pulled down his +coat, and patted the Herr Professor's shoulders. I remembered the cuff +story in Metz and watched through the crack of the door to see if it +still held good—and it did!</p> + +<p>Later I sang with Mengelberg in Frankfort. He said to me, eating apples +the while: "I engaged you because friends of mine in Holland told me you +could sing. Can you?" After the concert he came to me again, still +eating apples, and said: "<i>Es is wahr. Sie haben eine Prachtvolle +Stimme, und koennen prachtvoll singen</i>," and kissed my hand.</p> + +<p>To hear Mengelberg direct "Tod und Verklaerung" of Strauss, with his own +orchestra is one of the most tremendous things I have ever experienced. +One is transported. A little man with a tight mouth and an aureole of +fair hair, he is feared by his men, but <i>how</i> he is respected! That +winter he spent almost every night in the train, as he conducted +regularly in Holland, Germany and Russia.<a name="page_249" id="page_249"></a></p> + +<p>I have always been able to get on with really great musicians, and have +found only the second best <i>difficile</i> and small. The path seems +suddenly smooth when in rehearsal, you feel this wealth of absolute +knowledge and authority supporting, leading and inspiring you. Anxiety +vanishes and one's best pours from one without effort, only with the +sensation of wringing every last drop of beauty from the phrase.</p> + +<p>We returned to Sweden to concerts with Stenhammer, and I should have +crossed to Helsingfors to sing <i>Dalila</i>, but had to return on account of +engagements in Germany.</p> + +<p>Through our forbears, as I have said, we have many relations in Germany; +and in Berlin we enjoyed immensely knowing our cousins the von M—— s. +The General had just been moved back to Berlin to fill an extremely high +military position, and as he was musical we, of course, had much in +common. The daughters were all beautifully brought up; simple girls, +frank and natural as German aristocrats are. They gave a musical, at +which the General and I both sang. Their apartment was very large, but +was so crowded for the concert that I felt as though the Duchess of +Dalibor sat almost in my throat as I sang, and her enormous pearls +distracted me in the "Sapphische Ode." I have never seen such +unbelievably huge pearls. We were asked to stay to <i>Abendessen<a name="page_250" id="page_250"></a></i> after +the concert, and it consisted chiefly of the sandwiches and refreshments +left over from the party. This showed us again the absolute simplicity +of the well-born German of irreproachable position.</p> + +<p>The girls were very intimate with the Kaiser's only daughter, Princess +Victoria Louise, and when her marriage to the Duke of Brunswick's son, +was celebrated, Irma was one of the bride's-maids. Onkle Geo, as we +called him, told us about the Kaiser, to whom he was devoted. At the +dinner table, he said, His Majesty would usually talk only with the men +present, ignoring completely the ladies who might be present.</p> + +<p>When the General made his re-entry into court for the first time after +receiving his high office, all the courtiers present watched to see just +how he would be received by His Majesty, which would then give the +keynote for his treatment by the whole court. After the general +reception, General von M—— was invited to go into a more private room +with several more gentlemen. This promised well, as it was in this room +that the Kaiser talked more intimately with the guests of his choosing.</p> + +<p>The General held his helmet with its <i>Feder-busch</i>, or crest of white +feathers on his arm, and felt the eyes of all assembled on him as the +Kaiser came quickly<a name="page_251" id="page_251"></a> into the room, and made his way to him. Now was the +critical moment that might have everlasting consequences. Onkle Geo +confessed to nervousness, but His Majesty guessed the situation, and +said, "Hum! <i>You</i> need a new helmet, that <i>Feder-busch</i> is shabby," in a +bantering tone. The courtiers knew this was meant for friendly, humorous +comment, and was intended to be laughed at, so they laughed accordingly +at Onkle Geo's confusion, and the ice was broken. "And my helmet was +quite new!" said Onkle Geo, half indignantly, half laughing.</p> + +<p>The court was very simple, and we heard stories of this through other +friends who had the <i>entrée</i>. A Graefin D——, returning one evening +from a court ball given in honor of the then Regent of Bavaria, gave me +a bon-bon done up in silver paper, with a little photo of the Kaiserin +on it. The bon-bon was white, and the Graefin said as long as any one +could remember, these had been the official souvenirs of court dinners: +only the photo varied.</p> + +<p>One charming girl we knew, a great favourite of the Empress, came back +from the Palace one Christmas day, and told us what she had received +from Her Majesty as a Christmas greeting—a small, old-fashioned tippet +and muff of woolly white Angora, and two small, cheap Japanese vases, +that some one had<a name="page_252" id="page_252"></a> given the Empress the year before. The Royal +magnificence one would expect gave way to—extreme simplicity let us +call it.</p> + +<p>The Kaiser took a keen interest in the opera, and gave wonderful +presents to his favourite singers. We saw a spectacle at the opera house +that he was supposed to have inspired, and which was carried out under +his direction. It was a sort of panorama of scenes in Corfu, where he +spent much time. It must have been horribly expensive, for I never saw +so much scenery at any performance, and it really was exquisite to see +those beautifully reproduced scenes unfold before one.</p> + +<p>Such things, however, as painted castles and woods and flowers always +seem to me excessively naïve. The Russian idea of a wonderful +imaginative back-drop is infinitely more stimulating to a performance. +Of course, there are places where it cannot be used. If the scene is +laid in a Childs' restaurant a back-drop might perhaps be comic to a +mind not yet used to making its own pictures; but I hope and believe the +aim is towards simplicity in this direction; but the simplicity must be +carried out by artists, and first-rate ones. Who, who has seen the +leaping figures of the Russian Ballet in "Prince Igor," has felt a lack +on the scenic side because the tents with their feather of smoke were +suggested on a flat back-drop? Who<a name="page_253" id="page_253"></a> longed for real, that is, one-side +real, tents—with steam escaping from a semi-hidden pipe through the +top? The luridness was suggested by colour far more skilfully than if +rocks, thinly swaying and lit by red lights, had cluttered up the wings. +Make the audience do the thinking, blend stimulation with simulation, +and if your artist has been a true one no one will cry for flapping +pillars, or crumpled leaves on a net.</p> + +<p>"Boris Goudonow," as it used to be given at the Metropolitan, is a good +example of what real artist vision can do with colour. Those who saw +those figures in brilliant green, kneeling with their backs to the +audience, barring off the procession scene, while the towering minaret +of the cathedral carried the eye up and up at the back, will surely +never forget the light and shade grouping. It has since, I am sorry to +say, lost some of its skilful arrangement, which I suppose is +unavoidable, but the performance is still homogeneous and a unit, as to +<i>décors,</i> score and costumes.</p> + +<p>It was on the Kaiser's birthday that we saw "Corfu," and afterwards we +went to the newly-opened Hotel Esplanade for supper. I have never seen +such a sight. All imaginable uniforms were there, on all types of +officers and foreign diplomats. Some looked magnificently romantic, and +some as if they had<a name="page_254" id="page_254"></a> stepped from the comic opera stage. The women, as +usual in Germany, though plentifully be-jewelled, looked dull and +inadequate beside the men.</p> + +<p>One summer night in Berlin, we went to Max Reinhardt's small theatre, +the Kammerspiel, to see "Fruehlingserwachen." My dear friend, Oscar +Saenger, was in town, and I had happened to see him in a box at the +opera the evening before. He had come to see Berger, the giant baritone +whom he had transformed into a tenor, in his first performance of +<i>Siegmund</i>. I think Putnam Griswold, that splendid type of the best +American singer, sang the <i>Wanderer</i> that night. Saenger asked us to go +to the theatre with him, as we had not met in years, and by chance we +chose "Fruehlingserwachen" of Wedekind. Never shall I forget that +evening. The quiet, dark wooden walls of the theatre, and the +comfortable box they showed us into, in which we sat, seeing but unseen +in the obscurity; the lack of applause when the curtain fell, and +then—the performance. German actors lead the world, in my opinion, and +the intensity of those players, the skill with which they played those +most unhappy children, the tremulous, inadequate mother, that dark scene +with its girl-women shriek, left us breathless and dazed.</p> + +<p>The highest possible tribute I pay to German actors, and to some of +those gathered together that winter in<a name="page_255" id="page_255"></a> that theatre. Such a <i>Falstaff</i> +I never saw as we saw there in "Henry V," nor such marvellous +presentations of Shakespeare. Moissy as <i>Prince Hal</i> in his father's +deathbed scene; the <i>Doll Tearsheet</i>; the collection of hangers-on in +the Inn Scene, the understanding of the spirit of Shakespeare—all these +were priceless joys. Shakespeare does not spell bankruptcy in Germany, +and the people really love it, and perhaps there is a reason why.</p> + +<p>The next night in the same house, you might see a translation of a +French drawingroom comedy. With the exception of one or two, these +people were quite as at home in that as in classic drama. That I had +never believed possible till I saw it proven. It had always seemed to me +that the French were absolutely unrivalled in such things as "Mlle. +Georgette, ma femme"; but they were even more sincerely, yet just as +lightly done by Reinhardt's people. It was always such a joy in Europe +to go to the theatre in London, Paris or Berlin. To see Lavallière with +her inimitable <i>gamine</i> ways, was the most delicious of pleasures; and +the polish of the older actors of the French stage, the <i>Marquis</i> or +<i>Marquise</i>, or old butler or housekeeper, as the case may be, is a +wonderful model for the student. French actors seem to be able to come +into a room, sit down at a table and talk for half an hour, using almost +no gestures, without becoming in<a name="page_256" id="page_256"></a> the least boresome or monotonous. When +scenes of strong passion are wanted, the Germans, I think, excel their +French rivals. A Frenchman, or, for that matter, any Latin, is inclined +to rant just a bit, and become unconvincing, at least to an Anglo-Saxon +mind; but the German, when called upon for strength and power of +passion, rises thrillingly and gloriously, and completely sweeps you +away.</p> + +<p>Even in Darmstadt we had many notable performances. That of the +"Versunkene Glocke," for instance, was most memorable. We had a splendid +old actor for the <i>Well Spirit, Nickelmann,</i> and nothing could have been +wetter or more unearthly than his sloshing slowly up from the depth of +the well, his webbed, greenish fingers appearing clutchingly first, and +then his grating, fishy croak, "<i>R-r-r-rautendelein! +R-r-r-r-rautendelein!</i>" The faun was also excellently done by a young +fellow with marvellous faun-like agility; altogether these unpretentious +people realized the fairy-tale spirit, the wood feeling of the story, in +a most imaginative, subtle way. Where in America in a town of +Darmstadt's size could you see such a performance?<a name="page_257" id="page_257"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XXIII" id="CHAPTER_XXIII"></a>CHAPTER XXIII</h3> + +<h4>COVENT GARDEN AND—AMERICA</h4> + +<p class="nind"><span class="letra">I</span>N due time we set out for London. One of our cousins had found us +delightful diggings in M—— Street, which I was able to enjoy, as dear +Mr. and Mrs. Jones sent me an extra cheque to impress London with. We +were waited upon by an old butler, and his wife did the cooking. Such +legs of lamb, and deep plum tarts, with lashings of clotted cream! Such +snowy napery, and silver polished as only English butlers can polish it.</p> + +<p>It was not by any means my first visit to London, professionally. I had +sung in private drawingrooms in previous seasons, and had also given a +recital. Her Royal Highness Princess Christian of Schleswig-Holstein, +and her daughter, Princess Victoria, graciously consented to be my +patronesses at this concert. I had not the slightest idea how to arrange +for them, after they had kindly consented to be present, but I gathered +that a special pair of comfortable chairs must be put directly below the +stage, with a little table. Then I thought "Flowers or no<a name="page_258" id="page_258"></a> flowers?" I +should have loved to send them, but English Royalties are so simple and +natural I instinctively felt that any ostentation would be distasteful. +Somehow one hates to do the wrong thing in the presence of Personages; +it is an un-American feeling, but a human one.</p> + +<p>They applauded me a great deal, and after a bow of acknowledgment to the +nice audience I gave the Princesses each time an English, +straight-up-and-down curtsey, and I hope that was right. In Germany a +back-swaying, one-toe-pointed-in-front curtsey was demanded. These +things are at once trivial and vastly important.</p> + +<p>The decent getting Their Royal Highnesses in and out of the hall I left +to the capable manager, to whom Princess Christian said as she passed, +"She ought to be singing in Covent Garden." I very soon was.</p> + +<p>I was rather nervous at the beginning at Covent Garden. Most of the +others were so famous, and all of them so much older than I. However, I +soon got recognition and they were all very nice to me. I enjoyed +especially talking to Van Rooy. He told me all about the wonderful +armour he wore in the "Ring." Never have I seen his equal as the +<i>Wanderer</i>. As he himself said, the old line of singers, the giants, the +de Reszkes, Terninas, Lehmanns and Brandts, seemed to have died out. I +often look for<a name="page_259" id="page_259"></a> the grand line, the dignity, the flowing, noble breadth +of gesture one saw in the older Wagnerian singers, but how often does +one see it now? Of course, my memories of them are those of a very young +girl, but I saw the same thing in Van Rooy, though his voice showed +wear, and the bigness of their impersonations is stamped indelibly on my +memory, dwarfing the lesser ones.</p> + +<p>Nikisch came for the last few rehearsals. He took that raw, +English-sounding orchestra, with its unrelated sounds of blaring brass, +and rough strings, and unified and dignified it by his personality, his +work and his brain power till it produced what he would have—Wagner in +his glory. His gestures were like a sculptor's. My brother, who came to +stay with us, also noticed this. Nikisch seemed to sculpt the phrases +out of the air, and brought home again to us both the close relation +between the lines of music and the lines of noble sculpture. The +Parthenon freeze—is it not music? My brother says the Air of Bach is +absolutely one with the outlines of this masterpiece, just as pure, +noble and majestically simple, moving in slow, stately rhythm.</p> + +<p>We gave the "Ring" three times and I sang the <i>Erdas</i> and <i>Fricka</i> and +<i>Waltrautes</i>. The latter in "Goetterdaemmerung" I enjoyed doing so much +with Nikisch. We only rehearsed it at the piano, and he<a name="page_260" id="page_260"></a> said as he sat +down: "<i>Jetzt bin ich neugierig. Entweder kann die Waltraute +wunderschoen sein, oder sehr langweilig.</i>" ("Now I am curious. +<i>Waltraute</i> can either be very beautiful or very uninteresting.") He did +not find it <i>langweilig</i> however.</p> + +<p>I had one of my fits of depression I so often get after singing, (when I +feel I must leave the stage, I am so hopelessly bad, and nothing any one +can do or say cheers me inwardly), and it was particularly abysmal, the +day after <i>Waltraute</i>. One never sings just as one would like to, and in +my head I hear the phrase so much more beautifully done than any one but +Caruso can do it. That day I sat at lunch with my faithful Marjorie, who +always puts up with me. We were lunching in a little place near us, and +I was deep in the blues. Marjorie's eye fell on the <i>Daily Telegraph</i> +and we saw a wonderful criticism by Robin Legge; just a few words, but +so sincere and appreciative. It helped such a lot. Criticism can mean so +much to one for good or evil. The thought of a cruelly amusing phrase +the critic has coined, unable to resist the very human temptation, will +come winging to you the next time you step out on the stage to sing the +same rôle, and you feel that sardonic wave striking you afresh and +jangling your already quivering nerves. It takes courage after that to +go on. On the contrary, a few words of appreciation of what<a name="page_261" id="page_261"></a> you have +tried so hard, through such long years to do, will tide you over many +black hours of discouragement, and you think: "I can't be so absolutely +rotten, didn't X—— write that about me? and he's supposed to know +something about it." An intelligent constructive criticism is the most +helpful thing possible, and stimulates one to work to correct one's +faults. Personal remarks wound one's feelings deeply, and one is obliged +to swallow hard and go bravely on, but the policeman's life is not a +happy one.</p> + +<div class="centeredimage" style="width: 320px;"> +<a href="images/ill_260.jpg"> +<img src="images/ill_260_sml.jpg" width="320" height="500" alt="CARUSO'S CARICATURE OF KATHLEEN HOWARD" title="CARUSO'S CARICATURE OF KATHLEEN HOWARD" /></a><br /> +<span class="caption">CARUSO'S CARICATURE OF KATHLEEN HOWARD</span> +</div> + +<p>The Royal Opera is in the middle of the vegetable market, and on the +days when produce arrives, the streets are full of cockney porters. It +was rather amusing one day, going to rehearsal. I was dressed in my new +black satin suit from Paris, and a smart little white hat. A porter +caught sight of me, pushed back the other men on both sides of me, and +said, "Get out of the loidy's wy, cahn't yer, Bill? That's roight, Miss, +I always loikes to see the lydies wen Ahm workin', that's right, Miss, +very neat, too." The next day it was raining and I was not so smart, and +the same man saw me and said with an air of disappointment, "Ah don't +like it 'aaf so well as yisterdy, Miss."</p> + +<p>I have often heard of American singers who could "bluff" or "hypnotize" +directors into giving them chances which they thought they were entitled +to, and<a name="page_262" id="page_262"></a> from which they always emerged with flying colours. This is the +tale of how I once, and only once, tried to "bluff," and how I nearly +got caught at it.</p> + +<p>When the list of rôles for Convent Garden was submitted to me in Berlin +I had actually sung on the stage all of them but one, <i>Brangaene</i>. I +always found this lady so weak, compared to <i>Isolde</i>, that she had never +interested me especially, and I had never studied her. I decided, +however, that having sung ninety-nine per cent. of the rôles they wanted +I could risk the one per cent., <i>Brangaene</i>, hoping that Kirkby-Lunn +would not relinquish her. I learned the rôle, though, in record time +between concert dates, and trusted to "luck." The season was drawing to +a close, and all the operas had passed off well, when, just as we were +going to dinner one evening, I was called to the 'phone and told Madame +Kirkby-Lunn had been taken suddenly ill at the beginning of the first +act of "Tristan," would probably not be able to go on in the second, and +would I please come right down and make up.</p> + +<p>In a nervous tremor, for <i>Brangaene</i> is not easy without orchestra +rehearsal, and I was not quite sure of all the business cues, I went +down, hunted out something to wear, put on my trusty "beauty" wig, +hurriedly went over the second act with an assistant conductor, finding +my memory was standing the strain, and then stood trembling in the +wings. I thought to<a name="page_263" id="page_263"></a> myself "Nemesis!" and shivered. What I hoped +was—that if Madame really was going to have to give up it might be just +before the lovely "Warnung" behind the scenes, because I had always +wanted to sing that.</p> + +<p>There I stood and the rouge soaked into my face as it always +mysteriously does, when one is not at one's best, leaving me pale and +anxious—a real <i>Brangaene</i>. Poor Madame Kirkby-Lunn sang just as +beautifully as ever though, but fainted after the second act. I went +into her dressing room and offered to do the last bit and let her go +home after her plucky fight. She, however, said she realized it was a +thankless task for a singer to finish another singer's performance, and +that she would not think of asking me to do it. She rested awhile, I +still hovering, as requested by the management, till all was over; and I +then went home, more exhausted than if I had sung a performance, but +resolved to sin no more, and thanking my gods that I had not had to face +that critical assemblage without adequate preparation.</p> + +<p>The Italian season was to come directly after ours, and they all came +drifting in during our last days, to report for rehearsal. One day as I +was up in my dressing room, preparing for a matinée, I heard a golden +droning below me, rising and falling on half breath—Caruso at a room +rehearsal. Words cannot<a name="page_264" id="page_264"></a> describe the beauty of it, but it gave me +exquisite pleasure. A day or two later I was at the Opera House on some +errand and chanced to hear the rehearsal of "Pagliacci." Caruso was +strolling about the stage, beautifully dressed as usual, with a pale +grey Derby hat, gloves of wash-leather and light-coloured cane. The time +came for his famous solo. He stood near the footlights with his eyes on +the conductor, as we usually do when running over a familiar rôle with +an unfamiliar conductor. He began softly with his wonderful effortless +stream of tone, so characteristic, and so impossible of imitation. As +the music worked on his emotions, always just below the surface with +this great artist, his voice thrilled stronger and stronger in spite of +him, till suddenly in full flood it poured out its luscious stream—and +one thanked God anew for such a voice.</p> + +<p>Covent Garden on the night of a Court ball holds the most brilliant +audience I have ever seen. The English woman is at her best in evening +dress, the jewels are fabulous and the whole affair most dazzling. I +remember one evening seeing King Manoel of Portugal in a box. It was +shortly after his hasty flight from his own country, and by an odd +chance his box was just under a very large "Exit" sign, the pertinence +of which was striking.</p> + +<p>Destinn was our <i>Senta</i> in "Holländer." She was<a name="page_265" id="page_265"></a> just back from America, +and at rehearsal she had to cut out several portamenti which, she said, +she had contracted from the Italians, but which infuriated the German +conductor. At the stage rehearsals she directed everything in accordance +with Bayreuth tradition, which attaches the utmost importance to every +slightest stage position; and the other singers followed her directions +with an almost reverent devotion. At the performance she was wonderful, +as usual. She wore a real Norwegian bridal headdress, a sort of basket +of flowers. A Cockney super, on his way out, remarked in passing me, "I +s'y, wot price Destinn's hat?"</p> + +<p>It was strange, coming from Germany, where every word almost is +understood by the audience, to sing to people whose facial expression +did not respond to the text; one feels that the inner meaning of the +words is lost, is going for nothing, and this leads to a vague sense of +irritation, if one allows the impression to dominate.</p> + +<p>There were several young Americans with us with glorious voices, +straight from Jean de Reszke's studio. They were to sing the +<i>Rheintöchter</i>, and some of the <i>Walküren</i> in the "Ring." One or two +were full of ambition and thankful for the experience they were +receiving, while being paid. Some of them, however, showed a quite +extraordinary attitude, not rare among<a name="page_266" id="page_266"></a> students of the moneyed class. +The air was filled with their complaints at the length of rehearsals, at +the discomfort of the swings for the <i>Rhinemaidens</i>, at anything and +everything. I was present one day when one of them called Mr. Percy Pitt +aside and gravely took him to task for not having the swings adjusted to +her comfort—thereby incidentally killing her chances with the +management, for a beginner is before anything a beginner in a great +Opera House, and is supposed to find her level and make no fuss about +it. These girls constantly spoke loftily of their displeasure at the way +things were run. When they were offered an extension of their contracts, +owing to the repetitions of the "Ring," they could hardly be brought to +consider signing on. I said to them, knowing the game, "Girls, some day +you will be on your knees to get such engagements as you now hold. You +have the chance of singing difficult parts with a great Master in a +great Opera House, and you don't seem in the least to realize what that +means."</p> + +<p>I regret to say my prophecy was nearly correct, for I think only one, a +really serious girl, has prospered in her career. The attitude one +assumes to one's operatic work in early years is surely reflected later, +and the best advice a student can follow is that given me by +Schumann-Heink, "Sing everything, no matter what they ask you to do."<a name="page_267" id="page_267"></a></p> + +<p>It was very amusing to hear the discussions as to what the audience +should wear. We gave the performances more or less on the Bayreuth plan, +beginning early and with one unusually long pause. As it was broad +daylight at the hour set for the curtain to go up, and as the perfect +Londoner loathes to be about after dark in anything but evening dress, +the problem bothered many. Besides, evening dress is <i>de rigueur</i> at +Covent Garden. Some rushed home in the longest pause to dress and dine; +some frankly omitted the first acts and came late, splendidly +be-jewelled; some wore evening dresses and kept on their evening coats +till the sun was decently down; and then bared their suitably naked +shoulders. Others were just dubby and high-necked, and brought +sandwiches in their pockets, feeling the holier and more Germanly +reverent in consequence.</p> + +<p class="top5">It is a great help to be able to afford to have some one with you in +opera life. Home surroundings are the most conducive to good work, and +it is hard to make a home alone; but you do not absolutely <i>need</i> any +one, if this is not possible. My "morals" were never in danger—no +"infamous proposals" were made to me by agent, conductor or director. In +my first engagement, one or two of the giddier members of the company +had affairs with young officers—in no<a name="page_268" id="page_268"></a> case a flagrant scandal, as with +a married man. Their relations to each other in the theatre were all +that could be demanded. The most exaggeratedly correct behaviour was +exacted from me. One day in Metz, for example, we went for a walk in the +country with the lyric baritone, a nice little chap, who was a great +friend of ours. It was a lovely, frosty day in autumn, and we were +walking fast through a forest road, when we passed a carriage with the +very prim wife of an officer sitting in it. The next day, an +acquaintance of ours told us, as a joke, that the same woman had said +that afternoon to her, "I thought you told me that Fräulein Howard was a +lady?" "So she is," said our friend. "Oh, no," said the other, "she +can't be. I saw her and her sister walking with one of the singers from +the theatre, and they were behaving very badly." "What were they doing?" +asked our friend. "They were all three holding on to his stick!" said +she, in a horrified tone!</p> + +<p>I went abroad to learn my business and I learned it. There is much talk +about it not being necessary to go abroad to prepare oneself for an +operatic career, but the time has not yet come in America when the +student can find the same opportunity to practice, or work out <i>on the +stage</i> her beginner's faults. In Europe you can do this in blissful +semi-obscurity. I hope and believe the time will come when a girl will<a name="page_269" id="page_269"></a> +not have to go through all I went through in order to develop her +talent, but may do it in her own country. But the wonderfulness of +Europe for those whose eyes are open cannot yet be replaced by America, +and a real artist will surely flower more perfectly on that side of the +water.</p> + +<p>To those who go I can only say that I hope they may have the tremendous +advantage of fairy god-parents, as I had, and perhaps a sister Marjorie.</p> + +<p>After the season closed at Covent Garden I met the manager of the new +Century Opera, soon to be opened in New York. He offered me a long +contract, and I finally decided to return to America. I saw a photograph +of Edward Kellogg Baird in a musical paper at this time, and read of his +connection with the enterprise. I said to myself, "That is the type of +man I shall marry—if I ever do marry."</p> + +<p>I came to the Century, met my husband, E. K. B., and worked with him for +the success of the opera, which lay very near our hearts; but the war +and other unfortunate circumstances proved too much to overcome, and we +were forced to suspend. I finally attained the Metropolitan Opera, which +I find the most absorbingly interesting house with which I have ever +been connected, and which is the greatest school of all.<a name="page_270" id="page_270"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="REPERTOIRE" id="REPERTOIRE"></a>REPERTOIRE</h3> + +<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary="repertoire"> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">1.</td><td>Carmen<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>In French, German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">2.</td><td>Amneris<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Aida) French, German, English, Italian.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">3.</td><td>Azucena<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Trovatore) Italian, German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">4.</td><td>Fides<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Prophète) French, German.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">5.</td><td>Dalila<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Samson et Dalila) French, German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">6.</td><td>Martha<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(In Faust) French, German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">7.</td><td>Siebel<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(In Faust) French, German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">8.</td><td>Maddalena<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(In Rigoletto) Italian, German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">9.</td><td>Nancy<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(In Marta) Italian, German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">10.</td><td>Ortrud<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Lohengrin) German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">11.</td><td>Lucia<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Cav. Rus.) Italian, German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">12.</td><td>Lola<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Cav. Rus.) Italian, German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">13.</td><td>Mary<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Flieg. Hollaender) German.<a name="page_271" id="page_271"></a></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">14.</td><td>Erda<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Siegfried).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">15.</td><td>Erda<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Rheingold).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">16.</td><td>Schwertleite<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Walkuere).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">17.</td><td>Grimgerde<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Walkuere).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">18.</td><td>Waltraute<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Walkuere).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">19.</td><td>Waltraute<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Goetterdaemmerung).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">20.</td><td>Erste Norn<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Goetterdaemmerung).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">21.</td><td>Fricka<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Walkuere).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">22.</td><td>Flosshilde<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Goetterdaemmerung).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">23.</td><td>Flosshilde<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Rheingold).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">24.</td><td>Hexe<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Haensel und Gretel) German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">25.</td><td>Nicklaus<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Hoffman) German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">26.</td><td>Valencienne<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Merry Widow).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">27.</td><td>Frederika<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Waltzertraum).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">28.</td><td>Dritte Dame<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Zauberfloete).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">29.</td><td>Oeffentliche Meinung<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Orpheus in der Unterwelt).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">30.</td><td>Orfeo<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Gluck).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">31.</td><td>Molly<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Geisha).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">32.</td><td>Georgette<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Gloeckchen).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">33.</td><td>Pamela<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Fra Diavolo).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">34.</td><td>Graefin<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Trompeter).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">35.</td><td>Orlofsky<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Fledermaus).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">36.</td><td>Frau Reich<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Lustige Weibe).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">37.</td><td>Page<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Salome).<a name="page_272" id="page_272"></a></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">38.</td><td>Olga<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Dollar Prinzessin).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">39.</td><td>Magdalena<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Meistersingers).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">40.</td><td>Graefin<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Heilige Elisabeth) German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">41.</td><td>Martha<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Undine).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">42.</td><td>Hedwig<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Wilhelm Tell) German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">43.</td><td>Gertrude<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Hans Heiling).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">44.</td><td>Marzellina<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Figaro) Italian, German.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">45.</td><td>Graefin<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Wildschuetz).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">46.</td><td>Ascanio<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Benvenuto Cellini).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">47.</td><td>Jacqueline<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Arzt wieder willen) German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">48.</td><td>Gertrude<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Romeo and Juliet) German.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">49.</td><td>Stephano<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Romeo and Juliet) German, English.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">50.</td><td>Hexe<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Sieben Schwaben).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">51.</td><td>Ulrica<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Masken Ball) Italian, German.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">52.</td><td>Hexe<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Koenigskinder).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">53.</td><td>Cleo<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Kuhreigen).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">54.</td><td>Suzuki<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Butterfly) English, Italian, German.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">55.</td><td>Magdalena<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Evangelimann).<a name="page_273" id="page_273"></a></td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">56.</td><td>Carmela<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Jewels of the Madonna) English, Italian, German.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">57.</td><td>Mother<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Louise).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">58.</td><td>Cieca<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Giaconda) German, English, Italian.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">59.</td><td>Nutrice<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Boris).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">60.</td><td>Blumenmaedchen<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Parsifal).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">61.</td><td>Annina<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Rosenkavalier).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">62.</td><td>Albine<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Thais).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">63.</td><td>Mistress Benson<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Lakme).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">64.</td><td>Margarethe<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Weisse Dame).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">65.</td><td>Cypra<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Zigeuner Baron).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">66.</td><td>Fattoumah<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Marouf).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">67.</td><td>Amelfa<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Le Coq d'Or).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right">68.</td><td>Mrs.Everton<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Shanewis).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="center" colspan="3">Etc., etc.</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="center" colspan="3">STUDIED NOT SUNG</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right"> </td><td>Brangaene<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Tristan).</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="right"> </td><td>Mutter Gertrud<span class="dots">...</span></td><td>(Haensel und Gretel)</td></tr> +<tr valign="top"><td align="center" colspan="3">Etc., etc.</td></tr> +</table> + +<p class="c top15">THE END</p> + +<hr /> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Confessions of an Opera Singer, by Kathleen Howard + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CONFESSIONS OF AN OPERA SINGER *** + +***** This file should be named 32980-h.htm or 32980-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/9/8/32980/ + +Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was +produced from 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Confessions of an Opera Singer + +Author: Kathleen Howard + +Release Date: June 26, 2010 [EBook #32980] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CONFESSIONS OF AN OPERA SINGER *** + + + + +Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was +produced from scanned images of public domain material at +The Internet Archive.) + + + + + + + + + +[Illustration: Photo of Kathleen Howard, Autographed] + + + + +CONFESSIONS OF +AN OPERA SINGER + +BY KATHLEEN HOWARD + +NEW YORK MCMXVIII + +ALFRED A. KNOPF + +COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY +KATHLEEN HOWARD BAIRD + +_Published September 1918_ + + +PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA + + _To + Marjorie_ + + + + +FOREWORD + + +So many fantastic tales have come to us of students' life abroad, of +their temptations, trials, finances, successes and failures, that I have +attempted to give here the true story of the preparation for an operatic +career, and its fruition. My road leads from New York to Paris, to +Germany and thence to London, and back to the Metropolitan Opera House. +My operatic experiences in Germany are inalienably associated with the +lives of the people, particularly with the German officer class, viewed +publicly and privately; in fact in the town where I was first engaged, +Metz, I found they were as vital a part of the Opera house life as the +singers themselves. Their arrogance tainted the town life as well, and +here I first became acquainted with the pitiful attempt at swagger and +brilliancy which often covered a state of grinding poverty, or the +thwarted natural domestic instincts which were ruthlessly sacrificed to +the "uniform"--the all-desirable entree to society, for which no price +was too high to pay. I hope this book will be of interest not only to +those whose goal is the operatic or concert stage, but to those to whom +"human documents" appeal. It is a story of real people, real obstacles +overcome, and contains much intimate talk of back-stage life in opera +houses. + + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAPTER PAGE + + I THE WAY IT ALL HAPPENED 13 + + II A STRUGGLE AND A SOLUTION 21 + + III PARIS AT LAST 30 + + IV PENSION PERSONALITIES 39 + + V OPERATIC FRANCE VERSUS OPERATIC GERMANY 50 + + VI PREPARING ROLES IN BERLIN 59 + + VII MY FIRST OPERATIC CONTRACT SIGNED 67 + + VIII MY ONE LONE IMPROPOSITION 76 + + IX THE MAKINGS OF A SMALL MUNICIPAL OPERA HOUSE 85 + + X MY DEBUT AND BREAKING INTO HARNESS 100 + + XI SOME STAGE DELIGHTS 110 + + XII MISPLACED MOISTURE AND THE STORY OF A COURT-LADY 123 + + XIII HUMAN PASSIONS AND SMALLPOX 139 + + XIV DISCOURAGEMENTS THAT LED TO A COURT THEATRE 153 + + XV SALARIES AND A TENOR'S GENIUS 164 + + XVI THE ART OF MARIE MUELLE 172 + + XVII THE NON-MILITARY SIDE OF A GERMAN OFFICER'S LIFE 184 + + XVIII GEESE AND GUESTS 199 + + XIX RUSSIANS, COMMON AND PREFERRED 206 + + XX THE GRANDMOTHERS' BALLET 220 + + XXI STAGE FASHIONS AND THE GLORY OF COLOUR 230 + + XXII ROYAL HUMOUR 242 + + XXIII COVENT GARDEN AND--AMERICA 257 + + + + +LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + + +Kathleen Howard _Frontispiece_ + + I Carmen as I Used to Dress It 76 + + II Carmen as I Now Dress It 84 + + I Amneris as I Used to Dress It 126 + + II Amneris as I Now Dress It 134 + + I Dalila as I Used to Dress It 172 + + II Dalila as I Now Dress It 180 + + Caruso's Caricature of Kathleen Howard 260 + + + + +CHAPTER I + +THE WAY IT ALL HAPPENED + + +I was very young and I was engaged to be married. We had just lost our +money in rather dramatic fashion, and we were all doing what we could to +supply the sudden deficit. My sister began to prepare herself to be a +teacher, my brother left his boarding school and came home to go into a +friend's office, and I--well, I accepted the hand and heart of the young +man in our set with whom I had had most pleasure in dancing in winter +and sailing in summer. + +My heart didn't lose a beat and turn over when I saw him coming as did +those of the heroines in Marion Crawford's novels, but we were the best +friends in the world, and I thought that anything else must be a +literary exaggeration, put in to make the story more exciting; just as +the heroine's eyelashes were usually exaggerated to the abnormal length +of an inch to make her more beautiful, though none of the girls I knew +had them like that. + +He was a young business man, just starting as assistant to his father +whose business was an old established, comfortable sort of family +affair, big enough to supply, in time, an extra income for an +unambitious young couple like ourselves. Every one congratulated us +heartily, and I began to embroider towels and hem table napkins and to +dream about patterns of flat silver. + +The whole arrangement was satisfactory to the point of banality, and I +might be quite an old married woman by this time, but--I had a voice. + +Nine-tenths of me, at this age, were the normal, rational +characteristics of a well-brought up, bright, good looking girl. But the +last tenth was an unknown quantity, a great big powerful something which +I vaguely felt, even then, to be the master of all the other tenths, a +force which was capable of having its own way with the rest of me if I +should ever give it a chance. My voice, the agent of this vague power, +had developed rather late. It is true that our whole childhood had been +coloured by music, that we read notes before we could read letters, and +that music was our earliest and most natural mode of expression. + +My father's greatest joy in life was music, and he always played +imaginative musical games with us in the evenings. The earliest one I +remember was when we were tiny tots. He used to improvise on the small +organ we had and ask us questions which we had to answer, singing to +his accompaniment. I was Admiral Seymour and Marjorie was General +Wolsey. + +I remember his singing, + + "And how would you get your ships along, Admiral, + If your sails and oars were shot overboard?" + +I sang solemnly, + + "I'd shubble them along with shubbles." + +Afterwards when I began to sing from printed music with him I remember +saying one evening as he was playing hymns and unfamiliar English +ballads for me to sing, + +"Papa, please let me look at the music and follow the notes up and +down." + +I really began reading music at four years old. We played and sang all +our childhood. When Marjorie was seven and I was six we sang Even-song +at the village church, as the members of the regular choir were ill or +absent. Marjorie had a heavenly childish soprano and I a heavy +nondescript voice. But I always pleased my father by singing real +"second voice" and not just following the soprano in thirds. + +He used to give us a note, and we then had to run round our rather large +house humming it. It was the deepest disgrace we ever knew if we had +sharped or flatted when we got back to the starting point. He taught us +musical terms by making us dance to different rhythms he played, and +would call out "Allegro," "Vivace," "Adagio," "Molto allegro," "Legato," +and so forth, to which we had to change instantly. Whenever any one came +to the house, we played and sang for them, and though it might have been +rather awful for the visitors it was very good for us to get used to an +audience. + +He used to arrange fairy tales like "Bluebeard" in doggerel verses and +write accompaniments to them, and we then learned them by heart and +rehearsed them, and some grand night played them for all the neighbours. +I remember the way we showed Bluebeard's chamber where the heads of his +wives were kept. We hung a sheet on the wall and Marjorie and I stood in +front of it, with pale faces, closed eyes and open mouths, and our long +hair pinned up high above our heads on the sheet. Another sheet was then +stretched across us, just below our chins, and the effect was rather +ghastly in a dim light. I remember we sang at the last: + + "Oh, Bluebeard, oh, Bluebeard, + Frustrated, checkmated, + Dissipated, agitated, + Castigated, lacerated, + Bluebeard!" + +When school was over we always gave a dramatic performance; if the +weather was fine enough we held them in the big garden that was our +childhood's playground. We dressed behind a huge flowering-currant bush, +and I can remember a performance of an act of "Twelfth Night," in which +I, aged about seven, was _Malvolio_, Lal, my brother, _Maria_, and +Marjorie, _Olivia_. + +I had always been able to sing, but the sudden growth of my voice was a +surprise. One day, in school, we were asked to write a composition on +our favourite wish. All the other girls said they wished for curly hair, +for pretty dresses, for as much candy as they could eat, for any other +frivolous thing that came into their heads. But I took it seriously and +told my dearest wish in all the world--a great voice, a voice with which +I could make audiences cry or laugh at my will. And, strangely enough, +from that time my girlish voice began to grow stronger and stronger, +until I could proudly make more noise with it than any other girl in +school. Then it grew louder and higher, until it was impossible to +ignore such a big possession any longer, and the family decreed that I +must have singing lessons. + +I took lessons accordingly from an excellent local teacher, practised +scales and exercises and later studied the classic songs and arias as +seriously as I could, but it was so fatally easy to be interrupted. We +were all out of school for the first time and enjoying our freedom. It +was so much more chic to go down to Huyler's in the mornings, when the +girls only a year younger were hard at their lessons, than in the +afternoon when the whole girl world was at liberty. I would just begin a +morning's work when some one would call me on the telephone to go to the +dressmaker's with her, or help arrange the flowers for a dinner party. I +loved both flowers and dresses, and it was easy to think, "Oh! I'll +practise this afternoon!" and fly off to be gone all day. In the evening +there was my fiance who had to tell me all the absorbing details of his +office, or there was a dance, or a theatre party, and I took everything +that came my way and enjoyed it all equally. But all the time my voice +was really first in my thoughts, and I longed to study seriously and +intensely, to arrange my whole life for it and its proper development. + +The family, it seemed to me, was more interested in my trousseau than in +anything else. They had scraped together five hundred dollars, and I was +to have it all, incredible as it sounded, to buy clothes with. +Subconsciously all day, and compellingly in bed at night, the thought of +what I could do for my voice with that five hundred dollars was with me. +I saw myself only as a singer, and knew that I could never be happy +unless I were allowed first to get my instrument in thorough working +order and then to use it. The phrases, "working out your own salvation," +"fulfilling your own destiny," "the necessity of self-development," and +all those other nicely turned expressions which most students have at +their tongues' end, were unknown to me. I just _felt_, inarticulately. +But my feeling was strong enough to carry me into action, the step which +phrasemakers, who find complete satisfaction in their phrases, often +omit. + +New York was my Mecca. I talked it all over with my fiance, told him +what a year there would do for me, making it clear that I expected to +sing professionally after our marriage. He agreed to everything and +promised that I should do as I wished. His possible objection disposed +of, only the financial difficulty remained, looming large before me. +Deeply and more deeply I was convinced in my own mind that I might marry +in old clothes, but not with my voice untrained. I finally summoned +courage to propose to my family that I should use the precious five +hundred for a year's study in New York instead of a trousseau. +Miraculous to relate they agreed, and I was boundlessly happy and saw my +path golden ahead of me. + +We all spoke and thought of my future as that of a concert singer. My +intention of marrying seemed to make anything else out of the question. +Indeed, at that time, the Metropolitan in New York formed the only +oasis in the operatic desert of America. There were spasmodic attempts +at travelling companies in English, but no other sign of a permanent +institution throughout the length and breadth of the country. I must +confess, however, that the operatic bee buzzed considerably at times in +the less conspicuous portions of my bonnet. One or two musicians of +standing, who heard me sing, pronounced mine "an operatic voice," and +strange longings stirred inside me when I saw the Metropolitan singers +on the boards. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +A STRUGGLE AND A SOLUTION + + +That winter in New York was a revealing experience to me in many ways. +Numbers of things assumed different values in my estimation. One of the +first new things I learned was the comparative insignificance of $500 as +a provision for a year's expenses. I lived at one of those boarding +houses which are called both "reasonable" and respectable, but are +vastly inferior in both comfort and society to the European pension +which costs a good deal less. I had lessons in singing, diction and +French, all of which counted up to a great many dollars a week. My five +hundred began to shrink at an alarming rate, and I don't know what I +should have done if a friend had not advised me to try for a "church +position," that invaluable means of adding to the resources of a +student, which is possible only in America. Besides offering a splendid +chance of financial assistance, the church position system is an +infallible test of the money value of one's voice. How many girls have I +known in Europe embarking upon the expensive and dreadfully laborious +preparation for an operatic career, without possessing a single one of +the qualifications necessary to success, without even an adequate, to +say nothing of an unusual, voice! Their singing of "Because I love you!" +has been the admiration of their local circle, even less musical than +themselves, and this little success has been enough to start them on a +career, doomed to certain failure. If they had only tried for church +positions in a large city in America, had competed in the open market of +their own country, they would have been saved a heartbreak and much good +money besides. + +I won a $1000 position almost at once, over the heads of many older and +more experienced competitors, on the merits of my voice alone. The +salary was my financial salvation, but, besides this, my general +musicianship was much improved by the practice in sight-reading and +_ensemble_ singing. I grew used to facing an audience, and found a +chance to put into use what I learned in my singing lessons. Blessed be +the quartet choir of America, say I; an invaluable institution for the +musical sons and daughters of our country. + +The church in which I sang had many wealthy members, and the +dress-parade on Sundays used to be quite a sight. Our place, as choir, +was directly facing the congregation, in a little gallery, so that our +hats and dresses were subjected to very searching scrutiny. The +furnishing of suitable garments for such an exalted position became +quite a problem. The soprano was a well-known singer, who, in addition +to a good salary, had many concert and oratorio engagements; and her +furs and ostrich feathers were my despair. I would sit up half the night +to cover a last-year's straw hat with velvet. I made an endless +succession of smart blouses which, as we were hidden below the waist by +the railing, I wore with the same "utility" black broadcloth skirt. I +constructed the most original collars and jabots for them out of odds +and ends. + +I remember one was made of a packet of silver spangles sewn in rows +overlapping each other like fish scales. One of my engagement presents +had been a silver mesh bag, and when I wore it at my belt, and the +collar round my neck, the choir used to call me "Mrs. Lohengrin." As we +took off our outdoor wraps to sing, my smartness in the gallery was +assured, but the cleverest manager can't contrive at home a substitute +for furs, and the soprano had chinchilla! I was years younger than the +others and they were very sweet to me. + +Living at my boarding house was a young doctor, who also would have +liked to be nice to me. But my exaggerated conscientiousness would not +allow me to have anything to do with one man while I was engaged to +another, and I refused all his invitations to the theatre and to +Saturday afternoon excursions. My one indulgence was in standing-room +tickets for the Metropolitan. What a boon to girls in my situation would +be the inexpensive municipal opera and endowed theatres of Germany with +their system of _Schule Vorstellungen_ (students' performances) of +standard plays and operas at prices that put a comfortable seat within +the means of even the most humble purse! This was the lack the Century +Opera would have supplied. + +My church engagement was to come to an end May first. The thought of +turning my back on the start I had made depressed me fearfully. I had +given my word to marry and did not think of wavering. But the letters of +my fiance and his rare visits to New York had not helped us to +understand each other better. Many hours I walked the floor longing for +advice, and wrestling with myself. I said to my sister, "I have my foot +on the first rung of the ladder and now I must take it off." It all +seems so simple now. Almost any other girl would have broken her +engagement without much thought. But I had not been brought up that way, +and so I had hours and days of misery. + +The one thought that comforted me was that I could go on at any rate as +well as it was possible in my own town, and though it would be much +harder to make a career from there, it _could_ be done with the +co-operation of my husband. It was hard for me to talk in those days, +but one day driving down Fifth Avenue in a hansom, a rare treat, I +remember my feelings were too much for me, and I burst through my +repression and told him how I _must_ develop that side of me, and he +said, "And I'll help you, little girl; you can count on me." I believed +him of course. But while I was dreadfully serious, he, as I learned +later, ranked my singing with the china-painting and fancy-work of his +relations, as a sort of harmless pastime, to occupy my leisure moments. +The truth was, of course, that, as often happens, he had entirely +mistaken my character, had made his ideal woman out of his head, given +her my outward appearance, and fallen in love with her. The real "me" +was a disconcerting stranger, of whom he caught only occasional +glimpses. + +About the first of May, I returned home. They were all at the station to +meet me; my fiance had even broken into his office hours to be there +too. We had seen each other seldom during my absence from home, for New +York was a long way off, and he was saving his pennies religiously for +the great event. When we married, our income would be a tight fit in +any case, and I could not help rejoicing that my singing might add +considerably to it. There were no $1000 church positions in our town, +but one or two of the churches paid respectable salaries to their +quartets, and I hoped soon to begin to make a concert career. + +For a little while after my return I was very happy. Every one was so +nice to me and seemed to think I had done remarkable things already. Our +church asked me to sing a solo the Sunday when the bishop was expected, +and I held a sort of reception afterwards and heard many pleasant things +about my progress. After my hard work and self-denial, the rest, the +gentle flattery, and the comfort of home surroundings were very welcome. + +Only with my fiance things were not so satisfactory. Something, I did +not know what, was the matter; but it all culminated one evening in his +saying that no married woman should follow a profession, that she should +find "occupation enough in her own home." This was really a great shock +to me, as he had promised me his support in my work so often. Imagine my +surprise after a three years' engagement, when he had his family tell me +just three weeks before the wedding that I was to give up all hope of +singing professionally after encouraging me in it during the entire +time. I knew by then that I could never be happy nor make him happy if +I gave up all thought of singing professionally. + +I asked him very quietly if those were his convictions, and, on his +affirmative answer, I took off his ring, returned it to him, and went +upstairs without one more word, feeling as if I had been awakened out of +a nightmare, and though still palpitating from the shock was +experiencing relief at finding it over. In my own room I stretched my +arms above my head and said, "_Free!_" A marvellous vista of freedom +opened to me after the months of strain. I could hardly bear to go to +sleep; it was so wonderful to plan how I could go ahead and study, +study. + +The next morning I saw my mistake in supposing the affair to be over, +for there ensued many trying days and floods of tears all round. Then +came the solemn and awkward returning of all the engagement cups and +saucers and knicknacks, to nearly our whole circle of acquaintance. My +family stood by me and performed this unattractive task, while I packed +up to return to New York. + +I had given up my choir, and now found it a difficult matter to get +another. All the churches had made their arrangements for the year and +the best I could hope for was occasional substituting in case one of the +altos was unable to sing. I made the round of the agents' offices. Some +heard me and were complimentary, some refused as their lists were full. +But when I mentioned the word "engagement," I was always met by the +rejoinder "No experience." I used to say to them, "But how can I ever +get experience if you won't give me a chance?" They would shrug and +answer that that wasn't their affair. + +It seemed a hopeless deadlock. No one would engage me without experience +and no one would give me an opportunity to become experienced. I knew +that the one way out of the difficulty was to go abroad and get +experience there. I have said that the idea of singing in opera had +always made a strong appeal to me, and I knew that I had some of the +qualifications necessary for the stage--a big voice, good +stage-appearance, and ability to act (we had always acted) as well as a +great capacity for hard work. But the essential qualification, without +which the others were all ineffective, was the financial support +necessary to get me there and to provide means of studying and of living +adequately while I prepared myself for opera. + +I despaired of obtaining this, but the way was suddenly opened for me in +what seemed a miraculous manner. Friends of mine in the church, Frank +Smith Jones and his wife, offered to finance me through my years of +preparation and for as long afterwards as I might need their aid. These +real friends were behind me for years, and I owe them more than I could +ever repay. They made it possible for me to have my sister with me, for +me, a rather delicate girl, an inestimable benefit. In the seventh +heaven of joy, I prepared to go to Paris to study with Jacques Bouhy, +recommended to me by my New York teacher. I packed my few clothes, some +songs, and a boundless enthusiasm, and set sail. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +PARIS AT LAST + + +I crossed on one of the steady big boats of the Atlantic Transport Line. +I remember only one passenger, a boy of even then such personal +magnetism that he stands out in my recollection as clearly as any one I +have ever met, though he was then only a young fellow and unknown to +fame. His name was Douglas Fairbanks and his ambition was to go on the +stage. He said as we neared England: "Well, some day we'll read, +'Conried of the Metropolitan Opera House presents Miss Kathleen Howard,' +and 'Charles Frohman presents Mr. Douglas Fairbanks.'" His prophecy, +which I recall even to the spot on the boat where he made it, and the +expression of his eyes which matched mine at that moment, has almost +been fulfilled. + +I reached Paris in the beginning of September with "my instrument" in +working order, with a smattering of French, a letter of credit for +$1000, and a large supply of courage. I found my voice adequate to all +my demands upon it, but the money just half enough (it was increased +the next year). As for my courage, I have had to go on renewing that +ever since, until it has become the largest factor in my success. Emma +Juch told me once that she always said it was not difficult to attain +success and make a career. Perhaps her success was made at a time when +the competition was less keen, but I at any rate could never agree with +her. + +I arrived in Paris early in the morning and went to a small hotel in the +rue Cambon. It quite thrilled me to ask the chambermaid for _eau chaude_ +instead of "hot water"; and I felt proud of knowing that the midday meal +was called _dejeuner a la fourchette_. I remember that meal to this +day--it began with radishes and butter, those inseparable companions in +France, went on to omelette, then cold meat and salad, with small +clingstone peaches and little white grapes for dessert. Red or white +wine was "_compris_," and the bread was a yard long, cut half through +into sections, and laid down the middle of the table. It was all +half-miraculous to me, and afterwards when I went out to stroll under +the arches of the rue de Rivoli I thought myself in fairyland. The +jewelry, lingerie and photograph shops delighted me, as they have +innumerable tourists, and the name "Redfern" over a doorway gave me a +thrill. The Place de la Concorde seemed one of the most beautiful places +I had ever seen, an opinion which I still hold, by the way, and I felt +like a queen when I called an open _fiacre_ and drove in state toward +the Arc de Triomphe, stopping to buy a big bunch of red roses for twenty +cents from a ragged man who ran shouting beside my carriage. In the +evening I went to the opera and wondered at the great stairway and at +the big auditorium, and still more at the poor performance I saw there +but which I accounted for by the fact that September is the dull season. + +That first day was all thrills. The next was spent in arranging hours +for lessons, and collecting pension addresses from all my acquaintances, +as I saw that it would be impossible to do my work in a hotel. I set +bravely out on my hunt for a dwelling place. Prices have increased +considerably since those days, for at that time it was possible to get +very good board and lodging on the left bank of the Seine for five +francs a day. My professor, Jacques Bouhy, however, lived near the Arc +de Triomphe, and I wished to be within walking distance. I toiled up and +down a great many stairs, and peeped into a great many rooms without +finding what I sought. I could not bear to wait a day to begin working, +and was just a bit discouraged, when I had the good fortune to meet two +girls from home, who gave me the address of the pension where they had +stayed. I rushed off at once to see it, and found a very nice house of +several floors, situated in a _cite_, a sort of garden behind the first +row of houses on the street, so that its windows faced a view of trees +and flowerbeds with circular gravel walks around them, instead of +cobblestones. + +The head of the pension was an old woman who looked like a Bourbon but +was really a bourgeoise. It was nearly noon when I arrived, but she was +still in a wonderful dressing gown of purple and yellow stripes, with +_chaussons_, cloth slippers, on her feet, and an elaborate coiffure of +dyed black hair above her yellow old face. She came to me in the salon, +a long narrow room with French windows framing tree-tops, the windows +and doors all hung with rose-red velvet which looked as if it had been +in place since the First Empire. There were sofas of rose, and chairs of +the same with black wooden rims, tables and mantel-pieces with thousands +of things on them, and an old-fashioned square piano in the corner. +Madame was most gracious, remembered the name of her former lodgers, +said they were _tres gentilles_, turned a neat compliment to the +American nation, and showed me the rooms herself. + +I chose a back one of good size, nicely furnished and hung with a pretty +chintz. It had a _cabinet de toilette_, or large cupboard for washstand +and trunks, opening off it, and I was to have it with complete board, +for two hundred francs a month ($40). The price was really higher, but +my arrangement was for the winter. I was to pay extra for light and +heat. The room had an open fireplace with a _grille_ or fire-basket in +it, for which I could buy _boulets_, coal dust pressed into egg-shaped +balls, for three francs a sack. Later, I could have had a _salamandre_, +one of the excellent small stoves which fit into the fireplace, really +warm a room, and require filling only once in twenty-four hours. But I +wanted something to poke, and I had an idea that Paris winters were not +very formidable. As a matter of fact, anything more penetrating than +their damp sunless cold it is impossible to imagine. + +For light, there was a huge lamp for which I could buy _luciline_, a +kind of highly refined kerosene which has no odour and burns well. I +made my bath arrangements with Jean, Madame's old servant, who with his +wife, Eugenie, was the real head of the establishment. I had bought a +collapsible rubber tub, and Jean was to bring me a big can of hot water +every morning. I found that I had to tip occasionally or the water +became as cool as Jean's manners. Madame showed me her dining room, and +told me with pride that her cuisine was of an excellence renowned. I +went to fetch my trunks and hire a piano, glad that my long search was +over. The piano was a small upright, a tin pan for tone, as are all +Parisian pianos _en location_, and it was to cost me ten francs a month, +with eight francs for carting. They are more expensive now. When it was +installed, my Lares and Penates on top of it, and my music on a stool +beside it, I felt that my feet were firmly planted on the ladder leading +to success. + +Then I began to work. And how I did work that winter! I had two singing +lessons a week, and a session with the opera class lasting three hours +in which we went through the dramatic action of our roles. I slaved at +my repertoire working three hours a week with a coach, and spending +hours and hours a day learning by heart at home. Of course I began with +the very biggest roles--we all do. The personalities of _Amneris_, +_Carmen_, _Dalila_, _Azucena_ in turn, all in their French version of +course, occupied my mind waking and sleeping. + +Jacques Bouhy was always kind, grave and courteous with me. The thought +of his having created _Escamillo_ and his real knowledge of French +traditions thrilled me. He lent me his copy of "Samson et Dalila" from +which to copy the French words. It had an inscription from Saint-Saens +"A M. Bouhy, _grand pretre et grand artiste_." He created the role of +the Grand Priest. + +The only time I ever saw him upset was one day after the Opera class. We +all thought him safely out riding as he always was on Mondays. My +letter, written at that time to my mother, says: + +"This morning in the opera class we had rather an unpleasant time. +Little N., with the beautiful tenor voice, has learned in one week the +first half of the _Samson_ duet for me. He has had to learn it from a +score which has only his voice part written in it. He is frightfully +down on his luck and with the gorgeous voice and speaking French can't +get anything to do, and has no money, not a cent to his name. We had +done that, some one else had sung, and having ten minutes left, Valdejo +told N. to sing again if he would. He was tired, but jumped up and began +the first part of "Faust." He kept forgetting it. Suddenly the door +opened and in walked Bouhy as white as a sheet. He commanded N. to stop +singing and to learn his things before coming again to the class. Said, +why did he sing like a baritone when he was a tenor, mocked him, told +him he was ashamed to have such sounds made _chez lui_, that he had been +a year on "Faust." What example was he to the others? Every one else had +always worked seriously. He stormed for five long minutes, N. standing +quite still, with his brown dog's eyes fixed on him--then he left the +room. It was frightfully uncomfortable for us too. I am sure I have +done just such rotten work so it may be my turn next. Of course Bouhy +was right. N. has been there a year and ought to know it; but he is just +tired out, and never sleeps he says. They say Bouhy is beginning to show +his age. This week he bounced his cook whom he has had for years." + +I had two French lessons a week, and should have had at least one +diction lesson besides, but for an invaluable course which I had taken +in New York with the Yersin sisters. These lessons were a nerve-racking +experience from which I used to emerge with my feathers all rubbed the +wrong way from the strain of trying to imitate the intangible +differences between the various French "e's." But I have always been +grateful for this rigid training, from the time when I first reached +Paris, and, though speaking very little French, could give an address to +a _cocher_ without having to repeat it, until now, when I can thank my +trained ear for a perfect accent in singing foreign languages. + +I think no one ever studied more unrelentingly than I, during that first +year of hot enthusiasm. I began early in the morning, and the only +reason that I did not burn the midnight oil was that I found it cost me +too much in kerosene and firing. I could keep warm in bed for nothing, +and _boulets_ were my pet economy. Coming from a country where a warm +room was taken for granted, and where the furnaces in hotels and +boarding houses might have been supplied by Elijah's ravens for all I +knew about it, I just couldn't bear to see my money burning away bit by +bit in a grate; and many a time I have put on my fur-lined coat rather +than add fuel to the dying heap of dreadfully expensive ashes in the +_grille_. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +PENSION PERSONALITIES + + +At first I had no companionship and very little recreation, beyond the +ever fresh wonder and delight of the Paris streets as I saw them in my +daily constitutional. One day I went with a girl friend to visit her +_atelier_. I wrote to my mother: + +"We spent a long time in the life-class room--nude, (not us but the +model). It was a mixed class. A large oblong room, filled with I should +think over a hundred students, mostly men. They sat in a circle facing +the model throne. The floor is not raised, but the effect of an +amphitheatre is produced by rush bottom stools of different heights. +They rest their pads or drawing portfolios on a railing in front of +them. The room is intolerably hot because of the model. What struck us +most was the intense silence and atmosphere of earnestness; no one +speaks and there is only the gentle rub-rub of the charcoal, crayon, or +pencil against the paper. The students look quickly up and down and +never move their glance except from their sketch to the model and back +again. She was a very pretty young girl and took graceful half-hour +poses. The one interruption was a quiet voice at the end of a half-hour, +'_C'est l'heure_'; and they stopped for a few minutes' rest. We went +into another room, where a picturesque old wretch with long black curls, +red velvet waist-coat, long blue cape, well thrown back, black, grimy +hands clasped around his knee, and clumsy, rusty boots stuck out in +front of him, was seated." + +Later one of these old models used to come to my brother. He had a card +on which was printed the list of poses he was prepared to take.--"The +twelve Apostles," "The Eternal Father" and "The God Jupiter." + +I found a little English tea-room about a mile away, and often went +there for tea and muffins which in those days were hardly procurable in +French places. The tea-habit is only about ten years old in France. The +people in the shop soon knew me by sight, which was just as well, as I +would begin going over the words of some part in my head and walk out +serenely, quite forgetting to pay for my tea. I still go there +occasionally when I am in Paris and remind them of that. I sometimes +went to the two operas and to the theatre, but not nearly often enough, +as I could spare neither time nor money, and the late hours made a +concentration on the next morning's work more difficult. The concert +world was a great disappointment to me. I think I longed for nothing so +much that year, as to hear great orchestral music well performed; but +the Lamoreux and Chevillard concerts did little to satisfy this craving, +and I was amazed at the roughness of the strings and the narrow scope of +the programs. Many of the great artists avoided Paris in their tours, +the reason given being lack of suitable concert halls. + +On the other hand, a whole new school of composition was opened to me +that winter by a fellow _pensionnaire_. Charles Loeffler and Henry +Hadley spent part of the winter in our pension, and Mr. Loeffler +introduced me to the French modernists. Later in the winter we often +talked over their works together. He used to stroll into my room about +tea time, saying he liked to watch me make tea for I had such attractive +fingers. He used to take me to the odd corners of his beloved Paris, +_cafes_ haunted by long-haired _Sorbonne_ students, and _cafes +chantants_, where the frank improprieties of the ditties were for me so +impenetrably disguised by the _argot_ in which they were written that I +did not understand a word of them. "When your French gets more +colloquial," he used to say, "I shan't be able to bring you here any +more. Oh! if you were only a man!" He always ended with this +exclamation, and I never knew why, for my woman-hood did not seem to +disturb him particularly. Perhaps he felt the want of a sort of Fidus' +Achates to confide in. He took me to two famous places, and this is my +description of them in a letter to my mother: + +"We went first to the famous 'Noctambules' in the Quartier Latin. It is +where the wittiest men of their _genre_ are to be found. They are many +of them decorated by the government. One hears witty topical songs, +_chansons d'amour_, and absurdities telling of the eels and fishes in +amorous conversation, such extravagances as the French love. There is no +vulgarity. Their diction is marvellous, and of course they sacrifice, +entirely, their tone to their words. All around the walls are posters +and drawings of famous artists and caricatures of Parisians. The +performers are called on in turn by the master of ceremonies, and take +their stand on a little platform in front of the piano half way up the +room. When they have finished, if they have been popular, we are all +called on to join in the _doublement_ for Monsieur so and so. This +consists of clapping to a certain rhythm, which is thumped on the piano: +1 2 3 4 5,--1 2 3 4 5,--1 2 3 4 5--1 2 3--and over again." + +In those days Charles Fallot was still at the "Noctambules" and used to +arise, very black and white and thin, and gaze at himself in the big +mirror opposite, while he gestured with his long, skinny arms and +thoroughly French hands, and delivered himself of his witty _double +entendre chansons_. Another night we went to a famous Montmartre place, +Boite a Fursy, but it was not at all the same thing, and we neither of +us liked it. + +Henry Hadley had the room above me, and often told me my hours of +playing "Carmen," etc., nearly maddened him. I always studied in bed or +at the piano, without singing, and rarely used my voice when committing +roles to memory. Hadley often had Cyril Scott, the English composer, in +his rooms, and I used to listen with joy to Scott's imaginative playing. +It was like birds sweeping and swooping, all keys and intervals were +interwoven. He always said, one hand on his forehead, "I have no +understanding for limitations of harmony or rules of tempo." And indeed +why should one have? He liked nothing older than Debussy and was +unspeakably bored by Gluck or Beethoven and their ilk, though he loved +"Carmen." Hadley still retained a strong admiration for Wagner and +respect for the old school, though he much appreciated the moderns and +the modern orchestra. I first saw Mary Garden as _Melisande_ with him. +We both sat rapt and spellbound to the end, transported by what was to +me a perfect revelation as to scoring for modern orchestra, the +intangible operatic form, and most of all the subtle imaginative acting +of Mary Garden. Her power of suggestion in those days was capable of +conveying any shade of thought or delicate mood to the spectator. That +performance has always been and will always be an inspiration to me. + +Hadley was always starting off on impossible journeys to Egypt and the +Orient, in search of "material." His talk was filled with the strangest +scraps of out-of-the-way information, like bright-coloured rags in a +dust heap. Bauer lived a door or two away, and I used to hear him +practising and then hear his concerts. A wordy war would rage at our end +of the table at dinner, while old Madame, from her seat of honour in the +centre, would cry, "_Mais francais, parlez francais, mes enfants!_ You +crush my ears with your English!" Of course, no attention was paid to +her. Joining passionately in the discussions, though not themselves of +the _metier,_ were two American girls, living on the top floor, who were +supposed to be writing a play together. One or another of the composers +was usually more or less in love with one or other of the girls, and +they took sides accordingly, for and against the recognized masters of +the past. The two were amusing, always doing something eccentric. + +At one time they had an incubator in their room, the gift of a passing +admirer, and we engaged passionately in raising chickens. The machine +was heated by a huge kerosene lamp, and they were always turning it too +high and having it fill the room with blacks and smoke, or letting it go +out altogether. However, two or three chicks, more strenuously +determined to live than the rest, managed to struggle out at length, and +their advent was heralded by the whole pension. We had marked our +initials on the eggs, one egg each, and when mine showed the first signs +of life, I held it in my hand till it was partly hatched. The little +pecks inside the shell were fascinating to feel in one's palm. As soon +as the chicks could walk, they were taken downstairs into the _cite_, +and their attempts to scratch gravel were hailed by the assembled +inhabitants of the garden in a rapture of several languages. One +Englishman wanted to make them little jackets, so he could take them for +walks in the _Bois_. + +Discussion was meat and drink to all these people. Their cry was +"Sensations, sensations! Let the artist experience everything in his own +person!" This doctrine sounded rather a menace to conduct, but talking +endlessly about sensations seemed to be equivalent in most cases to +experiencing them. Nevertheless, some of them indulged in desperate +orgies of black coffee and cigarettes as an invocation to their muse; +and one of the composers assured me that the great symphonic poem on +which he was at work, had been inspired by breaking a bottle of +Houbigant's _Ideal_ in a closed cab and driving for hours in the _Bois_, +inhaling the perfume. They loved to recount these Gargantuan excesses, +and were extravagant in praise of midnight oil, attic windows, and the +calm inspiration of early dawn after nights of frantic toil. They were +dreadfully sincere, and very amusing to watch, but it seemed to me that +there was a great deal of stage setting for very little play. They +tended the green shoot of their artistic development with such fantastic +care, that it was in danger of dying from too much consideration. +Personally, I was too busy, either for sensations or the analysis of +them, though I used to wonder what this Paris could be like into which +they journeyed and from which they returned full of tales of affairs and +lovely women and gorgeous houses. It all seemed most romantic and +interesting to me. + +The other end of the dinner table represented staid conventionality in +contrast to our anarchism. In the centre sat Madame and beside her her +life-long friend, the editor of one of the Paris newspapers. Some hinted +that he was something more than a friend, in spite of Madame's seventy +years. Opposite her, was Madame M----, once an American in the days of +long ago, but with no trace of it left except in her persistent accent. +She was reputed to possess one hundred dresses, and certainly the +variety of her costume was amazing; but as she was at least fifty-five +and had preserved every gown for the last thirty years, her annual dress +expenditure, after all, was probably not extravagant. Her old husband +was never allowed a word when she was present, so he revenged himself +for the privation by interfering with every game started after dinner in +the _salon_--bridge, poker, patience, no matter what it was, he always +insisted that the players were quite wrong and that he could show them +how it was done in the clubs. + +There was a young Russian girl with a pretty face and pretty clothes, +whose hands, however, betrayed her peasant origin. Her beautiful sister +was engaged at the Grand Opera, so she was an object of great interest +to me. There were some Swedes, and nondescript Americans, and a charming +French family, a mother and two daughters, bearers of an historic name, +who had come up from their _chateau_ in the South of France that the +girls might have masters in various "accomplishments," and were living +in the _pension_ from motives of economy. On Sundays their brother, a +young naval officer, used to dine with them. With his pale, aristocratic +face, and with little side-whiskers, the high stock of his uniform, his +strapped trousers and narrow, arched feet, he was like a John Leech +drawing come to life. Then there was a large Frenchwoman, Madame la +Marquise de Quelquechose, who lent the lustre of her title and her +ancestral jewels to our _bourgeois_ board. At least, she said her jewels +were heirlooms, but her ancestors must have had a prophetic taste in +jewelry, as I often saw replicas of her ornaments in the shops of the +rue de Rivoli. An old Englishwoman completed our list of permanencies. +In spite of twenty years' residence in Paris, she would still ask for +"oon petty poo de pang" in a high, drawling voice. There were transients +of many nationalities, but these were our regular inmates. + +An interesting man sometimes dined with us. Writing my mother about him +I say: + +"Last night Mr. H---- dined here and told us many yarns about Sarah +Bernhardt. He said once when he was in California he was asked to meet +her and they all went on a hunting picnic together. She dropped her robe +when she got to the island where they had _dejeuner_, undoing a wide, +heavy, Egyptian gold and precious-stone belt, and appeared attired in a +man's velvet hunting-suit. He says she adores to talk _cancan_, and +referred to the manager as 'that _cochon_.' After breakfast, she threw +the champagne bottles far into the lake and shot them to pieces at the +first shot. The only posey thing she did was when she undid her belt and +threw it far across the road, and when he asked her if that was the way +she treated such beautiful things, she said that the man who gave it to +her was domestic!... It is colder than charity here at present, at least +I feel it so in the house. I shall start my fire today for the first +time. Yesterday I bought a bunch of violets, and do you know why? To +keep myself from buying chestnuts, which are bad for the voice. You see, +if I spent my _sous_ for violets I could not afford more for chestnuts. +Thus prevented I myself." + + + + +CHAPTER V + +OPERATIC FRANCE VERSUS OPERATIC GERMANY + + +After a few months of strenuous endeavour on my part, I began to be a +little dissatisfied and restless. I saw clearly that in a year's time, +working at such pressure, I should have a sufficient repertoire to begin +my apprenticeship on the stage; but I did not see my way to a _debut_ +quite so clearly. I talked with the other pupils, to get their ideas of +progression. They all said, "When I make my _debut_ at the Opera," or +"the Comique." They were all sure of an opening at the top and +apparently would consider nothing less than leading roles in a world +capital. That was not my idea at all. I did not care about a _debut_. I +wanted to learn to act, to do my big parts over and over again before an +audience, to sing them into my voice, to learn to make voice, face, and +my whole body an articulate expression of all that the role had to say. + +I tried to find out how the singers of the two operas had made their +careers. Some, I learned, though doing leading work, still paid for +their performances by taking so and so many francs worth of seats every +time they sang. Some had gained a hearing by the influence of their +teachers. Some were there by "protection." The Russian girl's sister was +very beautiful, but she was not very gifted either vocally or +histrionically, and I wondered at her engagement, until I heard that she +was the _protegee_ of a certain rich man. The winners of the first prize +at the Conservatoire had a chance given them, and one or two had made +good to a certain extent, and still sang occasionally. But, I thought, +if the debutantes of the Conservatoire must be given an opportunity, +there can be very little room for other inexperienced singers, and +certainly none for foreigners. The "France for the French" spirit had +impressed me tremendously, as it must all foreigners in Paris. Generous +as the city is to them, she rightly gives her rewards to those of her +own race first. + +The opera class was another source of annoyance to me. The one idea was +"copy what I show you"--make a faithful imitation whether it expresses +what you feel or not; it doesn't matter what you feel so long as you +pour everything into the same moulds and turn out neat little shapes, +labelled "love," "hate," "despair," all ready for use, and all "true to +the traditions of the French school." The first lessons of all were in +standing and walking, and there began my sadness. The traditions +demanded that one's feet be set eternally at "ten minutes to two." Mine +would deviate from this rule, and I aided and abetted them in their +mutiny. My instinct was to sit down occasionally with my knees together, +instead of always draping one leg at the side of the chair. I often felt +like singing quite a long phrase with no gestures at all, instead of +keeping up a succession of undulating arm-movements. + +Our dramatic coach, a fiery individual, who chewed coffee-berries +persistently, struggled in vain to teach me to lay one hand on my heart +in the traditional manner, two middle fingers together, little one +crooked, thumb in. Sometimes mine looked like a starfish, and sometimes +like a fist, and both were taboo. Gestures had to melt into each other; +there were different ones for different emotions, and woe betide you if +you mixed them! There was a sort of test speech beginning, "_Moi, qui +vous parle._" The hand at "_moi_" had to be laid upon the chest in the +approved manner. I have forgotten the middle, but the end was, "_Et vous +jure, que je le ferai jamais!_" At _jure_ one elevated the right hand, +the first two fingers raised, and at _jamais_ the right arm described a +figure eight across the upper half of the body, with the gesture of +tearing away a long beard. We did this all winter and never reached +perfection, that is, an exact copy of Valdejo, our instructor. + +We had to practice the classic walk--slowly advancing, foot dragging, +stomach out, very lordly to see, one arm bent from the elbow with the +forearm and hand resting against the body--a most difficult thing. The +different versions were very comic, but the idea was excellent and I +used it later in "Orfeo." Certainly a pulled back tummy would not be in +character in a Greek tunic. + +Later, we had to act scenes from our operas, and there I got on better. +I used to get absorbed in the character to the extent of becoming +perfectly oblivious of my surroundings. I remember once, as _Dalila_, +throwing myself so hard upon the supposed couch of _Dalila_, that I +thumped my head on the marble mantel behind me. My watching class mates +burst into a snicker, and I into real tears of anger, not of pain. I had +entirely forgotten them when their giggles wrenched me back into the +present; but their great pride was never to forget themselves and always +to be ready to imitate the coach in cold blood. He, however, appreciated +that I had something in me, and used to thump me on the back, and call +me "Canaille!" when I did anything that pleased him--a curious +expression of approval. + +I am not denouncing the ordinary "opera class." This method of slavish +imitation doubtless has its usefulness for some people. The old order of +opera singer was often trained by such schooling. But Mary Garden had +opened my eyes to the new order of singing actors, and the old method +was no help to me. I longed for a real stage on which to try out my own +ideas, and find by experience whether they were right or wrong. I wanted +to gain that subtle quality, "authority," which is nearly as important +as voice itself, that routine which makes one forget the four long bones +of the body, and blends all its members into an instrument of +expression, homogeneous and harmonious. + +In my researches into the life-stories of French singers, I heard much +of "the French provinces" as a training school, and turned my attention +to accumulating all the information on that subject that I could gather. +I heard tales of southern audiences who cheered their singers to the +echo, waited in a mob to tear the horses from their carriages after a +performance, pelted them with flowers and expressed their approval in +other picturesque fashions. The reverse side of these tales is of +directly opposite character, when benches are torn up and flung over the +gallery by the "gods," disappointed at not hearing a favourite singer, +and the head of the unlucky substitute is the target for their missiles +till he makes good with a high note loud enough to pierce the din of +their protestation. If a wretched singer clears his throat loud enough +to be heard, he will be greeted at each entrance by a chorus of +throat-clearing from the gallery. If his acting of a part strikes them +as being pretentious or over-solemn, groans and cries of +"Shakespear-r-r-e" reward his efforts. To crack on a high note is the +certain signal for a riot of yelling and jeers, but the unhappy singer +must stick it out at any cost, for if he leaves the stage, they wait for +him outside and set upon him bodily. + +"If you've made the round of the Provinces," as Harry Weldon, who has +done so, once said to me, "you can sing in Hell!" + +Of course, not all provincial audiences are so "temperamental" as the +southerners, but, as far as I could learn, paid performances and +protection seemed to exist everywhere in greater or less degree. The +repertoire was limited and old-fashioned--the standard French operas, +"Faust," "Mignon," "Carmen," "Hamlet," were performed, with "Traviata," +"Trovatore," "Aida," "The Barber," some Meyerbeer, and many of the +lighter works, like "La Fille du Regiment." Among the more modern works +were "Werther" and "Manon" of Massenet, with "Boheme" and "Butterfly" +and perhaps "Louise." "Lohengrin" and "Tannhaeuser" were sometimes given, +but the big Wagner dramas, the classics of Mozart, Weber and Gluck, and +the moderns like Debussy, Dukas, Strauss, Humperdinck, seemed +neglected. Over all there hung a general lack of method, musical +thoroughness and discipline. I must confess that I judge largely by +hear-say, as the only provincial French opera house of which I have any +personal knowledge is that of Nancy. So it may be that I do "The +Provinces" an injustice. Of course, both Monte Carlo and Nice offer many +novelties. But then Monte Carlo is not a provincial French opera at all. + +On the other hand, the stories I heard of the great operatic machinery +of Germany began to attract me irresistibly. The organized system of +opera, the great chain of opera houses, the discipline of their rigid +schooling, the concentration and deep musical sincerity of their +musicians, the simplicity of German life, all seemed to offer what I was +looking for. The dramatic quality of my voice would have more scope in +their more varied repertoire, while surely in their hundred-odd opera +houses I might find a place to work out my ideas in peace. + +Every one thought me crazy. My teachers tried their hardest to dissuade +me, promising me a great career in France. But I felt a call to Germany +where I hoped to find the right conditions for my own development which +seemed lacking in France. The great barrier was the language--the +difficulty of singing in it, to say nothing of learning it, for I did +not know one word. Jean de Reszke said to me later, speaking of German +as a language for singing: "_Avec cette langue, vous n'arriverez +jamais._" (With that language, you will never succeed.) However, I have +said that I had a good deal of courage in those days, and I determined +to go to Berlin to try my luck. + +Not that I was tired of Paris. It is still my favourite city offering a +wonderful opportunity for broadening culture to those who can get into +touch with its art life. I owe it a great debt for deepening my artistic +perception, and developing that sense of true proportion which keeps one +from exaggeration on the one hand and pedantry on the other. But I +should not recommend Paris as the best school for the ordinary American +student of singing, who has no opportunity to penetrate into real French +life. There is no lack of sincerity in the real French institutions, the +Conservatoire, the schools of art, the Sorbonne--there are found +concentration, competition, and keenness enough. But the foreign student +of singing does not ordinarily come into contact with these +institutions. In the Paris vocal studios, as I know them, there is a +dissipation instead of a conservation of energy. The students expect to +win the crown without running the race, and money and influence play too +great a role. They (vocal students, I mean) tend to exaggerate their +little emotions into _grandes passions_, and hold the most +disproportionate views of their own importance. I do not mean to say +that I agree with a certain singer who brought back harrowing tales of +immorality among American students in Europe. Amongst all the hundreds +of vocal students I have known, I never met one case of flagrant +misbehaviour. In general the girls live quietly and strive according to +their lights, though there is not one in twenty with resolution enough +to concentrate on the hard work necessary for a great career. The +temptation is to fritter away both time and money on the things that +don't matter. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +PREPARING ROLES IN BERLIN + + +The first of September, without a word of German, I set out for Berlin. +My mother had come over during the preceding Spring, to make her home in +Paris with my sculptor brother Cecil and my sister. From this time on I +went to them for the summers, and my sister joined me when I went to +Metz, and has never left me since. It made it harder to leave both +family and Paris behind and go into an unknown land, but I felt it to be +the best way. + +Lilli Lehmann's studio was my objective point. I found her address in a +musical journal, and armed with that, and the address of an inexpensive +_pension_, I took the train. Arrived in Berlin, I took a _Droschke_, +directing the driver to my pension by showing him the street and number +on a piece of paper. Somewhere between that _Droschke_ and my room, my +travelling clock got lost, and what a time I had to recover it! The +apple-cheeked maid knew of the existence of no other language beside +her own. In vain I made a pendulum of my finger and tirelessly repeated +"tick, tick"--no gleam of intelligence dawned in her Prussian blue eyes. + +The first few days brought a series of disappointments. The Lehmann idea +had to be abandoned. She was out of town and recommended me by letter to +a certain Herr----, to whom she was sending every one who applied to +her. I found him a dear old man indeed, but one who had nothing to say +to me on the subject of voice production which I had not heard already. +However, I decided to begin the study of German repertoire with him, +painstakingly re-learning the operas I already knew in French, and +adding the new ones required for a German engagement. Later I found a +good _repetiteur_, who knew the operas thoroughly, quite sufficient and +much cheaper, as he charged only four marks ($1.00) an hour. I studied +the words of my roles with Herr----'s wife, who had been an actress and +a good one, and who laid the foundation of what I am proud to say is now +a perfect German accent. These lessons were five marks an hour and were +quite worth it. I would learn a role by heart, sentence by sentence, +looking up every word in the dictionary and writing in the translation +over the German, spending hours in fruitless search for a past +participle which did not look as if it belonged to its infinitive, the +only part of the verb, of course, to be given in the dictionary! Then, +sentence by sentence, I would go over it with Frau----, repeating each +word after her, sometimes twenty times! We also used those splendid +books, known I found afterwards to every German actor, in which +paragraphs of words with the same vowel sound or combination of vowel +and consonants are given to be repeated over and over again. Besides +this drudgery, I had German lessons for four months (at three marks or +seventy-five cents) for which I had to translate and write exercises. +All the labyrinths of the declension of articles, nouns and adjectives +in three genders and plurals, lay before me to be explored. The datives +and accusatives haunted my dreams by night, and by day I was reduced to +the sign language. + +I had left my first pension, and crushing down the temptation to live in +one of the big, gay German-American pensions, where justice is tempered +with mercy, so to speak, I moved myself and my piano into a real German +one, where I was the only alien. It was one floor of a large house in a +quiet side street--the top floor, and no elevator! I climbed +eighty-seven steps by actual count every time I came home from a lesson. +I had a huge room, heated by steam, with board for four marks a day. The +meals were _echt Deutsch_. Breakfast was set ready on the dining-room +table at some unearthly hour, and the guests went in and helped +themselves when they chose. The coffee and hot milk were kept warm over +little alcohol flames, and there were delicious Berlin rolls and the +best of unsalted butter. Dinner was at two, and was good in its plain +way. We had some North German dishes which one had to learn to enjoy, +like olives. Hot chocolate soup I grew quite fond of, but beer soup, +sorrel soup, and cabbage soup with cherries in it were never exactly +intimates of mine. One dish of baked ham with dumplings and hot plum jam +sounds strange, but improves on acquaintance; _Pumpernickel_, and +_Schmierkaese_ are better than their names, and _Kartoffelpuffen mit +Preisselbeeren_ (potato cakes with cranberries) are delicious. We had +good plain puddings and black coffee for dessert every day, and quite +wonderful roast Pomeranian goose and _Eistorte_ with whipped cream on +Sundays. Supper was at eight, and the menu was certainly a model for the +simple life. Bread and butter with slices of sausage and cold ham, +sometimes big dishes of roast chestnuts instead of cold meat, or +potatoes in their jackets, or some of the endless variety of +North-German cheeses--to drink, tea or beer, and that was all. + +My fellow pensionnaires were nearly all teachers, or students preparing +to be teachers. They all spoke German and nothing but German, and, at +first, I used to think my mind would drown in the overwhelming floods of +it that assailed my ears. Gradually it came to sound like individual +words and phrases, and soon I dared occasionally to launch a small +conversational barque upon it, avoiding the disastrous rocks of gender +as skilfully as possible, though often at first, by the time that my +genders and cases were all arranged for a sentence, the subject had +changed, and I could not use it. We had a Fraeulein Lanz, Fraeulein Franz, +and Fraeulein Kranz, four or five other Fraeuleins and no males at all. + +Another American student of singing came to live there, and in the +evening we used to go to the opera or to concerts together. Everything +begins early in Berlin, and those who had tickets for some entertainment +missed the eight o'clock supper. So plates of _belegte Broedchen_ (rolls +with cold meat) would be set out for them on the dining-table, and all +the others would be sitting there with their needle-work, and would +demand "_Nun, wie war es?_" when we came in. On Saturdays the evening +paper announced the program at the opera for the week, and we could +hardly wait to look at it. The cheaper seats are in great demand. +Students wait for hours, sometimes from earliest dawn, outside the box +office on Sunday mornings when the sale for the week begins. We had an +arrangement with the keeper of a little fruit and vegetable shop, to +save ourselves the wait. We would decide what we wished to see and go +over to his shop on Saturday evening to order the seats from him. He +then went down early enough to secure the front row in the top gallery +for us at two marks fifty, and we paid him twelve cents for his trouble. +Sixty-two cents is quite a high price in comparison to those of the rest +of the Opera House, for the orchestra chairs cost only eight marks. The +top gallery is vast, and the back rows are much cheaper, but the +authorities show their sense in keeping up the price of the front rows +and I don't think there is ever an empty seat there. To concerts we were +often admitted free, on saying that we were students, unless the artist +was a great favourite, and in that case we could buy standing room, or +seats in the gallery for one mark. We always went and came home in the +street cars, paying the two cent fare with a one cent tip to the +conductor, and dressing in our ordinary street clothes, with scarves +over our hair. I used to go alone sometimes, and was never spoken to or +molested in any way. No one looked at you twice, unless you looked at +him three times. + +On Sundays I would take a day off, and, in true German fashion, make an +expedition; in bad weather to some museum or picture gallery, in Autumn +or Spring to some out-of-door restaurant. Sometimes I was too tired to +go further than the _Tiergarten_. Then I would stroll gently across it +and have coffee and cakes at the _Zelt_, or big open-air refreshment +gardens where the band plays. They are the resort of _hoi polloi_ of +Berlin in countless family groups: the father rather fat with hirsute +adornments, the mother also rather massive, and their plump children, +all drinking beer out of tall glasses and mugs, or coffee in inch-thick +white cups, and eating wedges of highly decorated _Torte_, with or +without the addition of heaped-up whipped cream. + +If I felt more strenuous, I would take a car out to the Grunewald, a +villa-colony suburb, with roads winding through pine woods. I would sit +under the trees and invite my soul. As I sat there, some girl or boy's +school would come trooping by, singing a _Volkslied_ of interminable +verses, in four parts, having tramped all day for the pure joy of motion +in the open air. Then I would have coffee and a triangle of cherry pie, +and what cherry pie! at the _Hundekehle_, an immense restaurant on the +border of a small lake, accommodating I don't know how many fat +Prussians at once with refreshments. Every German town has some such +resort, where inexpensive creature comforts are the reward of a long +walk. Such an expedition of the whole family is their greatest treat, +and one in which they have the sense to indulge as often as possible. +Even on week day afternoons the housewives find time for a stroll, a +reviving cup of coffee, and a little gossip, though of course that is +not the same thing as going _en masse_ with Hans and the Kinder. Of +course, this was long before the war. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +MY FIRST OPERATIC CONTRACT SIGNED + + +By the first of December I had broken the back of the German +declensions, understood a good part of an ordinary conversation, and had +painfully acquired three or four roles in German. The gadfly of my +ambition began to torment me again, and I determined to look for a +"job." + +Students often ask me "How did you get your first engagement?" This is +how. I went to see the best agent in Berlin, Herr Harder, a man of the +highest reputation for fair dealing, who was the recognized head of his +profession. Opinion as to the agent's powers of usefulness is divided +among singers. Some maintain that they have made all their good +engagements independently, others tell you that you are safe only in the +hands of a reputable agent. I have closed contracts in both ways. The +agent is not omnipotent. It is his business to watch the operatic field +and notify you when there is a vacancy that he thinks would suit you. He +is apt to know first where such vacancies are likely to occur. Directors +who are looking for singers sometimes go straight to their favourite +agent. Then he, the agent, sends you word that Herr Direktor So and So +will be at his Bureau on such a day to hear singers. When you respond, +you may find yourself the only contralto among many other voices, or you +may find yourself one of six or seven all wanting the same engagement. +The agent keeps contract blanks in his office, and when he hears of a +vacancy in an opera house, he fills in a blank with your name, the name +of the theatre, and tentatively the salary he thinks they will pay, and +sends it to you. You sign it if it suits you, and return it to the +agent. This is really nothing more than a notification that there is, or +will be, such a vacancy, and is not worth the paper it is written on. +American girls, who do not understand this, will tell you that they have +"been offered Berlin, or Vienna, or Munich," when they have merely +received one of these _Agenten-Vertraege_. A contract is worth nothing as +such, until it is countersigned by the director of the opera house, and +yourself as singer. Even then, it is not valid until you have sung as +many "trial performances" at the opera house as the contract calls for, +and for which you may have to wait six months. + +I told Herr Harder what I wanted--a chance to do big roles somewhere, +salary no particular object, as I should look upon the experience as the +completion of my training. I sang for him, left with him my repertoire +and photographs, and he promised to let me know of the first opportunity +that presented itself. In a short time, he sent for me to come and see +the Director of the Theater des Westens, a Berlin theatre which at that +time was the home of a sort of popular opera. I sang for the manager, +and he was very complimentary. He offered to engage me at once, but he +added, curiously enough, that I was too good for him! They gave only the +older operas like "Trovatore," on which the copyright had expired, and +of these only the ones which the Hofoper did not give, so that I should +have no chance to sing my big parts. At the same time, he said he would +very much like to have me. The offer did not suit my plans, and I +decided to refuse it. I went on with my work until just before +Christmas, when Herr Harder made me a second proposal. This was the +position of first contralto in the garrison town of Metz in +Alsace-Lorraine. The opera was a municipal one, that is it was +subsidized by the town, they played a season of seven months, and gave a +large repertoire including some of the Ring dramas. I was to go down +there, sing for the management, and if they liked me, begin my +engagement the following September, giving me time to make additions to +my German repertoire. As I was a beginner of course I could not give the +usual guest performances. + +_Vorsingen_ is a trying ordeal. The great theatres have regular days for +hearing aspirants, but this was a small theatre. The appointment is +usually made on the stage, sometimes during, sometimes just after a +rehearsal. Groups of the singers regularly engaged in the opera house +stand in the wings, and you feel a nameless hostility emanating from all +of them, especially from the one whom you are going to try to supplant. +The theatre is like a cavern, and the acoustic is of course totally +unknown to you. Two or three pale spots down in the orchestra chairs +indicate the whereabouts of the director and perhaps the stage manager +and first Kapellmeister who have come to hear you. The overhead +"rehearsal lights" are very unbecoming and you are quite conscious of +it. If you are to sing with orchestra, the conductor presents you to the +players, "_Meine Herren, Fraeulein----._" You bow, and your insides slip +a few inches lower. My first _Vorsingen_ was with the piano. It stood at +one side of the stage, and a whipper-snapper of a third Kapellmeister +dashed more or less accurately into the prelude of the second aria from +"Samson et Dalila." + +Then came a momentous interview in the Director's office. I had sung +such good German, thanks to Frau----, that he had no idea that I +understood only about three words in five of what he said. For form's +sake he kept saying, "_Sie verstehen mich, Fraeulein?_" and when I +answered "_Ja_," he was satisfied. His wife, who thought she spoke +English, was present, and tried to say a great deal, but my German +proved the more serviceable of the two. I gathered that I was offered a +two season contract, to sing the leading contralto parts, at the +princely salary of 150 marks a month! (about $35). There was no +_Spielgelt_. Salaries are usually divided into so much per month down, +and so much per performance, the number of performances per month +guaranteed; that is, one is paid for a certain number whether one sings +them or not, and any performances over and above this number are paid +extra. If a performance is lost by one's own fault, through illness for +example, the _Spielgelt_ for that performance is forfeited. Three days +absence from the cast through illness, even though one may be scheduled +to sing only once during those days, is counted as one _Spielgelt_. + +Illness is, in fact, almost a crime. In addition to losing your money, +you have to have witnesses to prove that you are really ill, for theatre +directors in Germany are a suspicious lot and take nothing for granted. +If you wake on the morning of a performance with laryngitis, that dread +enemy of the voice, or if you fall downstairs on your way to the theatre +and sprain your ankle, you must notify the theatre before a certain +hour in the day, perhaps ten or twelve, or four o'clock, that you cannot +sing that night. Your word for it alone won't do. Every theatre has +special doctors on its list, and you must call in one of these, whether +he is your regular physician or not. He makes an examination and gives +you a signed statement that you are unable to appear, adding, if the +disorder be serious, how many days it will be in his opinion, before you +can return to work. It often happens that the man most experienced in +treating your illness, the best throat specialist in town, for example, +is not on the books as "Theater-Arzt," and then if you wish to be +treated by him, you sometimes have trouble with the theatre doctor. In +the theatre in which I was first engaged, I had a disagreeable +experience of this kind. I was ill with bronchitis, and sent word to the +theatre the day before, that I should not be able to sing _Marta_, in +"Faust," on the night scheduled for it. I had already committed the +deadly crime of illness once before that season, and this time my +defection was particularly annoying to the management because they had +to get a guest for "Faust" anyway, and they would be forced to send +posthaste for another to sing the _Nurse_. Their irritation with me was +equalled, if not surpassed, by that of the regular theatre doctor, whose +professional honour had been outraged the last time by my insistence +upon the services of a very clever throat specialist who lived in the +town, and whose aid I had had the bad taste to prefer to his own. +Between them, I was the corn between the upper and nether millstone. +Next day the theatre sent word that they would accept nothing but a +certificate from their own doctor, and the doctor shortly after appeared +at my bedside. I could hardly speak out loud, but managed to whisper a +request that he would write me an "_Attest_" for three days. To my +surprise he began to hem and haw, and finally stammered out: "There is +really no reason in my opinion, why you shouldn't sing this evening!" I +was so furious I saw red. I sat up in bed, and whispered savagely: + +"You say I can sing tonight! Very well, get out of my room, and I'll go +to the theatre and sing this evening, with my voice in this condition, +and _you_ will be responsible for the consequences!" He got up, twisting +his hat in his hands, and stammering something. I simply fixed my eyes +on him, and fairly glared him out of the room. Then I dressed like a +hurricane and rushed to the director's office. + +"I have come to sing _Marta_," I announced hoarsely. + +"Oh! _liebes Fraeulein_----" began the director, positively scared by my +pale face and furious eyes, "_Of course_ we don't want you to sing when +you are so hoarse. Doctor---- was quite mistaken; please go home and +take care of yourself. We'll get a guest for the _Nurse_ at once!" + +"Very well," I said, "I will go home if you say so; but remember +Doctor---- says I can sing, and I am ready to do so on his +responsibility." + +I went back after my illness to see the director, who to my surprise +began to attack me violently about my absence. He stormed, and thumped +the desk, and would listen to nothing I said. I tried to tell him he had +no right to speak to me in that way, as I had really been ill, and had +always done my duty when well. He raved back that I had _not_ done my +duty, and it seemed to me so futile to argue, that I walked out without +answering and left him raving. I went home and stayed there for five +days, and at the end of that time the director sent his secretary "to +explain" and ask me to return to my duty. It was an awkward interview +for him, poor man, so I let him off easily, graciously accepted the +somewhat disguised apology, and, as I was quite recovered and eager to +sing again, signified my willingness to appear the following night. + +To return to my first contract.--There was a formidable list of roles +which I must agree to have ready, and the director also insisted on my +studying with a certain well-known woman teacher in Berlin! I conveyed +to him as well as I could, that I would settle all this with my agent, +as I had no intention of agreeing to all of it, and was afraid to trust +my German to say so diplomatically. He added, "Of course you are too +good for us, Fraeulein." This was the second time I had been told I was +too good for an engagement. Every one seemed to think I ought to aim at +a secondary position in one of the big opera houses, rather than a +leading one in a smaller place. The prospect of singing pages or +confidants in a capital city, with perhaps one good role in a season, +did not meet my needs at all; but no one seemed to sympathize with my +ideas. I wanted to make a career in Germany, as if I were a German +singer, having my own recognized place in the opera house in which I was +engaged, singing the big roles by right, without intriguing or fighting +for them. + +On returning to Berlin, I wrote to Herr Harder that I would learn a +certain specified number of roles in addition to those I already knew, +making about twelve in all, and ignored the singing-teacher proposition +altogether as I had formed the intention of going to coach with Jean de +Reszke. On these terms the contract was returned to me signed by the +director, and I was engaged. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +MY ONE LONE IMPROPOSITION + + +"When I make my debut" was the phrase that I had heard so often on the +lips of my American fellow students. Each one had chosen her opera +house, and decided in which role she would dazzle a clamouring public. +Sometimes one more modest would choose Monte Carlo in preference to +Paris, or if she intended to make a career in Germany, she might +hesitate between the rival merits of Dresden and Berlin. But that the +theatre should be one of the half-dozen leading ones in the world, and +the role her favourite, were foregone conclusions before she left +America. + +In this respect, I quite shattered the tradition of the prima donna, for +I sang my first part in a small provincial German opera house, at +twenty-four hours' notice, and it was one of those which I have least +pleasure in singing. I remember that a well-known American writer, +living in Paris, said patronizingly to my mother a propos of my first +appearance, "Let us hope that she will make a real debut later, for +this can hardly be called one, can it?" "Well, after all," answered +my mother, "who knows where most of the great singers of today made +their debuts?" + +[Illustration: I CARMEN AS I USED TO DRESS IT] + +Contemporary fiction is full of opera singing heroines who jump into +fame in a single night, like Minerva springing full armed from the head +of Jupiter. Well, perhaps some of them do so--but I have never met a +singer, even of the highest international reputation, who has not had +some dark checkers of disappointment in his career. All his clouds may +have had silver linings, but sometimes the silver gets mighty tarnished +before he succeeds in struggling through the cloud, and sometimes +another singer gets through first and steals the silver outright. I +cannot say that I have ever been in great danger morally on the stage, +but my courage, my nerve, has been sometimes severely threatened, and I +have needed to summon the most dogged determination to keep it from +failing altogether. I feel sure that all successful singers share my +experience in greater or less degree, especially those who have been +trained in foreign countries. Not all of them, by any means, have been +through as severe a school as mine; few American singers at any rate, +have made a career in a foreign country exactly as if they had been a +native of it. Many have been engaged for special roles in one of the +larger opera houses, and after several years of experience, have sung +but a few parts, all of which have been those most suited to them. I +have sung, on the contrary, the entire repertoire of a typical German +opera house, where operas are regularly given of which the Metropolitan +audience has never even heard. + +In my first season, I sang in all fifteen different roles in the first +seven months of my career. I have appeared in eighty-five, ranging from +the Wagner music dramas to the "Merry Widow" and singing many of the +roles in three different languages. It has been "the strenuous life" in +its severest form, but I do not regret any of it, nor feel that my +effort has been wasted, for I know that I understand my _metier_, +comprehensively and in detail, and nothing can take away the +satisfaction of that. + +The beginning of the season found my sister and myself in the town of +Metz, as according to contract we had arrived six days before the +opening. The weather was hot and dusty, and the town seemed deserted, +for the regiments which gave it life and colour was still away at the +Autumn manoeuvres. We felt very forlorn at first, strangers in a +strange land with a vengeance, and without the least idea of what the +immediate future might hold for us. My German had improved considerably +since my interview with the director, but my sister did not know one +word. Luckily for her there was almost as much French spoken in the +town as German. There were many shops of absolutely French character, +where she was treated with great consideration as coming from Paris. +Even the officials of the town, the post office employes, custom +officers, and others with whom she came in contact, though rather deaf +in their French ear, would make shift to understand her if necessary, +adding an extra touch of rigidity to their already sufficiently severe +manner, in order to nip any "French familiarity" in the bud. + +We went to the hotel that had been recommended to us, as the principal +one in the town was in the process of reconstruction and swarmed with +plasterers and carpenters. It was rather a dreadful place, with enormous +dark rooms, dingily furnished with heavy old-fashioned furniture; but it +was very near the theatre and as we meant to find lodgings later, we +tried not to be depressed by its gloominess. + +Of course, the first thing we did was to visit the theatre. To reach it +one crossed a bridge over the river, picturesquely bordered with old +overhanging houses, then a cobblestone "Platz," and there, rather shabby +but still quite imposing, it stood. On the way I read my name for the +first time on a German poster, with a distinct thrill. I knew my way to +the stage-entrance, and through it to the Direktor's Bureau, where +several shocks awaited me. I learned that the man who had engaged me +had been superseded by a new one, who had not yet arrived. Matters were +in charge of the stage manager, a huge, towering creature, with a great +bass voice, who was a rather remarkable actor. He had come down in the +world, having begun life as a cavalry officer, and he had strange gleams +of the gentleman about him, even then. He was, by the way, the one man +in the profession who ever made me a questionable offer. He grew to +admire me very much as time went on, and one day, after I had been there +some time, he asked me to sign a further contract with the theatre. + +"You'll never get anything very much better," he said, "as you are a +foreigner. We'll make a good contract with you, and perhaps, later--who +knows?--you may have a 'protection salary.'" + +He paused to see the effect of his proposal, and was met with absolute +non-comprehension on my part, as I really did not understand, at the +time, the German words he was using. He dropped his proposal there and +then, and the affair had no unpleasant consequences for me, as he never +referred to it again. And that is the single instance of that sort which +I have encountered. Nevertheless, I might possibly have had further +trouble with him, for my appearance really seemed to appeal to him very +much, later in the winter. Just before Christmas, however, he died, +almost overnight, as we were in the midst of rushing a production of +"Trompeter von Saekkingen." He had informed me on Friday night that I +should have to sing the _Countess_ on the following Tuesday. I did not +know a word of it, and was on the way on Saturday morning to get the +score, when I heard that he was dangerously ill--and by Sunday morning +he was dead. Poor man! he had some good qualities and real talents, but +it turned out that he was a great scoundrel and had been robbing the +direction left and right, under the pretence of assisting the new +director. + +This new director, who had never even heard my voice, had been a +well-known Wagnerian singer in his day and intended to take some of the +principal baritone roles in his new position, to the intense disgust of +the regular _Heldenbariton_. All the outstanding contracts had been +taken over in his name. This sudden change of management, during +vacation time, made a little trouble for me as it happened. None of the +present staff had heard me sing. They knew only that I was a foreigner +without experience, heard that my conversational German was not yet +perfect (a much rarer accomplishment than a perfect accent in singing), +and therefore doubted my ability to do the work of the first contralto. +So they had engaged a native, which meant that it was "up to me" to +prove myself capable at the first opportunity or lose the chance of +doing first roles or perhaps be dismissed altogether. + +Our hotel was impossible for a long stay, and, of course, after my +Berlin experience, my first idea was a good German pension. We went to +the _Verkehrsverein_--the Information Bureau which is a feature of all +German towns, and asked for a pension address. The man in charge shook +his head. There was only one such place, he said, and he feared that it +would not suit us, but we might go and see. We went accordingly, and +found a nice-enough looking house in the newest quarter, quite the other +side of the town from the theatre. The inside of the house, however, +told its own story--concrete floors, whitewashed walls with garish +religious prints on them, and deal furniture with red and white table +covers much in evidence. The bedrooms were cell-like and garnished with +mottoes, while a Bible and candlestick by each bedside were the only +other decorations. + +"What is this institution?" we asked. + +"It is the German Young Ladies Evangelical Home, for Protestants only," +we were told. + +We thanked the Matron, and decided that we were neither German, +Evangelical nor young enough for such a home, even though we might be +ladies and Protestants. + +Disappointed in our hope of finding a pension, we returned to our +friend of the Information Bureau, this time to ask for addresses of +furnished rooms with a decent landlady to attend to them for us. He +shook his head once more--it was very difficult in a garrison town, he +said, to be certain of the character of a house which had furnished +rooms to let. + +"But where do the artists of the theatres usually live?" we asked. + +"Oh! they either take furnished rooms, or bring their own furniture," he +answered, "or live in the smaller hotels. But then they are Germans and +used to judging in such cases. There is, however, an English lady living +here who knows the town thoroughly, and you had better go to her and get +her to find rooms for you." + +As we felt that we could not possibly ask a totally unknown Englishwoman +to find lodgings for us, my sister set out on the hunt alone. As a +foreigner speaking no German, and a woman looking for rooms all by +herself, she was received in a very curious manner by most of the +landladies she visited, and evidently looked upon with strong suspicion. +We were getting desperate, as the time of my debut was coming nearer and +nearer and we were still unsettled. Finally we resolved to throw +ourselves upon the mercy of the unknown Englishwoman after all, and +wrote her a note begging her assistance in finding two furnished rooms +near the theatre, with a _Hausfrau_ who would look after them and serve +our breakfast. We had to find a furnished apartment as we were not like +some of my colleagues who possess their own furniture and pass their +lives in a sort of singing journey through the country, always +surrounded by their own household goods. + +[Illustration: CARMEN AS I NOW DRESS IT] + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +THE MAKINGS OF A SMALL MUNICIPAL OPERA HOUSE + + +Early the next morning, before we were up, our English friend kindly +came to see us, and with her help we soon discovered just what we were +looking for, in an eminently respectable house, where the _Hausfrau_ was +the wife of a policeman, so that we were under the shadow of the majesty +of the law. + +A young doctor had the rooms, but she assured us that he was moving +immediately, and that we might send our trunks the following day. We +duly arrived the next afternoon with an avalanche of baggage and found +that the poor young man had had no intention of leaving before the end +of the month and had even invited guests for that very evening! Floods +of German ensued between him and the _Hausfrau_, while we sat +philosophically on our trunks in the hall and waited. Presently she +emerged, rather heated of countenance, to say that it was all arranged, +and to begin moving our things into the bedroom. The doctor called us +into the sitting-room, waived aside our explanations and thanks for his +gallantry, and shutting all the doors mysteriously, proceeded to the +only revenge in his power--to defame the character and impugn the +honesty of our future hostess. + +"Keep things locked, I warn you, keep them locked!" he repeated +earnestly, all the while cramming books, bottles and garments +promiscuously into a trunk. + +We made allowances for his need of reprisal, and took his warning with a +grain of salt; and as a matter of fact our landlady never touched +anything of ours except what she doubtless considered her proper +"commission" levied upon our coal and kerosene. She was quite +satisfactory on the whole, except that she _would_ quarrel very noisily +with her policeman from time to time, or rather he with her. When we +remonstrated and said that we could not stand it and that she shouldn't, +she answered that she would be only too glad to get out of her bargain, +but that she had put her money into this marriage and therefore had to +stay in it! + +Her small boy was named Karl, but she always called him "Schweinsche'." +She had a few wisps of greyish drab hair wound round a sort of +steering-wheel of celluloid in the back. On Christmas my sister hunted +for hours for a present for her, and finally returned with a +magnificent set of rhinestone-set haircombs. I have always wondered what +the poor woman did with them, as her hair could not have covered an +eighth of their prongs. + +The reason for the summary dismissal of her former tenant was, of +course, the extra money that she made out of our being foreigners who +did not know the tariff, and the fact that there were two of us to be +served. We paid sixty marks, fifteen dollars, a month for the rooms, +service and breakfast of coffee and rolls, and little as this seems, I +don't suppose the doctor had paid a penny over forty. Our colleagues +thought us spendthrifts and gullible foreigners, as they paid about +thirty marks and got their own breakfast. + +My sister had two chafing dishes on which she cooked our supper, but the +two o'clock dinner was a problem. I was too tired after the strenuous +morning rehearsals beginning at ten o'clock, and the strain of trying to +follow all the directions I received in German, to go to the Hotels or +restaurants for dinner, as most of my colleagues did. Our landlady +suggested that she should have it fetched from the officers' mess of the +crack cavalry regiment, whose barracks were near by. She said this was a +usual arrangement. We bought a sort of tier of enamelled dishes, fitting +into each other and carried in a kind of wickerwork handle. One +contained soup, the next meat, the third vegetable, while bread or +dessert reposed in the top. We can testify that even crack regiments are +not unduly pampered in the Fatherland, for anything plainer, or more +unappetizing than these dinners, I have never tried to eat. Perhaps they +gained something when served hot in the officers' _Casino_, but we found +it almost impossible to down them, eaten out of our enamel-ware dishes. +After a time, when the newness of everything in the theatre had worn off +a little, and I began "to feel my feet," we arranged to dine at the +hotel where many of the colleagues met daily. This was a far better +plan, as, in addition to a really hot meal, we had a splendid +opportunity to improve our German. I was naturally making rapid progress +in it, but my sister still had to confine herself to the shops where +they understood French. One day when I came home from rehearsal, she +told me that our _Hausfrau_ had repeated to her a long piece of gossip +in German. Seeing by my sister's face that she had not understood, the +woman said, "Oh, you don't understand, Fraeulein. Well, I'll say it all +over again in French." Then she proceeded to repeat it again, very +loudly and slowly--in German! + +Of course it is rather dreadful to be called just "Fraeulein" by your +landlady in Germany, but the social standing of the singers and players +in a provincial theatre is usually not high enough to warrant anything +else. A position in an opera house in a capital city, or in a +Hoftheater, confers social importance enough upon its holder to entitle +her to the prefix _gnaediges_ (gracious) before the ignominious +_Fraeulein_, which in society is properly used to designate only a +governess, a companion, or a saleswoman in a shop. + +Titles and forms of address are a ticklish subject in the Fatherland, at +any time. It is hard to comprehend the mazes of male progression from +the simple "Rat," through the subsequent variations of Hofrat (court +councillor), Geheimer Hofrat (privy court councillor), Geheimrat (privy +councillor), Wirklicher Geheimrat (really truly privy councillor), to +the lofty dignity of Excellenz. + +Old-fashioned ladies used to employ the feminized version of their +husband's titles, and I once knew an old dame who insisted upon being +addressed as "_Frau Oberlandgerichtsraethin_." The bourgeoisie used to +copy the aristocracy in this respect, and at the afternoon +Kaffeeklatsch, Frau Hofcondittor Meyer would inquire about the health of +Herr Strassenbahnsinspektor Braun, from his wife the Frau +Strassenbahnsinspektorin (street car inspectoress). Modern life is too +crowded perhaps for such lengthy addresses, but Frau Meyer and Herr +Braun are certainly less picturesque cognomens. Among the artistocracy +the proper titles and forms of address have many pitfalls for the +foreigner, though I used to dodge them fairly successfully by addressing +every woman older than myself as "_Gnaedige Frau_" irrespective of her +"handle," and the men by no title at all, except in the case of a prince +not of royal blood, who has to be called by the mouth-filling courtesy +title of _Durchlaucht_. + +Of course in letter-writing this way round is not always possible, and +here the complications are simply terrifying. The salutation of a lady +without any title at all ranges all the way from "Wertes Fraeulein" +(Worthy Miss), almost an insult to a person of any gentility, to the +punctilious "Hochvereherte und gnaedige Frau" (Highly honoured and +gracious lady) of high society. Even the envelope provides a subtle form +of insult or of flattery. In Germany one is simply born, well-born, +highly well-born, or high born as the case may be. If you are rightly +entitled to the third, how irritating to be publicly branded on the +outside of a letter as only well-born. On the other hand, if you really +belong among the merely born, what a delicate attention to be +acknowledged "_Hochwohlgeborene_" for all the world, including the +_Portier's Frau_ to see! Shops in writing to you (as long as your credit +is good) love to employ the latter on the envelope, repeat it in the +body of the letter which always begins "Highly honoured and gracious +Miss" and sign themselves "Mit Vorzueglicher Hochachtung"--"with +magnificent respect." Friends, of course, call you just Fraeulein +So-and-so, as we should say "Miss Brown," except if they are young men, +when they usually stick to the "gracious Miss." You must never inquire +for the members of a person's family without the Mr., Mrs., or Miss +being added: "How is your Frau Mother, Herr Father, or Fraeulein Sister?" +There is a curious phrase for parents--"How are your _Herren_ Parents?" +being the strictly correct form of question. + +Yes! Etiquette is very complicated in Germany and requires a great deal +of study from the "Out-lander." + +To return to the theatre--we expected that my sister would have the run +of my dressing-room, and that she might be present at the rehearsals. We +found on the contrary that the most rigorous rules were enforced to +forbid entrance to the theatre to any one not a regular member of the +staff. No one else was allowed to pass the porter's lodge. There were +regular dressers provided by the theatre, and my sister was present only +once or twice at rehearsals during my two seasons in Metz and then only +by special request. + +The rehearsals for the next day were posted at the stage door. They were +not printed or typed, but written in German script, with chalk on the +blackboard. They would be placed there at six o'clock every evening, and +my sister used to go over to find out for me what they were. She could +not read German script at all, neither could I, very well; so she used +to take paper and pencil and laboriously draw everything on the board, +chorus calls and all, for fear of missing something. Then, letter by +letter, we would puzzle it out, and find out the hours of my rehearsals, +as if they had been written in cipher. She was always present at my +performances. + +I had to write, "I beg in the most polite manner for a seat for my +sister for this evening's performance," and drop it into a special box +before half past eleven in the morning. Then in the evening, if there +were a vacant place in the orchestra chairs, she would have it. On +Sundays the house was often _ausverkauft_, sold out, so we generally +bought a seat if I were singing on that night, so as to be on the safe +side. The prices ranged from four marks for box seats, to five cents in +the gallery. The orchestra chairs cost three marks (75 cents), but +nearly every one had an _Abonnement_, or sort of season ticket, which +made them much cheaper. The rates for officers were very low indeed. The +chief cavalry regiments had the boxes between them, and the less +important lieutenants of the infantry or the despised engineers had +seats in the first balcony. Years ago, in the old unregenerate days, +these boxes full of young cavalrymen furnished almost more entertainment +than the stage. The boxes had curtains to be drawn at will, and the +young rascals would order champagne served to them there, and drink +toasts loudly to their favourite singers in the midst of their +performances. Some of the frail fair ones of the town would visit them +behind the drawn curtains, and there were high times generally. This has +all come to an end, gone the road of other equally charming old customs, +and I saw very little misbehaviour among the lieutenants, except +sometimes when the provocation was really too strong for them. One +evening a very solemn young White Dragoon, over six feet tall, coming in +in the half darkness after the curtain was up, missed his chair and +plumped down, sabre and all, on the floor of the box instead, to the joy +of his comrades; and once in a Christmas pantomime, they all forgot +their military dignity at the spectacle of a very fat young chorus girl, +whom bad judgment on the part of the ballet mistress had costumed most +realistically for the part of a white rabbit. + +Sunday is usually chosen for the first night, as a larger proportion of +the inhabitants is at liberty on that day. At our theatre, performances +of opera were given on Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday nights, with +plays or _Possen mit Gesang_ (farces with singing) on alternate nights. +The bill changed every night, but each standard opera was repeated three +or four times in the season. New operettas like the "Merry Widow" were +also produced, and, if successful, ran eight or ten times during the +seven months of the season. There was a company of singers consisting of +a "high dramatic" soprano, a "young dramatic," a coloratura, and an +"opera soubrette," all sopranos. There was a leading contralto, a second +contralto to do the very small parts, who was usually a volunteer +without pay, and a "comic old woman," who also took part in the plays. +There was sometimes another volunteer soprano to do pages and the like. +Then there was the "heroic tenor," who is a sort of King and is treated +by the management with some of the ceremony used toward royalty, and the +lyric tenor, quite humble in comparison, and a tenor-buffo for "funny +parts," with sometimes a special operetta tenor when the theatre was +prospering. There were two baritones, "heroic" and "lyric," a "serious" +and a "comic" bass, and one or two other men of more or less anomalous +position who "fill in" and act in the plays. The only singers who never +did anything but sing, were the two "dramatic" sopranos, the first +contralto, and the heroic tenor and baritone. There was a company of +actors besides and all of these, no matter what their standing, were +expected to appear in such operas as "Tannhaeuser" in the singing +contest, in the church scene of "Lohengrin," and as _Flora's_ guests in +"Traviata," to help "dress the stage." + +It is not the least of one's troubles as a beginner to stand on the +stage as _Ortrud_, perhaps, and see these supercilious real actresses +come filing out dressed as court beauties, cynically watching your +attempt at acting. + +Actors have their proper range of parts, called _Fach_ in Germany, and +special designations like the singers. The chief of them are the +_Jugendlicher Held_ or Young Hero, corresponding to the Heroic Tenor, +and his partner the _Erste Heldin_. Nearly as important, however, are +the _Erster Liebhaber_, or Young Lover, and the _Jugendliche Liebhaberin +und Erste Salondame_--Young Lovehaveress and First Drawingroom Lady. +There are the _Helden Vater_ and _Heldin Mutter_, the _Intrigant_ or +Villain, and the _Bon Vivant_ (pronounced Bong Vivong) who is a sort of +general good fellow and occasional hero. The _Erster Komiker_ is always +a popular figure with the public and has his subordinate funnyman, +usually much younger. There is a soubrette to do the saucy maid parts, +a _Naive_, what we should call Ingenue, and a _Komische Alte_, or funny +old woman; several "drawingroom ladies" and "gentlemen" and minor +"_Chargen Spieler_" or character actors. The small parts are usually +filled by chorus men and women, and the opera soubrette or the operetta +tenor, have to double and do the cheeky maids or giggly school girls and +giddy young officers in the plays. Many of the minor actors were, or +were assumed to be, sufficiently musical to take small parts in operas +requiring a large cast, appearing as _Telramund's_ four nobles, and as +_Meister_ in the first act of "Meistersingers" or as competitors in the +_Preissingen_ in "Tannhaeuser." The opera gains very much by having these +experienced actors in the small roles. + +Our chorus was composed of about thirty members, and the orchestra of +from forty to fifty, reinforced in the brass and wind instruments from +the local military bands. Three Kapellmeisters held sway over them: the +First Kapellmeister an autocrat with arbitrary power who directed the +important operas, the second who lead the old stagers like "Martha" and +"Trovatore" and the operettas, and the third who was usually a volunteer +learning his profession, and who acted as repetiteur for the soloists +and directed pantomimes, the songs in the farces, and "Haensel und +Gretel" once a year if he was good. He was always on duty during +performances to direct any music behind the scenes. In good theatres +there are several of these young men, as in "Rheingold" for example each +Rhine daughter ought to have one to herself, and there is a special +repetiteur for the chorus or chorus master besides. + +Our ballet was composed of a solo dancer and about sixteen coryphees, +directed by a _Balletmeisterin_ who also shared the leading parts with +the solo dancer. One of the girls,--Irene, was a big handsome creature +who usually danced the boy's parts. She had a little girl of about six, +who had apparently no father. During the second year I was told one day: +"This is Irene's wedding day; will you say something to her?" It +appeared she and her clown husband had been devoted to each other for +years, but had neglected the ceremony as they neither of them could earn +enough alone to support the two. The clown ("August," of course) could +not find an engagement in the theatre and so they had just waited. He +had just returned from a long world tour and now they were to be +married. Every one was delighted. + +Last but not least, came the supers, called in Germany _Statisten_, who +held spears in "Aida" and returned victorious in "Faust." They were +drawn from the infantry regiments and received thirty pfennigs (7-1/2c) +a night. They arrived with their _Unteroffizier_ an hour before they +were wanted and were turned into a big room to be made into warriors, +captives, or happy peasantry. The result was sometimes amusing. In +"Aida" they used to put on their pink cotton tights over their +underwear, so that one saw the dark outline of socks and the garters +gleaming through, and they all kept on their elastic-sided military +boots, with the tabs to pull them on by, sticking out before and behind. +Fortunately the audience had but a brief glimpse of them before they +were ranked in a conglomerate mass at the back of the stage. Sometimes +on our walks we would meet these men on sentry duty, or in batches with +their _Unteroffizier_, who would call out, "_Au-gen rechts!"_ (Eyes +right!) and give us the officers' salute with mighty grins of +recognition. + +The principals of the opera are usually talented young singers on the +way up, or older singers of some reputation on the way down, with +perhaps a sprinkling of those who have obtained their engagements by +influence. The contracts are usually for from two to three years, and +are not very often renewed. The talented ones go on to better +engagements, and it is "better business" for the theatre to have a +change of principals. Great favourites remain longer unless they get +something better. Many of those who were engaged with me in Metz have +made careers. Two were at the Charlottenburg Opera House in Berlin at +the outbreak of the war, and one in Hamburg, both in leading positions. +One was a stage-manager at the Volksoper in Vienna, and one teacher in a +conservatory. + + + + +CHAPTER X + +MY DEBUT AND BREAKING INTO HARNESS + + +I had to sing _Azucena_, my first part on any stage, without rehearsal. +The reason for this dawned upon me afterwards. Though I sang German well +by this time, my conversational powers still left something to be +desired. I have explained that the present director had never heard my +voice; no one knew of what I was capable, and they quite expected that I +would prove incompetent, and had engaged a native born contralto to +provide for this contingency. + +When I heard one evening, that I should have to sing _Azucena_ on the +next, I confess that something rather like panic assailed me for a few +minutes. The stage manager called me onto the stage, and spent half an +hour in showing me the entrances and exits, and giving me the merest +outline of the positions. That is all the preparation I had for my +so-called debut. The other members of the cast had sung the opera +together many times the year before, which made the performance +possible. The lyric tenor was a decent enough colleague, though an +absolute peasant in behaviour, with an extraordinary high voice which +was rapidly degenerating from misuse. The baritone was of the tried and +true type, and a great favourite, and the soprano was easy to get on +with. They were all nice enough to me, if somewhat uninterested and +indifferent, for I had had as yet so little to do with them that we +hardly knew each other. They thought me a rich dilettante at that time I +fancy. I was so horribly nervous all that day that I fainted whenever I +tried to stand up, and when I began to sing my sister did not recognize +my voice. However, I was very well received indeed, all the criticisms +the next day were favourable, and there was no question after that as to +who should sing the leading roles. + +It was fortunate for me that I succeeded in pulling myself together +sufficiently to make a success, as at that time the old system of +_Kuendigung_ was still in force. I have said that a contract was not +valid until the singer had successfully completed the number of guest +performances stated therein. I had not been called upon for these +_Gastspiele_ because I was a beginner, but they are almost invariably +included in the contract. Now-a-days your engagement is settled after +you have successfully made these trial appearances, and you then remain +in that engagement for a full season; and the management must let you +know before February first (sometimes January first) whether you are to +be re-engaged or not. This is in order to give the singer time to make +arrangements for the coming season. When I was engaged in Metz the +management of a theatre had the right to dismiss any singer after three +weeks, whether he had made his guest appearances beforehand or not, if +he had failed in that time to make good with the public. He was also +liable to dismissal after his first appearance, if he proved quite +impossible. This was what they were expecting in my case. The +arrangement was most unfair to the poor singer, leaving him stranded +(with practically no chance of work that year) after he had moved all +his possessions and thought himself established for the season. The big +artists' society, the _Genossenschaft_, which is the only protective +institution for singers in Germany, has at last succeeded in abolishing +this unjust condition of affairs. There was a flagrant case of this kind +in the theatre during the first three weeks of my engagement. The "high +dramatic" soprano had finished the first three weeks of her engagement, +during which she had had to learn two new parts, providing costumes, at +her own expense, for a role which she had not expected to have to sing. +She had had a fair success and thought herself secure. In the meantime, +the management had had no idea of keeping her on permanently, but had +merely engaged her to fill in the time, while they were waiting for +another singer, who was filling an out-of-season engagement elsewhere, +and could not report for three weeks. When she was free, they told the +first one that she had not pleased sufficiently and dismissed her. The +good theatres did not take advantage of this privilege of course, even +while it still existed. + +My second role was a very small one, one of the court ladies of "Les +Huguenots." A native first contralto would probably not have been asked +to do such a small part, but there being no regular part for my voice in +the opera, I think they were glad to use my good stage appearance, and +of course, as a beginner I made no protest, being glad of every chance +to become more used to the stage. The part was sprung upon me suddenly, +and I had no dress for it. The second contralto also had a court lady to +do, and the good creature offered to lend me a gorgeous Elizabethan +dress of white satin and silver (which, she told me, she also intended +to wear as _Amneris_!) and she would "go in black." I was touched, but I +could not deprive her of her splendour, so we arranged something out of +the pointed pink bodice of one of my other gowns, and the long white +skirt of a summer dress, with a ladder arrangement of pink velvet bands +sewn on up the front. + +I remember as I made my entrance, looking up suddenly and seeing the +sinister eyes of Carlhof the stage manager, fixed on me from the wings. +He proceeded to mock my walk, which was no doubt very American, and not +that of a court lady at all. I never forgot the mental jolt it gave me +and the sudden realization that every role should have a different walk. + +The range of parts that one is called upon to perform is astonishing. +Formerly the limits of a _Fach_ (line of parts) were more rigidly +observed than at present, when the personality of a singer in relation +to a role is more often taken into consideration. Still, if a role +definitely belongs to the _Fach_ of a certain singer, he is supposed to +have first right to it. Difficulties arise in apportioning the parts in +very modern operas, whose composers seem no longer disposed to write +definitely for a coloratura soprano or a serious bass, but mix up the +voice range and styles of singing indiscriminately in one part. My +second real part was _Fricka_ in "Walkuere," in which I had a great +success vocally, but unfortunately looked a great deal younger than the +portly _Bruennhilde_ and far more like her daughter than her stepmother. +Then came the _Third Lady_ in "Magic Flute," the _Third Grace_ in +"Tannhaeuser," _Martha_ in "Faust," _Orlofsky_ in "Fledermaus," _Frau +Reich_ in the "Merry Wives of Windsor," the _Graefin_ in "Trompeter von +Saekkingen," _Pamela_ in "Fra Diavolo," _Witch_ in "Haensel und Gretel"; +and finally "Carmen." All these before Christmas of my first year. I did +not have one of them on my repertoire when I arrived in Metz, except +_Fricka_ and _Carmen_, and the latter in French. + +The three graces in "Tannhaeuser" were done by the beauties of the +theatre, two premieres danseuses and myself! We were to dress in white +Greek draperies with jewels, and of course, as we were to be seductive, +pink roses. I wore my beautiful _Bergcrystal_ necklace, made for me in +Paris. The ladies could not contain their jealousy and said of course, +"aufgedonnert" (thundered out) like that I naturally would stand out +from them. Annoyed at their pettiness I removed the diamonds and flowers +and all ornaments. They then said of course to go without any ornaments +was palpably the best way of all to make myself conspicuous. So I let it +go at that. + +I well remember the _Third Lady_, for there are spoken passages in this +opera, and I had to speak German for the first time before an audience +of critically listening natives, and Mozartian German at that! _Pamela_ +nearly gave me nervous prostration. They were determined that I should +do it because she had to speak German with an English accent, so they +said it was made for me. As a matter of fact, after the months I had +spent in carefully eradicating my English accent it was difficult +suddenly to exaggerate it to order. I had to learn, rehearse and play +the entire part in five days, and I thought I should go mad. I had never +seen the wretched thing, so the baritone who played my husband kindly +came over to help me with the business. Otherwise my sister and I hardly +left the piano to eat and sleep. The dialect part of the libretto was in +an ancient manuscript copy, torn, marked and dog's-eared, and written in +an almost illegible German script. I could not take time enough to +puzzle it out, so my sister spent hours poring over it, deciphering the +German letters literally one by one by aid of a key, and writing it +again in Latin script. I had no clothes for it, as it was not on my +repertoire and it plays in 1820, but they costumed it for me in modern +dress, so again my summer wardrobe was called into service. + +I learned it so quickly that the colleagues called me "Die +Notenfresserin" or note-eater, but the strain was awful. I remember when +I was studying _Pamela_ the Kapellmeister told me at least ten times, +how the contralto who played the _Pamela_ in his father's theatre and +who was also an English-speaking woman, had so caught his father's fancy +in that role, that from then on he had a tremendous affair with her. +This he repeated to me again and again, but I never seemed to take the +hint. + +As _Erda_ in "Siegfried" I had a most trying experience. The director +had been, as I have said, a well-known Bayreuth singer, and he thought +no one could sing Wagner but himself. Unfortunately he had a strong +tendency to "look upon the wine," and when he had a part to sing +nervousness attacked him to such an extent that he began drinking in +self-defence to enable him to stand the strain. Perhaps his beverages +were more potent than usual, but that night he was decidedly +irresponsible. He struggled through the _Wanderer's_ first scene, and +conscious that he was doing it badly, he sent out for a bottle of +champagne as a bracer. The consequence was that in our scene in the +third act, he was utterly incapacitated. He sang all kinds of things not +in the text, bits from _Hunding_ in "Walkuere," from _Daland_ in +"Hollaender," from "Fidelio." He rolled about the stage and lurched in +my direction with his spear pointed at me, shouting _Pogner's_ advice to +_Eva_ while I was singing _Erda's_ responses. It seemed to go on for +ages, but at last _Siegfried_, waiting for his cue in the wings, +realized that he must save the scene, entered and escorted his befuddled +relation from the stage. I had made up with a creamy white grease paint +and no red. My sister said, "Why did you make up with rouge and not +have the pallor we agreed upon?" My cheeks were so scarlet from +mortification that no grease paint would have paled them. + +The audience took it splendidly, I must confess, and refrained from any +expression of disapproval or joy--though it _must_ have been funny! The +next day there were announcements in all the papers that he had had a +temporary lapse of memory owing to grief over the sudden death of his +mother, who, as the stage manager cynically informed us, had reached out +a hand from the grave to save her son, she having been dead for ten +years! The director went to Berlin and stayed there for weeks. We +afterwards learned that it was a plot, deliberately planned and put +through by Carlhof to gain the direction of the theatre. I can see him +now stalking around, six foot four, chewing his rag of a dyed moustache, +his face pale and his eyes glittering with anxiety as to the success of +his plan to encourage the director to drink. The director once told me +the hours between the last meal and the time to go to one's dressing +room to begin making up are the dangerous ones. He said, "First one +takes a glass of wine to steady one's shaking nerves; later a glass is +not enough so it becomes a bottle, then two bottles and so on till +control is lost." It is easy for any singer to understand, and the best +remedy is to omit that first glass. + +"Carmen" was the second opera which I had to do without rehearsal. The +soprano had failed in it and it was promised to me to keep if I could do +it _ohne probe_ (without rehearsal). I sang it for the first time, +quaking with nerves, on Christmas Day, and my nick-name after that was +"Die schoene Carmen." After Christmas we produced the "Merry Widow" +which was new then, and I was cast for the _Dutiful Wife_. There was +plenty of variety in my work. I would sing _Carmen_ on Sunday, +_Orlofsky_ in "Fledermaus" on Tuesday, speaking German with a Russian +accent, _Pamela_ on Thursday night with an English accent, and _Frau +Reich_ on Friday night with no accent at all! I dressed _Frau Reich_ in +a gown of the time of Henry V while the rest of the cast "went +Shakespearean." We were far too busy for dress rehearsals of an old +opera, and I supposed of course that it would be costumed in the real +period of the play. When I appeared on the stage, they all demanded "And +what, pray, are _you_ supposed to represent?" "I am playing +Shakespeare's _Frau Reich_," I answered with dignity--"and I am the only +person on the stage who is properly dressed." But you have to know your +colleagues well before you can make an answer like that successfully, +without their hating you for it. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +SOME STAGE DELIGHTS + + +We had also what is known as _Abstecher_, on off nights. That is, +performances in a neighbouring and still smaller town about once a +month. We would travel altogether, taking our costumes and make-up with +us, principals second class and chorus third. Our fare was paid, and the +generous management allowed us two marks apiece (50c) extra for +expenses! As we left at five P.M. returning at one or two in the +morning, this allowance was not excessive for food alone, but the +thrifty took black bread and sausage with them, and expended only +fifteen pfennigs (3-1/2c) for beer. Our _Abstecher_ was a village with a +cavalry barracks, a railroad station, and not much else. The theatre was +built over a sort of warehouse and stable combined, and we fell over +bales and packing cases at the entrance. The dressing rooms were tiny +boxes, with a shelf, one gas light in a wire globe, and a red-hot stove +in each room, and no window. We dressed three in a room. The stage was +so small that once, as _Nancy_, I played a whole scene with the tail of +my train caught in the door by which I had entered, and never knew it! +We were always given a rapturous welcome. Sometimes one of the +principals would miss the train and be forced to come on by a later one, +and then the sequence of scenes in the opera would be changed quite +regardless of the plot, for we would play all the scenes, in which he +did not appear, first, and do his afterwards. After the opening chorus, +the soprano would go on for her aria, and while she was singing it, we +would decide what to give next. "I'll do my aria!" "Oh no! Not the two +arias together!" "Let's have the duet from the third act, and then the +soprano and tenor can just come in casually and we'll do the big +quartet, and then you can do your aria!" We would see the audience +hunting in a confused sort of way through their libretto, with +expressions rather like Bill the Lizard. This happened once in the +"Merry Wives," which is confusing at best. + +After the performance there was no place in which to wait but the cafe +of the station. I was looked upon as recklessly extravagant because I +would order a _Wiener Schnitzel mit Salat_ for sixty pfennigs (15c) and +when I took two cents' worth of butter too, they would raise their +eyebrows and murmur, "_Diese Amerikaner!_" Sometimes the Director came +with us, and then the principals would be invited to his table and +treated to (German) champagne. But we were always glad when he stayed at +home, because we were much freer over our beer. There are always one or +two members of the company who are extremely amusing, and their antics, +imitations and reminiscences make the time fly. There was one little +chap, the son of a Rabbi, who lived on nothing a day and found himself, +and was an extraordinary mimic. His imitations of a director engaging +singers, the shy one, the bold one, the beginner; and his marvellous +take-off of the members of the company kept us in roars of laughter. He +could imitate anything--a horse, a worn-out piano--and is now one of the +most successful "entertainers" in Berlin. The ones in whose compartment +he travelled on the train thought themselves lucky and often arrived so +hoarse from laughing that they could hardly sing. + +All this experience is invaluable for the beginner, his +self-consciousness melts like snow in July, and it gives him, as nothing +else can, that poise and authority on the stage which are almost as +important as the voice itself. But the work, especially for a foreigner, +is killing. It is not so much the performances themselves, great as the +strain of these actually is, but the constant, never-ceasing learning by +heart, and the drag of continuous rehearsing. The "room rehearsals" of +the music alone, take place, in a theatre of this kind, in one of the +dressing rooms where there is a piano. The room is almost always small +and very close, and there are eight or ten people packed into it, all +singing hard and exhausting the little air there is. The stage +rehearsals with the almost invariable and inevitable shouting and +excitement are very trying to the nerves, especially when one is making +two or three debuts a week, that is, singing a new part for the first +time almost every other night as I did, at the beginning of my career. +The better the theatre, of course, the greater the smoothness and lack +of confusion at stage rehearsals. The singers and orchestra men are more +experienced, and more competent, and the manners of the Kapellmeister +improve in ratio to the importance of the opera house. A little extra +excitement is permissible when a new production is being put on, but at +the rehearsals of repetitions undue exhibitions of "temperament" on +either side are discouraged, and the powers that be have to mind their +manners and stick to the conventional forms of address. The +_Heldentenor_ may sometimes have to allow his artistic nature to get the +better of him for a moment, but no one else may claim such license. + +The stage during rehearsals is like a workshop--a certain amount of +noise and confusion is necessitated by the labour going on in it, but +no one has time to spare from his share of the job in hand, and the +discipline in a good theatre is remarkable. The native German is +trained, of course, both to give and take orders well, the result of the +whole system of government, both of the family and of the nation. Stage +etiquette and the relationship between principals and chorus, _erste und +zweite Kraefte_ (principals of first and second rank) singers and the +management, grows more conventional and regulated according to the class +of the theatre. Those in authority may exact perfect obedience, but they +must ask for it properly; and while an individual is entitled to proper +consideration, he must never forget that he is but a unit of the whole. + +The dressing-room arrangements in Metz were rather primitive. The +theatre was 100 years old, for one thing, and no one had ever had the +money to install new conveniences. In a good German theatre, the +dressing rooms are rarely used for rehearsing, and the principals dress +alone, at least when they have a big role to sing. In Metz I shared my +room with several other women and had only a corner of it which I could +call my own. Long shelves with lockers under them ran down two sides of +the room, with lights over them at intervals, and under every light a +singer "made up." There was a long glass at one end of the room, but we +had to provide individual mirrors for ourselves. There was no running +water, only a couple of jugs and basins stood in one corner of the +shelf. Good routined dressers were provided by the theatre. Mine was an +Alsatian who loved to speak French with me, but whom I discouraged as I +wanted all the practise I could get in German. She used to call me +"Fraeulein Miss"--pronouncing the latter like the German word _miess_ +which means mediocre, but she meant to be particularly respectful. I +have always found that it pays a hundred fold to make friends of the +dressers, stage-doorkeeper, property-man, carpenter, head scene-shifter, +fireman and all the other workers whose co-operation is necessary for a +good _ensemble_. It is usually quite easy to be on good terms with them, +and they have unlimited opportunities for making things go smoothly for +you, or the reverse. + +Women's costumes are not kept in the theatre; as they are the personal +property of the singer they must be kept at home, and be sent over to +the theatre on the morning of a performance. A _Korbtraeger_ (basket +carrier) is usually provided to whom you give from 75 cents to $1.00 a +month, and who performs this service for you--but many singers send +their maids. With the usual discrimination against our sex, men's +costumes are provided in opera houses of all grades. In the largest +theatres the women's are furnished also, and you even have to have +special permission to wear your own. + +The scenery and costumes in Metz were often surprisingly good when one +considered that so few "sets" must do such varied things. Our property +man was an inventive genius at making something out of nothing. He +prided himself upon certain realistic details. If the piece called for +coffee, the real article, though of some dreadful variety unknown to +contemporary culinary science, was provided, and really poured into the +cups. If a meal were to be served on the stage, some sort of real food +was there for the actors to eat, even if it were only slices of bread +served elaborately as the most _recherche_ French supper, though usually +it was ladyfingers. Eating scenes are usually confined to the drama, +though there are some operas in which a meal "comes before" as the +Germans say. In the "Merry Wives of Windsor" for example, the scene +containing _Anna's_ letter aria opens with the company at supper in +_Frau Reich's_ home. The wives are explaining their tricks and plotting +_Falstaff's_ final discomfiture in spoken dialogue. One night when I was +singing _Frau Reich_ in Metz there was a particularly attractive dish of +real apples on the stage supper table. The _Herr Reich_ was the serious +bass, a thrifty individual who couldn't bear to let a penny's worth of +anything escape him. As his guests rose to go he picked up the dish of +apples and pressed it upon them. + +"Here," he improvised, "take these home to the children. Oh! You have no +children--well, take them anyway--the children will come later." + +His hospitable wishes were received with bewilderment by the audience, +but as he made his exit with his guests and immediately began to eat the +apples, he bore his scolding from the _regisseur_ very philosophically. +On some stages where the provisions are more elaborate, the actors in +certain plays make a regular practise of eating their suppers on the +stage. In "Divorcons" for example or in the "Anatol Cyclus" of +Schnitzler. + +Our property man in Metz, with the historic Shakespearean name of +Mondenschein, (Moonshine) was an ardent lover of drapery. An +artistocratic interior, to his mind, must be entirely filled with as +many different materials as possible, all hanging in folds. He had three +pairs of near-silk portieres, bright pink, dull green, and pale yellow, +and the combinations that he made with those six curtains were endless. +Garlands of roses, too, were a great resource of his--draped round a +couch with a fur rug upon it, and a red light over all, they transformed +the scene into the bower of a Messalina. In a white light festooned +upon a mantel-piece, or above a doorway, they could be depended upon to +supply the appropriate setting of the _Erste Naive's_ most appealing +scene. The young lovehaveress and first salon lady, had to receive them, +wired together into a bunch, with the same delightful surprise, and put +them into the same Japanese jar without any water in it, in play after +play. But the property man always squandered a perfectly new, uncreased +piece of paper for every performance with which to make a cornucopia for +them, in the approved German style. He was quite a specialist in such +matters as the colour of telegrams in different countries, and in the +manner of folding newspapers, points which are sometimes neglected in +many better theatres. Of course his talents in this direction had a +better chance in the dramatic than in the operatic productions. + +It is a curious thing to note in this connection, how archaic the +arrangement of such details remains in operatic performances even on the +best stages. How in "Carmen" for example, the singers must pretend to +drink to _Escamillo_ out of perfectly dry tin cups, instead of using +real wine and glasses, as a quite second-rate dramatic company would do. +How _Butterfly_ and _Suzuki_ are never given real tea to serve to the +_Consul_ or _Yamadori_. Or how the girls in "Thais" bring up their +water-jars out of the well with the outsides quite dry. + +Of course in theatres of the Metz class matters of costuming are +simplified, and historical accuracy is not one of the aims. For example, +everything before Christ is done in fur rugs and winged helmets for the +men, and flannel nightgowns and long hair for the women. Any period up +to the thirteenth century is costumed in mantles and gowns of furniture +brocade, after that it is _Alt-deutsch_ (old German), or _Spanisch_ +(Shakespearean--mostly black velvet and jet or white satin and silver), +until it turns safely into _Rococo_, which means white wigs. After that +it is all _Modern_, and even the chorus has to supply its own modern +clothes. The men principals have their historical costumes, with the +exception of wigs, tights, and shoes, supplied to them, but the women +must have their own. The collection of men's clothes in an old theatre +is sometimes quite remarkable, some of the suits of a hundred years ago +being actually of the period. + +They retain the smells of the period also, many of them; for in a +theatre like that of Metz I don't believe the men's clothes were ever +cleaned. Things which have been worn several times a week for seven +months a year during the past hundred years, accumulate a richness and +variety of odours which must be sniffed to be appreciated--a very +ancient and fish-like smell indeed. I often wished at Metz that I had no +use of my nose, and I have wished it many times since. As _Amneris_, to +force your way for the entrance in the triumph scene, through an +Egyptian populace composed of German Infantrymen, is a squeamish +business at best; but when they are attired in clothes that haven't been +washed for years, it is a feat before which any one may quail, +especially if he belongs to the number of unfortunates, unluckily far +from rare among singers, whose stomach nerves are affected in any case +when they have a big part before them. + +Washing was not any too popular in Metz even among the principals. I +have dressed with leading women whose arms showed streaks of white where +the water had run down as they washed their hands, stopping +conscientiously at the wrists. Their make-up would be removed with the +same dirty rag night after night during the whole season; and their +personal garments under more or less smart outer raiment, had often done +overlong service. I must hasten to say, however, that this state of +affairs was the exception rather than the rule, and that in better +theatres, the women principals were always scrupulously cleanly. + +Over ornamentation or fineness in undergarments is usually looked upon +as rather questionable, among the solid middle classes in Germany. My +mother had made me a dainty supply of be-ribboned linen, and I was told +after I had been in Metz for some time, that at first, the Alsatian +woman who dressed me reported me to be "_beaucoup trop soignee de ne pas +avoir un amant_." However, she changed her mind later on, and put it +down to American extravagance--always a safe play. Some of the men were +much more careless than the women. Our operetta tenor played the whole +season in the same shirt, powdering the bosom freshly each evening with +a yellowish powder which he used for his face. + +At Carnival time, some of the Schauspieler remained for three days in +the clothes in which they had played on Saturday night, never going to +bed, or even removing their make-up till the fun came to an end early +Wednesday morning. + +Many of the older members dyed their hair, as it had begun to turn grey. +Of course they did not have it done by competent people, or nearly often +enough, and the shades of rusty brown, green, or purple it assumed were +quite startling. Our first Kapellmeister used to dye his hair a rich +black. He was a good-looking man and very vain. He was also portly and +easily became over-heated. Of course when this happened, the +perspiration running down his neck was dyed black too, and he would be +intensely worried for fear we should see it. We knew his sensitiveness, +and took delight in sitting directly behind him at the piano, though he +would urge, beg, and finally command us to sit beside him. He was +kindhearted in his way, and I remember one instance of this. The stage +manager, in a vile humour, had come storming into the midst of a room +rehearsal one day, with some trivial complaint against me, and had +succeeded in making me cry, not a difficult matter at that time as I was +always in a state of nerve strain owing to continuous over-fatigue. The +Kapellmeister did his best to comfort me, telling me not to mind, +praising my work, and finally pressing upon me his huge, brand new silk +handkerchief--a real sacrifice, as he had probably intended to use it +for days! His fingertips used to split in the cold weather from much +piano pounding and I won his heart by prescribing collodion for them. He +continually praised my sight reading and quickness in learning and it +was he who gave me the nick-name of "Notenfresserin." + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +MISPLACED MOISTURE AND THE STORY OF A COURT-LADY + + +The Bohemian, Hungarian and Croatian singers nearly always add to one's +joy in work by eating garlic. The "high dramatic" soprano in my next +engagement was from Croatia. The first time I went to Prague to sing, on +alighting from the train I sniffed a strangely familiar odour. The +impression of familiarity grew stronger and stronger as I drove to the +hotel--but I couldn't place it. At last it came to me--the whole town +smelled like our soprano! I have often wished, while on the stage, for +temporary atrophy of the senses. In addition to the fustiness of much +worn clothes and infrequent bathing, you really have all kinds of +horrors to endure. + +Some terrible creatures with a passion for distinct enunciation and with +unfortunate dental formation, spray you copiously when uttering words +like _Mutter_ or _Freude_. This always seems to happen in some +impassioned scene when you simply can't get away from them, and have +absolutely no defence. Others have painfully hot and wet, or painfully +cold and wet hands with which they persistently paw you. I remember one +lyric tenor who was my bugbear because he had hands like a fresh, cold +fish. The soprano and I had a scene with him in one opera, in which she +had to say, "_Die Hand, so weich, so warm_" (the hand, so soft, so +warm), speaking of his clammy member. I dared her one night, to say +instead, "_Die Hand, so feucht, so kalt_" (The hand, so moist, so cold), +and when it came to the point, sure enough she did so, her voice so +shaky with suppressed laughter, that it came out in a tremulous +pianissimo. We both had to turn away from the front in silent +convulsions, but not a soul in the house was the wiser. + +This is a horrible subject and I might enlarge upon it endlessly, +recalling for example, the pleasures of being folded in the embrace of a +large, warm, damp tenor smelling at best of onions; or still worse the +large drops which rain upon you during the most touching love scene from +his manly brow, while you, though shuddering with disgust, daren't try +to dodge them, or even change the wistfully adoring expression of your +countenance. It may be honest sweat, but it is a demned moist unpleasant +kind of honesty in my opinion. Goritz told me that he once, as +_Kurwenal_, in the last act of "Tristan," dripped on a prostrate +_Tristan's_ eye so long that the poor tenor was blind for days after. +This is German efficiency! + +Some of the colleagues at Metz were a great contrast to others in their +scrupulous care of their personal appearance. The lyric baritone, a +youngster from the Rhineland making his debut in opera, attracted me at +the very first rehearsal by his groomed look and beautifully manicured +finger-nails. He came from quite ordinary people, and had been brought +up to be a "Tapizierer," curtain hanger, upholsterer, etc. He had never +met any Americans before and we grew to like him very much, and used to +let him go for walks with us, and come to us for tea. He was always +wanting to _tapizieren_ for us and criticizing the hang of the curtains, +etc., in our rooms. We taught him to play Canfield, more to keep him +from talking than for any other reason, for my sister and I used to play +patience for hours, so that we should not be tempted to talk when I was +resting my voice in the brief intervals between rehearsals and +performances. We used to play with pretty little German patience cards +in a pocket size, and he was simply infatuated with the game. He showed +all his friends how to play, and dozens of packs of these cards were +imported from Frankfort where they are made. + +The craze spread rapidly; all the officers began to play in their +Casinos, and the principals in the theatre were always being roared at +for keeping the stage waiting during rehearsals, when they missed their +cues by being absorbed in the game of Canfield. It became the great +resource of those who had small parts in the first act of an opera, and +then had to wait in costume and make-up until the very end like the +_Meister_ in "Meistersinger," or _Mary_ in "Fliegender Hollaender" who +has a seemingly interminable wait after her one scene at the beginning +of the second act, until at the very last of the third she has to rush +in for the single phrase "_Senta, Senta, wass willst du tun?_" + +In return for our tea, the little baritone would tell us amusing tales +of his experiences in a cavalry regiment while doing his military +service. His high spirits and his beautiful voice made him popular with +officers and men, but he was quite unamenable to discipline, and had +spent something like ninety days in prison during his first year, for +such offences as refusing to stop singing on the march, or for cheeking +an officer. He used to call us his goddesses, and speak to us as +"Fraeuleinchen." Our rooms, through him, were the starting place of new +culinary ideas in Metz. We taught him to make and like such American +delicacies as salted almonds, chocolate fudge, and hot chocolate +sauce for ice cream, an unheard of combination. We tried to make him +like fruit salad with mayonnaise; but the mixture of sweet with oil and +vinegar was too much for his burgher palate, and he used to quote to us +the Bavarian proverb, "_Was der Bauer net kennt frisst er net._" (What +the peasant doesn't know he doesn't eat.) + +[Illustration: AMNERIS AS I USED TO DRESS IT] + +The country round Metz is rarely beautiful, in its half-French, +half-German character. It retains its typical French poplars, planted in +long lines, which turn pure gold in autumn. A placid river, the Moselle, +runs between hills covered with orchards and vineyards, with picturesque +villages of grey stone and red tiling, piled steeply up their sides. The +meadows in the fall are filled with lavender crocuses--the kind that +Meredith's Diana got up at four A.M. to gather. Every village has of +course its "Gasthaus," some still absolutely French in the arrangement +of their marble topped tables, mirrors, and red upholstered benches +running round three sides of the room. We have drunk coffee in autumn, +and _Maibowle_ in spring in every one of them, I think. I dare say many +of them are still using the same card board circles under their +customers' beer-glasses which we marked with our initials. Can you flip +them from the edge of the table into your own hand? + +The town of Metz itself is interesting enough, and we explored it +thoroughly. It is very ancient ground indeed, and there are Roman walls +still to be seen, with characteristically beautiful brick-work; old +chapels, a Gothic cathedral, and the remains of the mediaeval wall and +moat which once surrounded the town, with great arched fortified gates +at its east and west entrances. + +On returning once from a long walk with the little baritone we entered +by the eastern gate, and as he was doing a small part that evening, and +it was getting unpleasantly near the hour of the performance, we took a +short cut through an unfamiliar part of the town. We soon found +ourselves in a narrow street of respectable enough looking houses, but +as we passed, out of nearly every window on both sides, a female head +was thrust, all in varying degrees of frowsiness, and remarks and +comments in half unintelligible dialect were yelled at us with shrieks +of hideous laughter. Our little escort grew purple with confusion, +walking faster and faster, and when we reached an open square he broke +into the most fervent apologies for unwittingly leading us into such a +street. It was a curious and unpleasant little experience and reminded +me of certain quarters in oriental cities of which I had heard tales. We +named it "the street of queer women" and avoided the eastern gateway in +our walks thereafter. + +Later in the season another colleague sometimes joined our tea parties +and walking expeditions. This was an immensely talented youth, attached +to the theatre in an anomalous position of third Kapellmeister, in +reality a volunteer without pay, hoping to pick up an occasional chance +to gain experience in conducting an orchestra. He was a Frenchman of +excellent family who had studied in one of the great conservatories and +thought he spoke the German language. Such German I have never heard +before or since. His French inability to aspirate an "h," a pronounced +stutter, and the most nonchalant disregard of gender, formed a +combination which was enough to upset the gravity of a German customs +house official himself! It was his business among other things, to +"_einstudieren_" the new members of the chorus in any opera which they +did not know, but of course his version of their language rendered any +authority he might have had over them quite ineffectual, and his +position was anything but enviable. At the same time he was a really +magnificent pianist, a composer of promise, and a thorough musician; but +if ever a creature was out of his element he was that creature as +Kapellmeister in Metz. And yet what is a young fellow in his position to +do? The desire to conduct, the longing to interpret the great masters +through the medium of an orchestra, possessed him to the point of +obsession; but where to find an orchestra to conduct was a problem. The +barrier "no experience" was erected across his path as it had been +across mine, though he must serve an apprenticeship somewhere. + +The musical life of Germany attracted him for the same reasons as it had +attracted me, and so he endured a veritable martyrdom in the pursuance +of his dream. He was a pupil of Nikisch and told us Nikisch had told him +he made half his career with his cuffs. Whoever has watched him shoot +them gently out as he begins to conduct will know what he meant. + +Our rooms were a sort of haven for this boy, I think, where he could +talk of the things that absorbed him in a language that was his servant +instead of his master. In return he would play so gorgeously for us, +that our little upright piano rocked under the strain. He could suggest +a whole orchestra in his playing. Strauss' "Salome" was brand new then +and he revelled in it, and adopted the motif of _Jochanaan_ as a signal +which he and the baritone would whistle under our windows. Sometimes he +would get lost at the piano and play for hours, till our supper time was +past, and our good friend Emma Seebold, the "_Hoch Dramatische_," would +rush in and urge us to hurry and get ready for some mythical dinner to +which we were invited. This was always successful, owing to Seebold's +talent. + +We grew very fond of her and often spent our evenings together. She had +a lovely voice and would put her head back on her chair sometimes in the +evening and sing us languorous Austrian peasant songs with her +fascinating Viennese accent. Her passion was remnants, and she would +send home boxes of scraps of passementerie and odds and ends of silk +trimmings which she would sew all over her costumes. The richness she +saw in it was pathetic. Bargain gloves were also irresistible, and she +had green ones and purple ones, spotted and mildewed ones, and loved +them all because they were cheap. + +The pianist and the baritone often met at our rooms and got on +surprisingly well considering their utter lack of points of contact and +the natural contempt that they felt for each other. The Frenchman was +certainly mildly crazy. He believed that his astral body, or psychic +envelope, or something was visible as an aura of light around his hand, +and he would hold it up and look at it and say, "_Ah, oui, elle est +la--je vais bien aujourd'hui_," or shake his head and say, "_Non, pas la +aujourd'hui--je ne suis rien!_" He was good looking, bearing a strong +resemblance to the portraits of Oscar Wilde. He dressed well, and his +washing bills--amounting as we were told, with bated breath, to ten and +fifteen marks a week--were the scandal of the theatre! Since those days +he has gone back to his piano, though he persevered in the theatre long +enough to obtain a second Kapellmeister position in a good opera house. +I have met him casually all over Europe, and he is one of the very few +of the old _Kollegen_ from Metz whom I have ever seen again. + +These three were the only ones that season whom we cared about, though +we were friendly enough with all of them after Christmas, and as I have +said, we dined at the hotel with a group of them every day. They were +all types in their way. First the director--a survival of the old +school, with rather long dyed hair and enormous dyed moustache, always +in _Gehrock_ (frock coat) with a large tie in which reposed a royal +monogram in pearls and diamonds presented to him by the Hereditary Grand +Duke of Glumphenbergen-Schlimmerheim or something, during his career as +_Heldenbariton_. In the street he wore a soft black felt hat which would +have done for the _Wanderer_ in "Siegfried," and of course a fur-lined +coat whenever the weather gave the least excuse for one. Champagne was +his universal panacea--his very present help in trouble. If he had a +disagreement with a singer for any cause and wished to make it right +again, he would always send a bottle of _Sekt_ if it were a woman, or +present the money to buy one if it were a man. He had been a famous +singer in his day, and known others far more so, and his reminiscences +could be interesting enough. His stories of Bayreuth under the old +regime, were really interesting, with the prescribed position of every +finger, every gesture studied to an inch, every tone closed, opened, +coloured according to strictest rule, every syllable enunciated with +minutest care, and the effect of all this schooling on the singer--the +strained and broken nerves, the wrecked voices that were the result of +it. Diction--_Aussprache_--was naturally enough his hobby, but his ideas +were absurdly exaggerated and caused much more or less hidden amusement +among the _Personal_. He insisted, for example, upon so much "t" in a +phrase like Mignon's "_Dahin, dahin, moecht ich mit dir_," that it +sounded like "_Moecht tich mit tier_." Anything of that sort among +colleagues is looked upon as a tremendous joke, especially when it is on +the director. + +One result of his former glory was that famous people came to this +theatre to _gastieren_ and it also seemed to us as if every former +singer or actor in Germany of any pretension to fame, who had a son or +daughter to launch in either profession, sent them to our director for a +debut. This was looked upon by us as a bore; but the famous guests were +rather amusing, because when they had gone, the director used to relate +all kinds of derogatory stories about them. Possart---- Ritter, Ernst +von---- was perhaps the most renowned. He came to recite Manfred at a +special performance with our soloists and chorus. The director told us +how, during the most impassioned speeches of Goethe or Shakespeare his +eye would be on the upper gallery, counting empty places, and how after +the performance when the box office sheet showed an _ausverkauftes Haus_ +he would demand, "What about those three empty seats in the second row +of the top gallery, at the left?" + +He told a similar tale of a famous Austrian guest-artist, the leading +Teutonic exponent of his day of the negative side in the never-ending +argument of stage technique "to feel or not to feel." He had mechanical +as well as histrionic genius, and his dramatic art had become so +mechanical too, towards the end of his career, that he could utilize +such places in his great parts as Hamlet's soliloquy for thinking out +scientific puzzles, although his power over the emotions of his audience +never lost its effect. + +[Illustration: AMNERIS AS I NOW DRESS IT] + +The director's own story was a real romance. While still on the upward +side of the hill of fame, he had met and loved the wife of a nobleman, +the scion of an ancient house. She had been maid-of-honour at the most +exclusive court in Europe, the confidante of the royal family, and +was said to know the true story of many of the mysterious incidents in +court history. In fact she was supposed to have been married off +hurriedly to her much older husband to get her away from the royal +circle of whose secrets she knew altogether too many. The infatuation of +the singer for the lady was mutual, and in course of time a boy was born +to them, who reached the age of six years before the noble husband +consented to divorce his wife, or rather, I think, his lawyers consented +for him, as by that time dissipation had quite softened whatever brain +he may have had to begin with. This mental condition of his gave her the +care of their children, and in Metz their youngest son, their daughter a +girl of about twenty, and the director's little boy all lived together. +At holiday times another of her sons, a most charming young fellow, a +lieutenant in a crack cavalry regiment, used to visit them too. She +invited my sister and me to meet him, and the whole family often +attended the opera together. He liked me in several roles and used to +send me wonderful flowers. I still have a huge green bowl which he sent +me filled with violets, in return for the photograph for which he had +begged. He was an example of the most elegant type of young officer, the +aristocrat of _Uradlige Familie_, fair, with delicate features; his six +feet of slimness, with long slender limbs and very little body, clothed +in his glove-fitting uniform. He had the fashionable three creases +across the front of his smart Hussar jacket where his tummy should have +been. His poor little story turned into tragedy. He contracted +consumption and did not tell his people, but used their influence to get +himself transferred to German West Africa, on the plea of wanting to see +service. Arrived there, he quietly shot himself one evening as the +easiest way out of a life that promised him nothing but misery. A sort +of malignant fate seemed to pursue the children of that first marriage, +for the charming young daughter also came to a sudden and most tragic +end, as I shall tell later on. + +The director's wife was very nice to us. She often invited us to visit +her although we did so but seldom. Her rooms were filled with relics of +her former life--portraits of herself as lady-in-waiting to the Empress +of Austria, in court dress, portraits of her Empress, old photographs of +groups on terraces and at castle gates, almost every person in them a +"personage." She herself still wore her hair as her Empress had done, in +a coronet of narrow braids set round her head. She said that they were +sewn together with the same coloured silk as the hair every morning +after being braided, to make them stand up. With us she always played +the _grande dame_, apparently quite without effort, but there were +stories about her which seemed to show that she could be something very +different. + +She certainly could talk most interestingly of her former grandeur. One +of her tales was of a lady of the court who owned the smallest dog that +any one had ever seen. It was so tiny that she used to carry it, when in +evening dress, in the front of her decolletage. One night at dinner as +she leaned forward to eat her soup, the dog fell into the plate. There +was vermicelli in the soup, and before she could fish it out of this +entanglement, the poor little thing was drowned! Another time the Frau +Direktor showed us a photograph of a very slim and shapely young dragoon +in full regalia, cloak and all, holding a letter up to hide his face. As +there was evidently a story we begged her to tell it to us. She said +that there had been a certain young married Countess of the court, who +was known as a great prude and was always boasting of her exaggerated +wifely devotion. Her airs became, said the Frau Direktor, quite +insufferable, and so she herself resolved to put such armour-plate +virtue to the test. At Carnival time, therefore, she dressed herself as +a young officer for a ball at which the _Hofgesellschaft_ was to be +present, and a very dashing figure she made, according to the picture. +In this disguise she then proceeded to give the Countess the rush of her +life. The gallant pursued the virtuous Countess all the evening, and +was rewarded by being asked to escort her ladyship to her home. In the +carriage the "Lieutenant's" attentions became still more pressing, when +to his secret dismay, the fair creature suddenly melted entirely, cast +herself into his arms, and swore she adored him. Arrived at her house, +the "Lieutenant" beat a hasty retreat vowing all sorts of things for +their next meeting, which naturally never took place. But the vanished +Lieutenant did not resemble the gentlemen of Virginia who kiss and never +tell, for the Countess' share in the story leaked out, and her +reputation for unassailable devotion was irreparably damaged, to the +great satisfaction of all her acquaintance. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +HUMAN PASSIONS AND SMALLPOX + + +At the beginning of the season, the director's family was still in the +country, where they remained until the opera had been running for some +time. We met his wife and daughter for the first time at a luncheon +given by him at the hotel where we had arranged to take our two o'clock +dinner, after trying all sorts of unsuccessful ways of dining in +private. The stage manager of the drama, the first and second +Kapellmeister, the "Bureau Chef," the Heldentenor, Heldenbariton, High +Dramatic, Coloratura, my sister and myself were all invited. Just as we +were seating ourselves, the _Schauspiel Regisseur_, Herr S----, noticed +that there were thirteen at table. He turned as white as a sheet, jumped +up, and scarcely stopping to apologize, hurriedly left the room, nor +could he be prevailed upon to return, although the director followed him +into the hall to remonstrate. He protested that one of our number was +certain to die within the year as it was, and he wished to insure its +not being himself by refusing to sit down at all. Curiously enough, his +prophecy came true, for the Director's young step-daughter died very +suddenly soon after. + +Herr S---- was a most unpleasant person, as I discovered later, and I +was always thankful that my identification with the _Opern-Personal_ +kept me out of his way. He had a sort of spurious veneer and +ingratiating manner, which was at variance with his hard, square, +passion-scarred countenance. He pretended an enormous admiration for the +American woman, and that very day before luncheon, he showed me with +great pride a small American-made patent-leather shoe, which he took out +of the tail pocket of his frock-coat, telling me with a leer that it +belonged to a girl of _my_ country, where the women had the most +beautiful feet in the world, and that it was his talisman and never left +him! He bore a bad name among the women players in the company. One of +the little actresses, a girl of good family, in her first season, used +to tell me unpleasant tales of him in her rapid, ungrammatical French, +whenever I met her; and she always referred to him as "That beast!" + +Our Heldentenor of that season was an uninteresting personage, a quite +elderly man of enormous routine and mediocre equipment, who had sung in +all sorts of opera houses and was on the last lap of a long career. He +was said to be nearly sixty, and was quite bald, but he managed to make +a surprisingly youthful appearance on the stage. He had been at it so +long that he could make an attempt at acting almost anything--even +youth. His sprightly legs in "Fra Diavolo" were quite adolescent. He +kept himself discreetly to himself, and was never seen in the cafes, nor +on the streets with his colleagues. + +His greatest joy was a tiny dog, whose tricks he delighted to show off +to every one. The little thing would whine for a soprano, growl for a +bass, howl for a tenor, bark when told "The Direktor's coming," and sit +up and beg at the word _Gage_ (salary,) in a very amusing way, and his +master was intensely proud of his accomplishments. + +The lyric tenor of the first season was a peasant from Swabia, with a +droll accent and a lovely voice which he forced in a most agonizing +manner. He would shake all over when he sang a high note, and yet his +natural voice ranged easily to high D sharp--I have even heard him sing +an E. His dialect and his ignorance made him the butt of the company, +but he was very goodnatured and took it all in good part. He used to +say: "Yes, I know--my wife is a French woman and she tells me to say +_Mignon_, but I'm a peasant--I say _Mischnong_." She was years older +than he and of better class. She had helped him to the little study that +he had had, and out of gratitude he had married her, but they were said +to disagree very consistently. + +The Heldenbariton was quite a nice fellow, big and burly with a good +voice; he was a great favourite with the public, whom he had pleased by +marrying, out of the chorus, a townswoman who adored him. + +The second Kapellmeister was a vague, weak creature, henpecked by his +vain little wife who was never happy unless she was the centre of some +one's admiration. She was inordinately proud of her small feet, and our +little friend the lyric baritone used to make her furious, by insisting +that mine were smaller! Her dream was to go on the stage too, if only to +sing pages in "Lohengrin" and "Tannhaeuser," and later her hope was +realized, I heard, when several of them went off together in April to a +"Monatsoper" on the _Russische Grenze_ (Russian Frontier). The +coloratura soprano was a Dutch woman, speaking German with more accent +than I did. She was very fair, very fat, and very lazy, and she had a +capacity for food that I have seen equalled but never surpassed. She +dined with us daily, and woe to the person who had to serve himself from +a dish that had been passed to her! Eat until you could hold no more was +a part of the creed of all my colleagues. Anything short of absolute +repletion, and the meal was considered a failure. "_Sind Sie satt?_" +They would ask each other gravely--"_Ich bin nicht satt!_" Meaning +literally, "Are you full?" "_I_ am _not_ full." And this was a grave +cause of resentment against the hotel management. I must say that most +of them reached this desirable consummation long before the coloratura +soprano, for she continued placidly as long as there was any food in +sight. She would even finish anything left on another's plate, and our +table always looked as if a horde of locusts had visited it. + +Those colleagues of my first engagement are stamped upon my +memory--representing as they did so much that was new to me,--a new +nationality, a new profession, and in many cases a new social class. +Take them all together they were a pretty decent lot considering their +antecedents and surroundings. As a general rule, I think the actors are +apt to be of a somewhat higher social class than the singers, as a +remarkable voice occurs when and where it will, while a vocation for the +acting stage presupposes a certain amount of education and refinement of +surroundings, although there have been, of course, some notable +exceptions. + +They wanted us to meet the officers of the different smart regiments. +The Red Dragoons in particular were supposed to be all-powerful in +deciding the success or failure of a singer, and the colleagues kindly +thought we ought all to have the advantage of this. One or two of the +women of course had affairs with them, and as Marjorie and I did not +care to meet the officers in just that society, we were sometimes hard +put to it to find a good excuse. Once my sister went to bed, though +perfectly well, for several days, to avoid a particularly pressing +invitation. Later we met these officers through letters from our +relatives, and liked some of them tremendously. Even their affairs were +the outcome of the system, and did no particular harm to any one. + +The opera soubrette had one of years' standing with a tall ungainly +White Dragoon. He was a harmless idiot, and she a smart German-Polish +Jewess, a nice little thing. We each had a "Benefiz" before leaving the +Metz engagement, when we were showered with flowers and gifts from our +friends and admirers, also sharing in the box-office receipts. R----, +the soubrette, told us the day after hers, still breathless from rage, +that "_Er_"--she never called him anything but "He"--had sent her an +umbrella, bound in the middle of a huge sheaf of roses. He had not +passed it over the footlights, so that every one might see its +splendour, but had left it at her rooms. When he called on her expecting +soft thanks, she berated him soundly, and succeeded in so enraging his +usually placid self that he threw his big sabre through the window, +sending it crashing into the court below. + +One handsome Red Dragoon, a notorious connoisseur of music and women, +and believed absolutely irresistible, always sat in a box at our right +from the stage. His one reputable passion was music. He had at that time +an affair with a Dutch woman, who had been handsome and distinguee--she +was pitifully his slave. Going to the theatre one evening we saw her +approaching from one direction in the big court in front of the theatre, +as he approached from another. She smiled infatuatedly at him but he +passed her without a look--perhaps his idea of a tribute to my sister +and me. I felt sorry for her as the joy left her face. + +Several years after, while touring in Holland, in a charming little +place where we went to pass a free afternoon, we saw this same woman. +She had found the strength to shake off her German master, had married a +countryman and looked prosperous and happy. + +Neither Marjorie nor I ever received an offensive word or look from an +officer. They used sometimes to send me postcards after a _Carmen_ or +_Amneris_ night, closely scribbled over with signatures and greetings +and phrases of admiration, all highly respectful. It always pleased me +very much to receive these cards. + +The _Genossenschaft_ members of most theatres organize a _fete_ every +year for the benefit of their society, and that spring we had a fancy +dress ball. A lady is chosen at these balls by popular vote to be Rose +Queen. I was chosen that time and had to parade around the room on the +arm of a portly Major, who often sent me flowers and books of his own +poems. I wore my _Carmen_ dress of black satin, with gold flowers, and +my scarlet Spanish shawl. There was much cheap champagne drunk to the +popular toast of "General Quenousamong." This was originally "_Que nous +aimons_" (To those we love), and the "general" meant that every one was +to join in. The French touch was considered elegant, just as _Couzank_ +was the polite word for cousin, and _Satank_ for satin. Balls of this +kind are highly popular and a great contrast to the usually simple lives +of these small-town people. + +One form of simplicity I never adopted was the quite general one of +eating their evening supper, consisting usually of a bit of sausage, and +black bread and butter, out of bits of paper casually put down amongst +the objects on the table in their bedrooms. When you had finished, you +simply rolled up and threw away the greasy papers and the thing was +over. + +Sometimes a meal may be captured free. One of our "comics" in Metz had +to fish at the back of the stage in an operetta. He was always furnished +with a salt herring by the property man, which he would suspend solemnly +out of sight of the audience for a while, then slowly draw up, and +proceed to eat. A clean picked spine was all that remained by the end of +the act, and he had had his supper. + +Often the performances supplied me with welcome comic relief behind the +scenes. I learned for instance, that the text of the Anvil chorus sung +round me, as I lay on the canvas rock couch of _Azucena_, in +"Trovatore," was: "_Ich habe Dir schon laengst gesagt, die Wurst sie +schmeckt nach Seife_"--"I told you long ago, the sausage tastes of +soap." Also the soldiers in "Faust" made their rollicking return from +the wars to the words: "_He--ring und Apfel--Kartoffelnsalat._" "Herring +and apple--potato salad." _Siegmund_ grows woefully vulgar, and the +opening bars of his love song to his sister always say now to me: +"_Winter Struempfe riechen im Monat Mai._" + +Once in "Tiefland" the old man in the first act was presented with a +large lump of Limburger cheese, which he had to sniff and hold +gratefully for a long time, while his rejoicing colleagues slapped their +knees with glee in the wings. Sometimes the humour was replaced by other +less agreeable emotions. For my _Benefiz_, the last year of my +engagement, I was to sing _Carmen_. I wanted a popular guest tenor from +a neighbouring _Hoftheater_ to be my _Jose_, and he finally agreed to +come. He would not come in time for rehearsal and I did not see him +until I turn my head in the first recitative and see him making his +sword chain. From then on, he directed me in lordly tones throughout the +first act. I had often sung _Carmen_ in Metz and the audience knew most +of my business and expected it; also as I had prepared the role in Paris +and spent months of study on it I did not see why all of my business +should be changed on my own festive night. Therefore in our short talk +before the second act, I told him my positions as nicely as I could, he +saying to everything, "_Aber warum? Warum?_" (But why, why?). I stood +this as long as I could and told him all the warums, till finally I said +"Because I want to!" At this he lost his temper and left the stage. I +was surprised, but supposed he was nervous. From then on, things went +from bad to worse. Everything _Carmen_ said to _Jose_, he thought Howard +was saying to him. I tried to whisper that I meant nothing by it--that +that was the way I played it, but he grew blacker and blacker. Finally +in the last act I struck him with my fan, my usual business to make +_Jose_ let _Carmen_ pass. He rushed at me and caught my wrists and +shouted, "_Was faellt Ihnen denn ein_" ("What's the matter with you?") +I was frightfully upset and nearly crying by then, but had to go on. At +the last as I lay on the floor and he stood over me, he deliberately +threw his heavy dagger in my face, and I, a corpse, had to move my head +to avoid being hurt. He rushed to his dressing room and cried and +shouted for a half hour before his wife dared to go in and calm him. I +believe it was all jealousy. He had been most popular in the town, and +could not bear to share a performance with any one. The next day I could +hardly hobble; all my bones seemed wrenched; but every one was most +sympathetic and kind. + +The bells in Metz were most numerous and depressing. The cathedral near +us chimed all day an out-of-tune singsong, which the natives said was, +"_Ich bin todt und komm' nicht wieder!_" ("I am dead and shall not come +again!") + +The depression of the first year culminated in a smallpox epidemic, +which broke out shortly before the theatre closed. Marjorie dreamed of +it just before it happened, and that I died of it, which, of course, +haunted her all through the outbreak. It was frightfully mismanaged by +the authorities. The suspects were called for by policemen and carried +from the houses to an open wagon, (this in February and March,) and +driven to the hospitals. The _Kaserne_ or barracks where cases +occurred, were isolated; but in our daily walks we passed them with +shudders. We were both so tired and had had so many shocks and +eye-openers as to what life really is, that this last nightmare +completely obsessed and unnerved us. Our policeman neighbour carried +suspects, and of course his uniform was never even fumigated and we knew +it. + +The dear little daughter of the director's wife was taken away from home +one night, in spite of her parents' remonstrances. She was ill of +rheumatic fever, and the authorities heard of it, pronounced it +smallpox, and took her away in the open carriage. She died in a few +days, and no one ever knew whether it was smallpox or not. Her mother +never quite got over it; the child was so sweet and young. + +The wagon used to stand in the street before a suspect house, with +children playing around it. The police seemed to run the whole thing, +and would carry bedding out of the houses and leave it to be burned in +the street. We were told that the very poor used to steal this bedding +at night. Of course we were vaccinated, but it did not take. The last +performances of the season were abandoned, as every one was afraid of +crowded places, and I left for Berlin on business. While there my throat +became frightfully sore, and of course I thought, "Aha! I have it!" And +of course I didn't have it. I returned worn out to Paris and rested +there. + +About this time I went first to Jean de Reszke. His beautiful house, +near the _Bois_, with its little theatre, was the scene of much +nervousness and struggles to become _prime donne_. The master opened my +eyes to the beauties of style. His Wagner, better than the best +Wagnerian singer I have ever heard, his French style, the wonderfully +Italian and yet manly interpretations he gave the Puccini and Verdi +roles, were all a marvellous inspiration to me. With a pupil he +considered intelligent he would take no end of trouble, and a "_Bien_" +from him was a jewel above price. The tales de Reszke pupils sometimes +tell me of the wonderful things he told them and predicted for them have +always amused me, because in all the time I have been in his studio I +have never heard anything like it. + +I was so infatuated by my work with him, and so humbled at the vista of +endless effort it opened before me, before his ideas could be carried +out in every tone one sang, that I asked him one day if I should not +spend the next winter in his studio, and leave the stage for a year. He +thought it over seriously, and advised me to go on with the stage work, +for the routine I was getting was as valuable a teacher as he was. It +would have been a great privilege to have spent an entire year with him, +and if I could have afforded it, I should have done so. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +DISCOURAGEMENTS THAT LEAD TO A COURT THEATRE + + +The second year of my first engagement was drawing to a close, and I was +much exercised over the next step. I wanted to try for one of the +_Hoftheaters_, not the very largest and most famous, but a place with a +good orchestra and carefully prepared productions. There seemed to be no +vacancy in just such a theatre, and my agent offered me a contract for a +great _Stadttheater_, probably the first municipal opera house in +Germany. Their contralto, who was a great favourite, had a contract for +a big Royal Opera, and they felt sure she would be engaged. With some +misgivings, I signed the _Vertrag_, and then began the long dickering to +arrange the guest performances which should decide my fate. They finally +asked me to sing _Azucena_ at an afternoon performance. It had taken so +long to find a date which suited us both, that a good deal of time had +elapsed between the signing of the contract and their letter. I, of +course, refused to sing an afternoon performance, and it was finally +arranged that I should sing _Carmen_ on a certain date. There is a sort +of unwritten law that they shall choose one part, and you another, but +it is not always observed. This difficulty over the role should have +warned me that there was something wrong. Such a disagreement is a +pretty good indication that your contract will not be made _perfekt_. + +I travelled all night, and arrived to find a rehearsal on the same day +as the performance. It was what is called an _Arrangier Probe fuer den +Gast_, rehearsal without orchestra, of the scenes in which the "Guest" +takes part. All the colleagues were nice to me, but I saw the contralto +watching from the wings, and she gave me a dagger glare; so I thought +that there was "something rotten in the state of Denmark," as she was +supposed to be leaving voluntarily. I sang well that night, and had a +real success with the audience, and with my colleagues. They all said to +me, "Oh, you are certainly engaged after a hit like that." But I felt a +premonition which increased to a certainty when I heard that the +Director had not troubled to watch my performance, but had left the +theatre in the middle of the first act. + +I left the next morning, and in a day I received a letter from the +Director saying that I had not had quite enough experience to sing their +repertoire. I learned some time afterwards that their contralto had +sung one of her guest-performances before I went there, had failed to +make a sufficient impression, and had decided to remain where she was. +This had been settled between her and the Direction before I sang at +all; still they had let me sing with no prospect of an engagement, and +allowed it to appear to be my fault that I was not engaged. Legally, of +course, they were quite within their rights, as I could have sued them +if they had not given me a chance to sing the _Gastspiel_ called for in +my contract. But any singer, in such circumstances, would infinitely +prefer to be told the facts. Later, I once begged a director to tell me +if it were really worth while to _gastieren_ in his opera house. He +said, certainly, they were not considering any one else and really +wanted to hear me. I sang there with one of the biggest personal +successes I have ever made, the _Buergermeister_ and all the Committee +(it was a municipal theatre managed by a Committee with the Mayor at the +head) came on the stage to congratulate me, and I had to take nine +curtain calls alone after the last act. I was not engaged, however, and +found out that they had already decided to engage a contralto who had +sung one _Gastspiel_ before me and the other directly afterwards. This +sort of thing happens even to the most experienced native-born singer. +One tenor in D. sang a guest performance _auf Engagement_, and learned +that he was the seventh who had tried for that position in the same +part, and they kept on their original one after all! Of course, these +performances are paid, but the fact that one has sung without being +engaged becomes known everywhere through the weekly theatrical paper, +which gives the repertoire and singers in each opera, of all the +reputable opera houses in Germany. But the fact that the management +never intended to engage you is not generally known. If you have bad +luck like this three or four times, it injures your standing as an +artist. The _Genossenschaft_ or stage society is trying to make each +theatre confine itself to issuing only one contract at a time to fill +any vacancy they may have, which will largely prevent this evil. + +A second disappointment followed right on the heels of the first one. I +had a second string to my bow, as there was a vacancy in a very good +_Stadttheater_ for which I was anxious to try. I opened negotiations +with them through my agent, and after the usual delay arranged the +_Gastspiels_. Their contralto was also leaving voluntarily. I was to +sing the two _Erdas_ and _Ulrica_ in the "Masked Ball." When I got +there, I found this changed to the _Erdas_ and _Fricka_, which I had not +sung for a year. Then they demanded _Frau Reich_ in "Merry Wives" +without a rehearsal instead of the "Siegfried" _Erda_. I was very +unhappy, for I knew from this that things were going badly, and that +they had no intention of engaging me, no matter how or what I sang. The +Direction wrote me that, in spite of my great talents, my voice was not +quite large enough for their house. The truth was that their contralto, +who was a Jewess and therefore of the same religion as most of the +committee, had been offered an increase of salary to remain, and had +accepted. The Direction themselves felt badly over the way they had +treated me, and the _Intendant_ telephoned to a _Hoftheater_, not far +off, where he knew there was going to be a vacancy, to recommend me to +their Director in the highest terms. + +This was Darmstadt, the capital of a small principality, famous for its +opera house, which had existed for a hundred years. It is a town of +about 100,000 inhabitants, and the residence of the reigning Grand Duke, +Ernst Ludwig. His mother had been the Princess Alice of England, +daughter of Queen Victoria. He and his second wife, Eleanore, lived with +their two little sons at the palace Princess Alice's money had built for +them. It was really not a palace at all, but a large, roomy, comfortable +house. His beautiful sister, Alexandra, married the Czar of Russia; +another sister married the Kaiser's brother, Prince Henry of Prussia. + +The opera house, called _Hoftheater_, stood high in the second class. In +the first class are Berlin, Vienna, Dresden and Muenich, with possibly +Hamburg. Then come Cologne, Frankfurt and Leipsic, and the _Hoftheaters_ +Hanover, Stuttgart, Mannheim, Wiesbaden, Darmstadt, etc. In the third +class are the smaller _Hoftheaters_ like Coburg, and the _Stadttheaters_ +like Mainz. In the fourth, are the smallest _Stadttheaters_, and last of +all come the little towns which have _Monatsoper_, or a one month season +of opera in the year, after the seven month theatres are closed. The +first class houses are open all the year, with a four or six weeks' +vacation for the singers at different times, so that they shall not all +be away together. The next class has a nine months' season, but in the +_Hoftheaters_ the salary is paid in monthly instalments for twelve +months in the year. + +I took the train for the town, not caring much whether they wanted me or +not. Perhaps that was the right attitude, for after hearing one song +with piano accompaniment, the _Intendant_ offered me a five-year +contract. I asked them to make it three; the town seemed so small and +quiet that I did not like the sound of five years in it. The salary was +the highest they had ever paid a contralto. The Director said at once, +"How much did they offer you in----?" and agreed to pay me only 500 +marks a year less. I arranged to _gastieren_ very soon in _Carmen_, +with _Nancy_ and one other part to follow. I sang only the _Carmen_ on +trial, however, as the Grand Duke, who had come in especially from his +country place to hear me, engaged me personally after the first act. I +had a wonderful and rare chance to "be grand" when the Director told me +this. He asked me if I would be willing to sing my other _Gastspiel_ of +_Nancy_. I replied loftily that I really could not do so, as I must +return to Paris. + +Six days before the opening of the season, according to contract, I +arrived with my sister in the town which was to be my home for the next +three years. It is surrounded by forests and looked very pretty; but oh! +so quiet! The _Hoftheater_ stands in a park, and is a classic-looking +structure seating 1,400 persons. It has been there for a hundred years, +and runs by clockwork. A building behind it, more than half as large as +the theatre itself, contains the ballet school and scene-painting lofts +and a complete dressmaking and tailoring establishment, with the +wardrobe mistress and master at the head, where all costumes are made. +They are also kept here, and the collection is a very complete one, with +endless sets of uniforms, armour and historical costumes of all kinds. +Men's dress is supplied; women who have a salary of more than 3600 marks +($900) are supposed to supply their own, but if you are nice to the +wardrobe mistress she will usually contrive to find what you want, +though you must get permission from the Direction to wear it. Excellent +dressers are provided for the principals, and a hair-dresser to put on +your wig. There is a small charge if it requires dressing. The theatre +pays these people, but you are supposed to tip them on New Year's Day, +also the stage doorkeeper, the man who brings you the scores of your +parts, and any one else you like, though only the first four expect it; +and 10 marks ($2.50) is a liberal tip. You are expected to keep your +costumes at home, and send them over in a basket-trunk on the morning of +the performance for your dresser to unpack, press and hang up. You pay a +man $1.00 a month to do this, though many singers send their servant. + +There are four Kapellmeisters, the first one who rejoiced in the title +of _Hofrat_ (Court councillor), the second, and third, and a fourth for +the chorus. Felix Weingartner is now first conductor there. The +orchestra consists of sixty musicians, and is really good. They have +played together so long, that they can play almost anything, and they +excel in Mozart, whom, with Wagner, they adore, while they look with +condescension upon the works of Puccini. The scenery of this particular +opera house used to be famous. They were the first to have moons which +really rose about as slowly as the real one, and they are still unique +in possessing a wonderful clock-work sun, which contracts as it rises. +The _Ring_ dramas, with their complicated settings, are given without a +single hitch; the "Magic Flute" is presented with some nineteen scenes, +all dark changes; and this is one of the four theatres in the world +where Goethe's "Faust" is given entire, on four consecutive evenings. +The artist, Kempin, who is responsible for all new scenery, is a man of +considerable reputation, outside the town as well as in it, as a +painter. He does excellent things when he is allowed a free hand, as he +inclines very strongly toward modern _styliziert_ (conventionalized) +scenery _a la Reinhardt_. His production of "La Belle Helene" was worth +seeing, and his "_Gretchen's_ room" in "Faust" is one of the most +charming stage settings I have ever seen. + +There is a large, thoroughly trained chorus, each with a repertoire of +over fifty operas, whose members are paid, as a rule, about 125 marks a +month ($26), everything but modern dress supplied. None receives more, +except those who fill small "speaking parts." In a ballet of forty the +dancers receive from 75 to 80 marks apiece with all costumes furnished. +Knowing these figures, as I do, it is hard for me to credit those I once +saw quoted in a music journal from a German book on the subject. The +author stated that the ballet girls in Hanover receive only 10 marks +($2.50) a month. Hanover, being a larger city and affiliated with Berlin +pays better salaries than this opera house of which I am writing. He +also said that the "leading lady" in Eisenach had only 15 marks a month! +As I, as a beginner and foreigner, in Metz, received $35 a month, I +cannot but think that he had forgotten to add the cipher and meant 150 +marks! The costume expenses that he spoke of, are certainly a great tax +upon the German _actresses_ in smaller theatres; but I think I have +shown how greatly the wardrobe of a _singer_ in such a theatre may be +simplified, especially by a thrifty German woman, up to all the dodges +of different pairs of sleeves for the same gown. After all, costume +expenses are as high or as low as one makes them. None of our American +girls thinks of becoming an actress on the European stage, so these +costume expenses need not trouble her personally, and the majority of +German actresses manage to live on their earnings. The principals in my +theatre received from $900 to $3500 a year, which last named sum is paid +to the _Heldentenor_, and on which he is rich. The rent of a good flat +is 700-800 marks a year ($180-$200). I paid 1100 marks ($275) for mine +because it was situated on the best street, near the palace. It +contained four rooms, with kitchen, bath, maid's room and two balconies. +A good general servant receives 25 marks a month ($6.24). Her wages and +everything about her are regulated by police inspection. The _Polizei_, +in fact, regulates the whole town, even the closing of the theatre, +which can only be shut in case of destruction by fire, serious epidemic +or martial law. + +The same system of alternating plays with opera obtains in all but the +very largest German cities. We had some splendid actors in our cast, +some of whom are now in leading positions in the greatest theatres. The +repertoire, for a town of 100,000 people, is extraordinary. The German +classics, Goethe and Schiller, alternate with Shakespeare; the modern +poetic dramas, the plays of Hebbel, Grillpartzer, the sparkling comedies +of Schnitzler are interchanged with translations of Ibsen, Bernard Shaw, +Pinero, etc. Sudermann and Hauptmann may follow the latest French salon +comedy, or a new farce; and the good old ones that everybody knows like +"Kyritz Pyritz," and "Charley's Aunt" are not allowed to die. Then there +are peasant plays in dialect and fairy plays for the children at +Christmas. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +SALARIES AND A TENOR'S GENIUS + + +If you make a hit with the audience your residence in the town is made +very pleasant. Even the conductors and motormen of the street cars used +to greet me as they passed and all the policemen were my friends. I had +letters to some of the people in the town through relations, and took as +much part as I had time for in the really charming, if slightly narrow, +social life of the place. The centre of everything was, of course, the +Court. The Grand Duke took a great interest in the theatre, and used to +watch the productions notebook in hand. Any detail which did not please +him was immediately noted and sent then and there to the stage manager +to be changed. We had some special privileges as we were classed as +_Beamten_ or official servants of the government. One was the right to +wine from the ducal cellars at cost price, or duty free. Another was a +10 per cent. discount at all the shops. + +Extra money is often to be picked up by a _Gastspiel aushilfsweise_, +that is, an emergency call from a neighbouring theatre. Our opera +soubrette once received a hurry call to another _Hofoper_ one hour's +journey away. The train would have made her too late, so she took an +automobile and her costume with her, and drove at breakneck speed +through the woods to the town. She was to sing _Cherubino_ in "Figaro" +and, as she dressed in the auto to save time, the surprise of the +chauffeur may be imagined when, instead of a brunette girl, a blond boy +emerged from his car! + +I made my first appearance as a regular member of the company as +_Dalila_. The only comment afterwards of the first Kapellmeister, who +directed the performance, was, "Why did you make the eighth note in such +and such a phrase a sixteenth?" I repeat this, in order to give an idea +of the standard of thoroughness with which the musical part of the opera +was prepared. When we were rehearsing _Dalila_ on the stage, I, having +studied the role in Paris and being imbued with the spirit of the French +performers, occasionally gave that swing from the hips on a particularly +luscious phrase, using as faithfully as I could remember it de Reszke's +masterly interpretation and flow of line. The _Hofrat_ rapped on his +desk, and half patronizingly, half contemptuously, with a pitying smile, +bade me not indulge in _franzoesische Manniere_--French mannerisms. As +many room rehearsals were held as were necessary before the singers +could sing their parts, giving every note its exact value. A singer +might make mistakes during the performance, but the _Hofrat_ always +mentioned it afterwards. My _Samson_ was, of course, the _Heldentenor_, +and he was a character; a tall, good-looking man, with an immense, +ill-used voice, but a wonderful actor. He had a great success with the +ladies, and his adventures, matrimonial and otherwise, were the +principal source of gossip of the town. His lady-love at this time was a +certain Baroness, whom he afterwards married. Their great amusement was +rushing about the country together in a white automobile filled with +flowers. She used to hang fascinated over the edge of her box, high +above the stage, watching his every look and gesture, her large bust on +the edge of the box. When he left the stage she would sink back in her +chair, really exhausted, and rub her eyes with her hand. He was the only +person who was allowed to disturb the orderly rehearsals. Every one was +afraid of him when he lost his temper and raged up and down the stage, +shouting what he would do to his enemy when he caught him. One day, I +remember, he was furious with the _Intendant_ because birthday honours +had been distributed by the Grand Duke, in the form of decorations, and +he had received none. He made sure that it was the _Intendant's_ spite +against him, but it was in reality, of course, his notorious way of +living that prevented his being decorated. He shouted that he would "buy +himself two cents' worth of soft soap and grease his back with it and +make the _Intendant_ climb up it!" Then that he would get him in the +woods and run his auto over him, and run it back and forth, and back and +forth, until there was nothing left but apple sauce! Finally the +Direction could stand him no longer, great actor as he was, and his +contract was broken on the pretext of his having been absent from the +town without leave. You are supposed not to go further than a certain +stated distance from the theatre without due notification and +permission. He left the place with his Baroness, and his return to it +was characteristic. The first time that Zeppelin's airship passed over +the town, he was in it, hanging out of the car, shouting and throwing +down postcards! + +As _Siegfried_ in "Goetterdaemmerung," he left an ineffaceable +impression on me. I have never seen it equalled by any tenor. When he +gazes at _Bruennhilde's_ ring, and his memory fails to recall just what +it means to him, his puzzled look of baffled memory, the ray of +understanding that almost pierced his forgetfulness, all were suggested +in so tremendous a way that one saw inside his brain,--and all this +utterly without exaggerated mannerisms. + +I seemed to find favour in his sight, and during the _Dalila_ rehearsals +he made hot love to me. In the performance, when _Dalila_ sinks into his +arms on the couch, he nearly upset me by saying fervently out loud: +"_Ach! endlich weiss man was est ist ein schoenes Weib im Arm zu +haben?_" ("Ah! at last one knows what it is to have a beautiful woman in +one's arms.") I considered this a distinct reflection on his adoring +Baroness, and withheld the signs of delight he no doubt expected. He +told me once, one only wish he had,--just to see my _Spinne_, or +_lingerie_ closet. One day, as we were all in the greenroom, during a +rehearsal, waiting our turn to be called to the stage, I saw S----'s +eyes transfixed with horror. Looking in the direction he pointed I saw +the opera soubrette Z----, putting on her rubbers and crossing her legs +in doing so. This action revealed to our delighted gaze trouserettes of +red striped canton flannel, shirred into a band half way between calf +and ankle, and there adorned with a blanket-stitched frill of the same +material. S---- was too sickened by the sight to do more than helplessly +gasp, "Typical!" to me. A curious person; fastidious, sensual, +unquestionably endowed with genius, he just couldn't behave. + +He was asked to sing _Siegfried_ once, at a neighbouring opera house, on +very short notice. He had to dress in the train in order to be there on +time when the curtain went up. Fellow travellers, who saw him enter the +train dressed in the ordinary way, were rather horrified to see a +half-naked savage emerge at the journey's end; but S---- was quite +impervious to the sensation he created. He never wore the hideous tights +most _Siegfrieds_ try to make you think are skin, but his splendid +shoulders rose naked from his bearskin, and his bare legs were bound +with furry thongs. + +The _Heldenbariton_ was of another type. He had been twenty-five years +on the stage, and twenty in this theatre. Opera singing for him was like +going to his office. He had his house with a charming garden, his +family, and a circle of friends and acquaintances, which included nearly +the whole population. There are many cases like his in this class of +theatre, and a pleasant life they lead. After eight years in the same +_Hoftheater_ they are eligible for a pension, a certain proportion of +their salary, which increases with their years of service, up to a fixed +point. Only certain _Hoftheaters_ have this pension fund; it is very +nice for some singers, but a great hardship for others. If you leave +that theatre before your eight years are up, you lose all that you have +paid during your engagement. Contribution to the pension fund is +compulsory for all singers and actors in that theatre. One singer whom +I knew had spent sixteen years in different theatres, always paying a +pension tax, and never receiving the benefit of one penny from the +money, as her engagement in each place came to an end before the +stipulated eight years. Unscrupulous directors take advantage of this to +fail to renew a singer's contract when it gets near the eighth year. The +invaluable _Genossenschaft_ is also trying to remedy this abuse. + +Some of the regular members of a _Hoftheater_ have enviable concert +reputations as well, though in Germany the two professions are quite +separate, and concert singing is generally looked upon as the higher +branch of art. The critics are suspicious of the opera singer in +concert, to such an extent that I was advised, at my first Berlin +recital, to keep my real standing in the profession dark and present +myself without my title of _Hofopernsaengerin_. I suggested to my agent +that, as I was quite unknown in Berlin, it might be well to spend a +little money in extra advertising. "Advertising?" said he, "they will +think you are a soap!" So I sang unheralded except by the usual +half-inch in the daily papers. In contrast to the publicity campaigns +and press-agents of this country, let me give another instance of how +they did things in Germany before the war. On being engaged at this +_Hoftheater_, I thought I ought to let the public know it. I wrote my +agent, Herr Harder, asking him to spend 1000 marks ($250) for me in +judicious advertising of my engagement. He answered that there was no +way in which he could place the money to further my interests, and +returned it! The first contract which was offered me for a concert tour +in America, provided for $2,000 to be paid down for advertising before +the tour began. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +THE ART OF MARIE MUELLE + + +One factor in my success was the beautiful wardrobe I was enabled to +have through the kindness of Mr. and Mrs. Frank S. Jones. The first +clothes I ordered from Marie Muelle in Paris, the summer before I went +to Metz, I left entirely to her. She showed me designs and had bolts of +wonderful shimmering silks unrolled for my inspection, and brought out +boxes of curious embroideries, which she kept for her special friends. +The _Amneris_ and _Dalila_ costumes she made me were very French of that +period of the _Comique_; pale pinks and greens and everything in long +wigs. I wore them a few seasons, but as I grew more in knowledge I did +not feel at all Egyptian in pink _crepe de Chine_, nor Syrian in pale +green. My brother Cecil and I love the Egyptian part of the Louvre, and +have spent hours there together. We found a fascinating bronze princess +of the right period, which we proceeded to try and copy for me for +_Amneris_. + +[Illustration: DALILA AS I USED TO DRESS IT] + +We were staying out of town at Giverny, the artist colony made famous by +Monet, Macmonnies, Friesieke, the A. B. Frost family and many artist +friends. I had a big studio with my brother, and he made huge designs of +the wings the princess used for her skirt, pinning them on the wall of +the studio, then colouring them in the tones of the mummy cases, +allowing for their fading through the ages. These designs we took to +Muelle, who was most enthusiastic. We worked hard and long on that +costume, getting the headdress just right, and making it practical as +well as correct. The jewelry I made myself, from wooden beads painted +the right colour and in the rue de Rivoli I found just the right +Egyptian charms and figures of blue earthenware to hang on the necklace. +My wig maker could not seem to satisfy me, so I finally took a +short-haired black wig, and braided into it one hundred strands, made of +lustreless wool. The dress seemed to lack something when on, so I +twisted ropes of turquoise beads round the wrists and the blue accented +the whole. + +The _Dalila_ clothes I had been wearing then seemed hopelessly pale, +washy and conventional, so we hunted the shops of Berlin and Paris for +vivid embroideries and searched museums for Syrian women. They did not +seem at all popular, though we found magnificent reliefs of men. Taking +these as a basis, we built some barbaric robes of scarlet and purple, +added a fuzzy short black wig, and I felt much more "like it." I found a +necklace of silver chains with clumps of turquoise matrix, in Darmstadt, +and had a headdress made to match it. A comparison of the _Amneris_ and +_Dalila_ photos will show how one's sense of costuming develops. + +We bought all the books on the subject we could find, and studied them +for hours. We cut out reproductions of historic portraits and invested +largely in photos in the different art galleries we haunted, and pasted +them into scrap books. Caps and headdresses have always interested me +intensely. The one I wear in "Meistersinger" I copied from a portrait in +Antwerp. The Norwegian one I wear as _Mary_ in "Fliegender Hollaender" I +bought in Norway, together with the rest of my costume. + +Nothing gives such character to a silhouette as a characteristic head, +and having to do endless old women, I could give them all just as +endless changes of headgear. A comparison of the photos will also show +how one grows into the role with years of playing, and how one's eyes +"come to," how one develops histrionically--how the silhouette acquires +snap and vim and carrying power at a distance, and outlines become crisp +and authoritative. + +My first _Carmen_ clothes were very _Opera Comique_ and not at all +Spanish gipsy. I studied the Spanish cigarette girls and those of gipsy +blood as carefully as possible, and my idea of the role changed +naturally. I went to Muelle one summer, and told her that I was no +longer happy in satin princess dresses. She said that Zuloaga had just +designed and superintended the making of Breval's clothes for the +_Comique's_ real Spanish revival of _Carmen_. She could duplicate these +for me as she knew just where to send in Spain for the flowered cottons +in garish colours, and the shot silk scarfs that Zuloaga had imported +for Breval. I was delighted at this and adapted the costumes to my +needs, using the last one exactly as Zuloaga had intended, with the huge +red comb, made specially in Spain. + +When I sang _Carmen_ before Prince Henry of Prussia in Darmstadt, he +sent word to me that my skirts were too long, no Spanish woman wore them +so long. I knew, however, that they were the right length, and any one +can see by studying Zuloaga's paintings that the soubrette length skirt +is not worn on the proud, swinging hips of the Spanish girl. I have been +told by Spaniards that I am an exact reproduction of a Spanish gipsy as +_Carmen_, which shows my studies were not in vain. People have said that +Merimee's and Bizet's _Carmen_ is not Spanish, and perhaps they are +right; but in aiming to portray a Spaniard, what model can one take but +a real one? + +My _Orfeo_ clothes I have never changed. The _crepe de chine_ for them +was imported by Mounet-Sully for one of his characters, and Muelle gave +me the piece that was left over. Its beautiful creamy colour and thick +softness cannot be improved upon, to my mind. + +Marie Muelle is now the first operatic costumer of the world. This +reputation she has built unaided through her own unfailing energy. +Through her rooms pass the most fabulous-priced opera singers, the +greatest actors, the stage beauties, famous managers, producers, and +designers, the ladies of the great world seeking costumes for wonderful +private _fetes_--and gentlemen seeking the ladies--all the varied crowd +of many nationalities to whom the old childish pastime of "dressing up" +is a business or a pleasure. The present establishment in the rue de la +Victoire is quite impressive. The hall is usually half-filled with the +trunks of "Muelle artists" engaged in America, who bring their things +into New York in bond to avoid paying the ruinous customs charges, and +are therefore forced to go through the weary round of dispatching the +same old stage wardrobe out of the country and bringing it back again +every season. Even when the clothes are quite reduced to shreds and +patches the rags have to be elaborately packed, identified by lynx-eyed +officials, and sent at least outside the three-mile limit of the +American Continent to be thrown away! + +The first big white reception room of the Maison contains a long table +usually littered with samples, some chairs, and a large mirror lit like +that of a star's dressing room. There is a mantelpiece covered with +photographs of singers of all grades of celebrity, each dedicated with a +message of admiring affection to Marie Muelle. Around the wall are +various _armoires_, one containing a library of works on costume, +another a glittering collection of stage jewelry, a third many +portfolios of water-colour designs for every sort and kind of theatrical +garment for every role. + +Oh! those designs! A young soprano has won an engagement in Monte Carlo +and wants a stage wardrobe for her repertoire. Out comes the "Modern +French" portfolio with a bewildering series of blonde and sinuous +_Thaises_, Moyen-Age _Melisandes_, a scintillating _Ariane_ in contrast +to a demure little work-a-day _Louise_; and the lady spends a delightful +afternoon in selecting her favourites. + +Then Muelle sends for an armful of samples-- + +"_Crepe de chine_, of course, for the _Thais_. Yes, in flesh pink with +plenty of embroidery. Here is an _echantillon_"--and she pins it to the +drawing. + +The singer picks out a scrap of heavy, lustrous crepe-- + +"No, not that quality. That is something special, and there is no more +to be had for love or money." + +Colours and fabrics are decided upon, all tested for becomingness under +the bunched electric lights, which mimic the strong light of the stage. +Each design has an assortment of tags of material pinned where many +others have been pinned before. Muelle is an expert in colours for the +stage. She doesn't talk learnedly of synthetic dyes, processes, or +German competition, but she can give you a bright blue that is warranted +to stay blue, no matter what vagaries of lighting a stage manager may +indulge in. + +Her pale colours never turn insipid, nor her dark ones muddy. She keeps +a special dyeing establishment busy with her orders alone, and +twenty-four hours seems time enough to obtain any shade known to the +palette. + +The textiles once chosen, Camille is called to "take measures" and +arrange for the fittings. + +"And now, one question," says Mademoiselle, "Is your stage level, or +does it slope towards the back? Very well, that is all." + +When the singer arrives for her first trying-on, the fitting room is +filled with lengths of material, and Mademoiselle herself stands in the +midst, brandishing a huge pair of shears. She throws a length of silk +over one of your shoulders, puts in two pins, and bunching the material +in her left hand, gives a slash with the scissors in her right, with a +recklessness that makes you shudder. A pull here, a fold there, two more +pins--and the stuff hangs as almost no one else can make it hang, +accentuating a good figure and disguising a poor one. + +Occasionally in filling a regular order she will stumble upon an unusual +effect. One day they were making Moyen-Age sleeves for the dress of a +well-known singer whom Mlle. Muelle has gowned for years, but who has +never been included in the list of her special favourites. The sleeve +was of slashed silvery grey, lined with cerise, the lining showing on +the edges. She picked up a bit of cloth of silver and pulled it through +the slashes. The effect charmed her. + +"_Tenez!_" she said, "That is too good for her. We'll keep that for La +Belle Geraldine." + +"La Belle Geraldine," as Miss Farrar is known in Paris, is one of +Muelle's most constant patrons. Ever since her Berlin days she has been +costumed by the Maison Muelle, and she stands very high in the list of +Mademoiselle's favourites. + +The outer room may contain the photographs of celebrities great and +small, but in the inner room there are just two--a portrait of Miss +Farrar as _Elizabeth_ and one of myself as _Carmen_. + +Opening off the main reception and fitting rooms are others lined with +_armoires_ and stacks of boxes running to the ceiling. Then come the +rooms for cutting and sewing, and the embroidery rooms. Muelle uses +quantities of solid embroidery and _applique_ work, where other +costumers are content with stenciling and gilding. She has the secret of +a metal thread that does not tarnish. Her idea is that the use of +first-class materials, good silks and satins, real velvets is a +necessity in these days of electric lighting, which is as revealing as +sunlight; that the substitution of imitation fabrics went out with the +use of gas in the theatre, and that the superior wearing qualities alone +of the best materials justify the greater expense. + +The capacity of her _armoires_ and the size of the accumulated +collections they contain were tested some years ago by the special +production of Strauss's "Salome" at the Chatelet Theatre in Paris, when +Muelle was called upon, at ridiculously short notice, to furnish all +costumes for a cast of 150 people. There was a royal ransacking of +cupboards and jewel cabinets, but everything was ready on time for the +dress rehearsal. + +[Illustration: DALILA AS I NOW DRESS IT] + +A greater feather in her cap was the order to costume the new +productions of the Russian Ballet, from designs by no less a +personage than the great Leon Bakst himself. Then ensued a dyeing of +silks and a printing of chiffons, a stringing of beads and knotting of +fringes which set the whole establishment humming like a beehive. + +For all their thousand problems, the costumes were finished and +delivered at the appointed time. + +Since that triumph there has been hardly an important costume event in +all Paris in which Muelle has not had a share, if not entire charge. She +costumed Astruc's first season in the Theatre des Champs Elysees. She +has been responsible for the costuming of many productions of the +Russian Ballet, and for great spectacles like Debussy's "St. Sebastien" +and "La Pisanelle" of D'Annunzio. Society knows her as well as the +stage, for she has been the presiding genius at many an exquisite fete, +Greek, Roman, or Persian, held in lovely gardens behind the prosaic +exteriors of exclusive Parisian homes. + +But all this has not turned her head, nor changed her toward her old +friends. She still loves a good gossip. Many a note have we had from +her--"I am delighted that Mademoiselle is returning to Paris, and hope +that she will come to see me. I have quantities of stories to tell her, +and we shall die of laughing." + +But though she enjoys a choice tidbit, she will tolerate no malicious +tale-bearing. She refused an order, tactfully and firmly, from one +singer because the lady tried to tell tales out of school against one of +Muelle's chosen favourites. Her revenge in this case was typical. She +knows that advancing age is the enemy _par excellence_ of popularity for +stage people, so she makes a point of always referring to the delinquent +as "La Mere So-and-So!" + +The list of her kindnesses to artists is unending. One case that I know +of personally is typical. A girl with an unusually beautiful voice had +arranged a debut, leading to a first engagement, and she ordered her +wardrobe from Muelle. She failed to be engaged after her debut, however, +and one disappointment after another came to her, so that it seemed +impossible for her to make a start at all. But Muelle had faith in her, +and kept the beautiful clothes, unpaid for, hanging in her presses for +several years. At last the girl made a great hit in Russia, and is now a +well-known singer, and, needless to say, a faithful adherent of the +Maison Muelle. This is only one instance of the kind, and, of course, +there are many, many more in which Mademoiselle's kindness does not find +a monetary reward. + +Often have I heard her suggesting economy to those whose salaries are +not in the "fabulous" class. She will show a girl how to costume two +roles, with the same dresses, by combinations and changes so cleverly +thought out that the keenest public won't detect them. _Elizabeth_ and +_Elsa_ may wear the same mantle, right side out in one role and wrong +side out in the other. An extra tabard of brocade or embroidery will +allow an _Ophelia_ to wear the gowns of _Marguerite_--all tricks of the +trade, and well understood in the Maison Muelle. + +Brilliantly clever, immensely capable, good-natured, and big-hearted, a +splendid organizer and the faithfulest of friends, Marie Muelle has +earned by the hardest of hard work, and now justly enjoys her title of +"First Theatrical Costumer," not only of Paris, but of the world. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +THE NON-MILITARY SIDE OF A GERMAN OFFICER'S LIFE + + +One of the first things you do on arriving at a new residence in Germany +is to acquaint the police of your presence. This is called _Anmeldung_. +It is a fearsome experience and admits of no trifling. You go to the +appointed stuffy office, and tell your nationality, birthplace with date +of birth, your parents' names, their profession if any, and your own, +their birthplaces and ages, if they are dead and what they died of, +whether you are married or single, number, names and ages of your +children, and any little extra detail that may occur to the official in +Prussian blue who holds the inquisition. If you have an unusual name, he +won't believe you when you claim it. A girl I knew was christened Jean, +but she is down in the police records of Berlin as Johanna, because her +policeman said that Jean was a man's name, and French at that! + +Every servant maid has a book, which must be signed by the police when +you engage her, and when she leaves you, before she may take another +place. When you engage her she must be _angemeldet_ too, in order that +she may be charged with her proper insurance tax. This amounts to about +five dollars a year; the employer pays one-half, the servant the other. +Many employers pay it all. This entitles the servant to treatment at the +dispensary or in the hospital if she is ill. The police are very careful +of her comfort, and pay a visit to the house in which she is employed to +see that her room is big enough, airy enough, warmed in winter, and that +her bed is comfortable! She has a long list of "rights" including so +many loaves of black bread and so many bottles of beer per week; and she +dare not be offended if you keep everything under lock and key. + +You have not yet finished your _Anmeldung_ if you keep a dog, for he +must be registered, too, and you pay highly for the luxury. The +_Polizei_ decides when you may and may not play on your piano or sing. +Before nine in the morning, after nine at night, all musical instruments +are taboo. The sacred sleeping hour after dinner, from two to four, must +also be observed in silence in Berlin. Nothing dare interfere with the +after-dinner nap; even the banks are closed from one to two, or even +three. You write to the _Polizei_ in Germany where the Englishman writes +to the _Times_. I remember a perfect avalanche of anonymous cards in +Darmstadt because a child in our house would practise with her windows +open and neighbours thought it was the _Hofopernsaengerin_ Howard. + +The intricacies of paying your taxes take some study. Foreigners must +pay taxes on money earned in the country; town and county taxes are +payable every three months, on alternate months, in two different parts +of the town. You arrive at the _Staedtische Halle_ to pay your town +taxes, and you are very lucky if, after picking out the right month, you +succeed in hitting the day when the place is open. A small sign on the +locked door may greet you: "Closed on the ninth and fifteenth of every +month." If day and month are right, you may easily strike the wrong +hour, for town taxes are payable, say, from eight to ten A. M., and two +to five P. M., while county ones are from nine to twelve, and four to +seven. There are church taxes besides, very small if you are Catholic +and larger if you are Evangelical. I succeeded in getting out of these +by declaring myself neither. Unfortunately I did not know the word for +undenominational and so had to say that we were "heathen." My sister was +asked in a rasping official voice, filled with the large contempt for +women which a certain type of German official always reeks with, "_Sind +Sie ledig?_" She, poor dear, had never heard "_ledig_" before, and +stammered "_Was?_" The question was rapped out again, and she said, +"_Ich--weiss nicht._" When she got home and looked up _ledig_, she found +the man had been asking if she were married or single. What he made of +her answer we never knew. + +All these little things are very amusing in Germany. The way everything +seems _verboten_, at first is annoying, but later amusing. The paths in +the Tiergarten in Berlin always used to tempt me to be bad. I always +wanted to walk on the path reserved for bicyclists, or horses, or sit on +the benches reserved for children only. The letter boxes say to you, +"_Aufschrift und Marke nicht vergessen!_" ("Address and stamp not to be +forgotten!") The door mat shrieks at you, "_Bitte, Fuesse Reinigen!_" +("Please wipe your feet.") Towels, brushes, etc., all say "_Bitte_" at +you. I believe one could travel all through Germany with just "_Bitte_," +and get an insight into the different phases of German character through +the intonations of this word. + +A rather annoying custom in Darmstadt was the way the bakers +over-celebrated every holiday. They had usually the "_Erster, Zweiter, +und Dritter Feiertag_"--first, second and third holiday, and they toiled +not on those three days. All the bread you could get, if you had +neglected to provide enough, was square pretzels, baked exceptionally +large and hard. This may have been a Darmstadt custom only, as they +vary so all over Germany, that what holds good in the north may be quite +unknown in the south. For instance, cream is _Sahne_ in Berlin, _Rahm_ +in Darmstadt, and has even a third name in other parts of Germany, which +I have forgotten. You can get a wonderful _Sandtorte_--a firm, delicious +cake, in Berlin, but I never succeeded in getting it just right in +Southern or Middle Germany. + +A quaint old custom in Darmstadt was always observed on the first Sunday +in Advent. The Grand Duke always did his shopping for Christmas on that +day, and the country people thronged into the town. A band used to play +before the shop in which the Grand Duke was, and move as he moved. We +gave an extra long performance at the opera, "Goetterdaemmerung," or +some such serious business, but the Grand Duke never could honour us +with his presence, as every one in town would have felt cheated if he +had. + +The shopping in Darmstadt was really quite remarkable. We always thought +it an excellent thing that after eleven o'clock in the morning not a +scrap of meat was visible in the white-tiled butcher shops, everything +being put away on ice. + +Food is taken very seriously, of course, and asparagus is honoured above +any other vegetable by having its own subscription season. That is, you +subscribe at the beginning of the season, so much a day, and asparagus +is delivered to you daily while it lasts at that price, the sum not +varying with the fluctuations of the market. + +The old market place was a delight on full market days. The grumpy old +women would sit in the middle of their piles of fruit and vegetables, +while you threaded your way along the uneven cobblestone lanes they had +left in between their stalls. Brilliant awning umbrellas have been +adopted and glow in the sun, against the darkly moist, old walls of the +frowning castle just behind. The old Dames call out to you, "Well, +Madamsche', nothing from me today? Aren't my things good enough for +you?" "Madamsche'" is a left-over from ancient French times, and the +final "n" is left off, as are all "n's" in Hessen dialect. + +This dialect also lacks "r's." They tell a tale of the Railroad +conductors calling out "Station Daaaaamstadt!" so loudly and +persistently as to annoy Grand Ducal ears, and they were ordered to pay +more attention to their "r's." Now they call out in a superior tone +"Starrrr-rtion--Damstadt!" and feel sure every one is satisfied. + +We had exceptional opportunities of knowing Germans of all classes, from +the cleaning women in the theatre to royalty. The military types are +most varied, ranging from the Prussian Junker to the _gemuetlicher +Bayer_, with his easy South German ways. We met many officers and their +families, both in Metz and Darmstadt. In Metz, during the last year, we +grew to know and be fond of a young Bavarian lieutenant. With him we +drove and picnicked in the lovely Metz country. It was early spring, and +we would take the train to some little village near by, and have our tea +in the woods or at one of the thousands of _Gasthaeuse_ that dot Germany. +I remember one Sunday afternoon in a still, steep-sided ravine, the +walls of it rising sharply on either side, thickly wooded with giant +beeches; the sun-flecked grass aquiver with myriads of white ethereal +wind-flowers. A shrine, with a blue-robed Virgin looked down on us, and +the wood-hush was only broken by the songs of birds, twittering and +gurgling high above us in the branches. Suddenly far off the sound of +singing; and slowly a procession of children came into view, singing in +well-harmonized parts as they walked. They all genuflected before the +Virgin and wound off into the woods, their voices dying away in the +distance. + +We often studied the old battlefields, so fiercely contested in 1870, +and F---- would point out to us just where the different regiments +advanced and fell. A long way off seemed the horrors of war, and we +never dreamed what much greater horrors were soon to descend on us. + +We loved the Bavarians with their kind artistic souls in those days, and +yet they tell me they were among the worst in the early days in Belgium. + +The military spirit was rampant in Metz, of course, and we got to know +that side of it well, as some of the officers had English wives, who +were very good to us. The delightful manners of the officers always +charmed us; we were told they are trained to social manners by their +superior officers. The cavalry regiments were the smartest ones, both in +Metz and Darmstadt, the Infantry being solidly aristocratic, but less +dashing. The _Pioniere_ (Engineers) were rather despised socially, while +the poor _Train_ or Commissariat, was utterly looked down upon and +hardly bowed to. The Bavarian infantry has its special social standing, +because the old nobility is largely represented in it. What they lack in +riches they make up in pride. All the other German infantry regiments +wear dark blue trousers, no matter what colour their tunics; the +Bavarians, however, have stuck to their light blue trousers, in spite of +all attempts to change them. The Prince Regent was famous for wearing +his much too long, and very wrinkled over badly fitting boots. The +smartest officers wore the _Ballon Muetze_ (balloon cap) introduced by +the Crown Prince and ineffectually forbidden by his father. It is called +"balloon" because it is much higher than the ones worn by less smart +officers. The height of the collar is the other important thing. In a +sterling officer of the old school, it is low and comfy; the smarter you +are the higher your collar. If they are fat, the two or three creases at +the back of the neck above the collar, always look to me +unmistakably--German. + +The life they lead is in general very simple, according to our ideas. +Their Casino is their meeting place in the evening, like an officers' +club. Some of them are tremendously hard workers, most ambitious, and +showing real interest in their men. F---- used to teach his more +illiterate ones to read and write, and many were the stories he told of +the thick-headed Bavarian peasants. The difference in these men, when we +saw them arriving in the fall, as rookies, and after a year's training, +was absolutely amazing; slumped shoulders had straightened, lower jaws +had decided to connect with upper ones, and eyes focused intelligently. +Each officer has his _Bursch_ or private servant, who usually chooses to +be one. These are treated as friends by their masters, if the latter +happen to be non-Prussian in character. I said once to F----, "Is Karl +your servant?" "No, he is _mein Freund_" he said. + +An officer in Diedenhofen where we occasionally sang while I was with +the Metz opera, used to send me gorgeous flowers. He had a way of +sitting near the stage and applauding by flapping his handkerchief +against the palm of his white kid glove, which so enraged me that I +never acknowledged the flowers. One night, an ugly old contralto took my +part, as I was laid up, and that was the night the officer had selected +to present me with a huge basket of white azaleas and blue satin ribbon. +The old dame rewarded the house in general with a false-teeth smile on +receiving them over the footlights, which must have discouraged my +admirer as the flowers stopped abruptly. + +We quite often saw young officers very drunk on the streets in Metz, at +about five in the afternoon. Asking F---- about this, we were told that +it was only the young ones, if we would notice, and that they were +obliged to empty their glasses, when toasted by superior officers at +regimental dinners. If these gentlemen caught their eyes, as they raised +their glasses, many times during the two o'clock dinner, the silly young +fellows' heads naturally grew befuddled, but it was not etiquette to +refuse to empty their glass. This custom was very hard on a _Faehnrich_ +or Ensign, and was later done away with. + +The smartest officers had English dogcarts, and were certainly most +dashing. Many clever ones in the cavalry made money out of horses, +buying and selling them amongst themselves. In Darmstadt they introduced +the English hunt, and wore the pink. We used to go up to Frankfort for +the "gentlemen races," and often saw our own Northern cousins, whose +names we knew, but whom we never had the opportunity of meeting, riding +with great skill and daring. These races were much encouraged by the +Kaiser, and sometimes giant Eitel-Fritz would come and look on, or the +dandy Prince Schaumberg-Lippe would make his horse mince round the ring. +He was a great beau and ladies' favourite and the horrible accident that +has deprived him of his beauty in the battlefield, seems an impossible +thing to have happened to just him. + +Our friend F---- was known in his regiment as "Revolver mouth." This +title he earned through his witty tongue and his habit of hitting the +bull's-eye in his table conversation. His great friend, a smart young +_nouveau riche_, in the most exclusive cavalry regiment, who had much +more money than brains, was the butt of much goodnatured chaff from +F----. One evening F---- recounted to a group of brother officers how +S----, who was notorious for his absent-mindedness and poor memory, was +seen miles away from home, galloping down a dusty road. F---- hailed him +and said, "But where's your horse?" "That's true," said S---- looking +down in utter astonishment, "I must have forgotten to get on him." + +S---- was famous for his sharpness in choosing and trading horseflesh, +and F---- used to call him on the 'phone, saying "Is this Herr S----? +_Guten tag!_ I am Graf Pumpernickel." Then he would elaborately arrange +a rendezvous in some very public spot in Metz, at which S---- was to +appear with the horse he wished to trade. Of course when poor S---- kept +the appointment, only a group of jeering young rascals greeted him, and +S---- never discovered who Graf Pumpernickel was, though the joke was +often repeated. + +The money question of the poorer officers, often proves very serious. +They are forbidden to earn money in any way except by writing. They +cannot marry the girl they choose unless between them they have a +certain sum, a minimum; this keeps many fine young officers and charming +girls from matrimony; and frequently results on the man's side in +far-reaching evils of entangling affairs, and illegitimate children. An +officer said to me once, he _thought_ he had no children, but a pretty +woman who kept a shop in the Kathedral Plate once sent him a baby's +pillow and he never was quite sure just what that meant. The Berlin +demi-mondaines are certainly fascinating creatures, dressed in the most +exquisite Paris clothes, and it is easy to understand how some penniless +Graf may become hopelessly involved in an affair with one of them. +Officially such things are frowned on. Talking of officers' troubles one +day, F---- told me that suicide was often the _only_ possible solution, +and for the honour of one's regiment one was sometimes expected to end +one's life. An acquaintance of his had had a revolver sent him by his +commanding officer as a gentle hint, on finding himself involved in a +scandalous affair. + +In one Bavarian regiment, if you had debts, you were liable to be +summoned at literally a moment's notice before your Colonel, and ordered +to pay your debts in so many days, or leave the regiment. The usual +thing was then to obtain the hand in marriage of the most attractive +girl you knew with the most attractive bank-account. Sometimes they +disappeared to America. Frau Seebold told us once, while she was singing +in New York one winter, with an Austrian prima donna, that a man applied +at the door for work during a heavy fall of snow. She told him to clear +it away, and then come in for his money. He came, and noticing her +strong accent, asked if she had long left the Fatherland. On her +replying "no," he burst into a flood of German, and told her his pitiful +story, while she made him hot coffee and tried to comfort him. He had +been a lieutenant in a smart regiment, had gotten into trouble through a +brother officer betraying his trust in him, and had had to disappear to +America for the honour of the regiment. The poor fellow put his head on +the kitchen table and sobbed as he told her how he sank lower and lower, +till finally he shovelled snow. He also told her there was a club in New +York where ex-officers who were coachmen, truck drivers, or waiters by +day, could be gentlemen and comrades by night. He said their crests were +carved above their places on the wall, and no one could belong except +those of high birth. All this was years ago, and I have no idea whether +such a place still exists. + +When a sudden silence falls on a party in Germany they say, "A +Lieutenant pays his debts." Promotion is very slow, and to arrive at a +decent income takes years. A Bavarian Colonel has only eight thousand +marks a year. The equipment of an officer is very expensive; their +Parade uniforms must always be spotless, and though you may wear tricot +cloth every day, your parade uniform must be of finest broadcloth, and +your sword knots of shining silver though a dash of rain ruins both. The +scarlet collars are more extravagant even than the white cloth ones, as +white may be cleaned at least once with gasoline, but scarlet is too +delicate, and the slightest perspiration makes a lasting stain. This was +all before the war, though, and perhaps the dazzling uniforms have given +place for ever to dull khaki. If so Germany is the drabber, for the +colour was a thing to make one's heart leap. In Darmstadt the first four +rows in the orchestra were reserved for officers at reduced rates, and +that beautiful border of colour always framed the stage in a brilliant +band on opera nights. + +In Metz the rule against appearing in "Civil" on the street was very +strict, and F---- used to come to see us in a full set of tennis +flannels brandishing a racket, though he had never played in his life! +In Darmstadt the same strictness prevailed. A friend of ours, a Major +holding a very high position, had to dodge round corners, when he was +out of uniform, in case the terrible General Plueskow should see him, +and order him twenty-four hours' room arrest! By the way, when General +Plueskow, who was about six feet seven, was in France as a young man, +the French made a quip about him, "Who is the tallest officer in the +German army?" was the question, and the answer was "Plueskow, because he +is _Plus que haut_." + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +GEESE AND GUESTS + + +I was on the whole very happy in Darmstadt. All the leading contralto +work came to me by right, and it was brightened by an occasional role in +operetta. They found they could use me for smart ladies in such things +as "Dollar Prinzessin," and I greatly enjoyed the dancing and gaiety of +those performances. We had many operas in the repertoire that are seldom +or never heard of in this country, "Evangelimann," "Hans Heiling," +"Sieben Schwaben," all the Lortzings, "Undine," "Wildschuetz," "Zar und +Zimmermann," "Weisse Dame," etc. Such things as "Fra Diavolo," and +"Lustige Weiber," were always delightful to play. + +We gave "Koenigskinder" the first year it was brought out in Germany. +Our clever Kempin designed charming sets for it, lit in the modern way, +and the soprano, though a plain little thing, had a heavenly sympathetic +voice, with a floating quality most appealing in the high part. During +the _Premiere_ at the end of the last act, just as we were taking our +calls from an enthusiastic public, a strange bearded man stepped out of +the wings and joined us. Humperdinck, of course, whom I recognized in a +minute from his photos. He said nothing to any of us, and we often +speculated as to why he did not. He must have been pleased with the +production, or he would not have shown himself; indeed we heard he was +pleased, but no word was vouchsafed us. + +For our geese we had grey Pomeranian beauties and immense white birds +from Italy. The Italians, besides being bigger were more numerous; they +saw their opportunity to bully the Teutons within an inch of their +lives, and they took it. There was a tank of real water on the stage, in +which they loved to splash, but do you suppose a German goose was ever +allowed to go near it? Ominous hisses kept them away, and they hated +hissing as all actors do. The foreigners gobbled up all the food, before +the others could get it, and the only time that there was any unanimity +among them was when they were doing something they should not. One night +the largest Italian stepped into a depression near the footlights, +caught his foot, squawked loudly and passed on. The second largest +immediately followed suit; there were eleven of them, and they all in +turn caught a foot, squawked and waddled on, to the great delight of +the audience. It was agonizing for us on the stage, waiting for each +squawk. + +Animals were always a trial to the performers, though considered to lend +a sure magnificence from the manager's point of view. We used to have a +pack of hounds in the first act finale of "Tannhaeuser." They always +behaved beautifully and were allowed to run without leashes. One night, +however, our little round _Souffleuse_, as the prompter is called, named +"Bobberle" by the tenor as she was as broad as she was long, had taken +her bread and sausages into her tiny pen. The dogs suddenly winded this, +made a dive for the _Souffler Kasten_ (prompter's box), scratched out +the package, devoured the contents and then politely left their cards on +the box; poor Bobberle in helpless rage prompting the while. Since that +night the dogs have been chained two and two. + +We often had famous guests. Edith Walker sang several times with us, and +Knote quite as often. Schumann-Heink, a great friend of the Grand Duke's +(she told me she would go through fire for him), sang _Azucena_. She had +always been my girlhood's idol, and my ideal of an artist, so I embraced +the opportunity to send her a wreath. They said she was much pleased by +the attention from a contralto! She used some of my _Schmink_ to make up +with, and I proudly have the stubs to this day. She made us all laugh +in rehearsal. When she says in the last act that they will find only a +skeleton when they come to drag her from her prison, she passed her +hands over her ample contours and emitted a spontaneous chuckle that was +irresistibly infectious. Bahr Mildenburg came to us also and revealed to +me what _Ortrud_ might be. Especially in the first act is she +overwhelming. In playing the part later I always felt her influence, and +many things I do in that act were inspired by thoughts she gave me. +Watch most _Ortruds_ in that scene. They simply stand in what they +consider mantled inscrutability, trying to portray evil in a heavy, +unsubtle manner; and then see Bahr Mildenburg, if you can. All the +really great people I have ever met are unpretentious and absolutely +charming to work with. Only the near-great seem to consider it necessary +to remind you all the time that they are other than you. The greater the +man the simpler his manner, I have always found, and I think many will +agree with me. + +There was an excellent store of men's costumes to call on; beautiful +embroidered coats and waistcoats from the eighteenth century, real +uniforms of many regiments of bygone days, and the best Wagnerian +barbaric stuff I have ever seen, with the exception of van Rooy's. + +One of the principal men singers was a tall dark fellow, with a most +passionate disposition. We played together often and he fell very much +in love with me. One day when we were all together at a wood coffee +house, his wife asked him how he had broken his watch which she found +smashed on the floor one morning. He said he had dropped it while +reading the night before, but he told me he had been sitting thinking of +me long after his wife had retired, and suddenly saw his watch shattered +in a thousand pieces on the floor across the room, where he had hurled +it. He was devoted to his little son, a charming sunny little chap, with +the dark colouring of his mother. + +When I think of these good comrades of mine I cannot but wonder what the +war has done to them. The Hun element seemed to be in very few of them, +but I can remember it in one. This impossible person, frightfully +conceited, lacking absolutely in humour, annoyed and goaded me through +two long years with his boorish manners, low ideas of American life, +loudly expressed, and crass ignorance of all ideals of living. I came to +rehearsal one day and found the colleagues assembled in the green room +looking very grave over something. This man H---- said "Ah, here she +is!" Then he proceeded to hand round to every one a clipping, which +seemed to hurt and annoy them all. He would not show it to me, +insinuating that I knew all about it. This I stood for an hour and a +half; finally I insisted on seeing the clipping which was from the +leading paper of a neighbouring city. The critic reviewed a _premiere_ +we had just given, slating every one but myself, and saying that I +belonged on the world-stage. This had been sufficient grounds for my +persecutor to explain the bad criticisms of my other colleagues to them, +by telling them that I had an affair with this to me of course, utterly +unknown, unheard of critic. When I realized just what he meant, I saw +black, seized a property crook stick that lay on the table, and struck +him violently on the arm. I then came to, and rushed to the window to +cool off. He took the blow without a word, and when I finally turned +back from the window ready in a revulsion of feeling to tell him that I +was sorry to have hurt him, I found the others all smiling broadly, in +relief that I had cleared the matter up. Of course none of them had +believed for a second what he had tried to make them believe. + +We gave the whole of Goethe's "Faust" in four evenings. We had Lassens' +music and I sang two angels and an archangel, a sphinx and a siren +during the performances. The mechanical part of the production with its +flying witches, flying swings for _Faust_ and the devil, traps, dark +changes, built-up effects reaching from the footlights to almost the top +of the proscenium arch at the back of the stage, and a thousand and one +details were managed without a hitch. + +"Butterfly" we gave for the first time while I was there, and the Grand +Duke took a great interest in the performance. He sent down some +beautiful kimonos from his private collection for the _Butterfly_ to +wear, but paid me the compliment of letting me get my own. I had +searched costumers and Japanese shops in vain, in London, Paris and +Berlin, for a plain coloured kimono such as servants wear, and finally +got one direct from Japan. The _Suzukis_ I have always seen have been +attired like second editions of _Butterfly_ not realizing in the least +the value of the contrast to them if they look like a real servant. I +have had letters from people who knew the East intimately, who have said +very flattering things about my portrayal of the manner of a Japanese, +after they have seen my performance, in company with real Japanese. +This, considering my height, has always pleased me immensely. If you can +feel in a vast audience that even one person knows, understands and +appreciates the study you have put upon a role to make it true to life, +you are rewarded for your pains. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +RUSSIANS, COMMON AND PREFERRED + + +The Grand Duke was always very good to me. He liked talking English with +my sister and me, and always referred to the Germans as "they," never as +"we." He asked me to the palace one evening to dinner. We dined in a +room hung with portraits of his beautiful sisters. They looked like fair +angels, the portraits having been painted when both the Czarina of +Russia and her sisters were quite young girls. We were told by friends +that the Czarina used to be perfectly exquisite as a young woman, +usually gowned in pale grey with a huge bunch of violets. After dinner +we went up to the Grand Duke's own private music room where guests were +seldom invited. The piano was set high, on a hollow inlaid sounding box, +an idea of His Royal Highness's which improved the tone immensely. +Behind it on the wall was a life size painting of a Buddha-like female +figure. This was in creamy brown and gold, inlaid with chrysophrases, +and lit mysteriously at will from either side, on top, or bottom. The +lighting he preferred, and which he told me he used when he played for +hours--he knew not what--was provided by four rings of glass, suspended +horizontally from the ceiling, through which a radiant sapphire light +poured. I don't know how it was managed, but it was very beautiful. In +one corner of the room was a grotto, also blue lit with a charming, +quiet, nude figure, and a fountain that drip-dripped as you listened. + +I sat down at the piano and played and sang all the negro melodies my +father had collected in the Bahamas years before. I think the guests +were rather bewildered by the swift pattering English, but the Grand +Duke and his cousin, the Princess Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein were +charmed with them. Princess Victoria and her mother, Princess Christian, +King Edward's sister, were afterwards good enough to be patronesses at +my first recital in London. + +The Grand Duke loved beautiful Oriental effects, and never seemed to me +to be in the least German. He came to a supper-dance once, given by a +Baronin O----, dressed as an oriental potentate of sorts. He kept the +several hundred guests, and the good dinner waiting over an hour, +because he insisted on making up the whole court himself. His wife wore +a wonderful headdress she made herself, copied from the fresco in his +music room. It was all gold beads and emeralds. Round her neck was a +huge pear-shaped green stone. I was thinking of the chrysophrases I had +seen inset in the wall of the music room, and said: "What wonderful +chrysophrases, Your Royal Highness." "Not chrysophrases, emeralds," she +gently corrected me. + +The Baroness had engaged some people to entertain the Grand Duke at +supper, served in the huge new ball-room, but two days before the ball, +she telephoned she was in despair as the people had _abgesagt_, and she +could get no one else. Would I be so awfully kind as I was coming +anyway, to help her out? Every one in town knew all my intimate songs as +I had sung them at various functions where the court was invited, so +Marjorie and I had to put on our thinking caps to find a new "stunt." +Marjorie played the _Laute_, that big, graceful instrument so popular +with the love-sick girl in Germany, and I knew some old French songs +like "Claire de Lune," that I sang to her accompaniment. I went to the +theatre and borrowed the tenor's Pagliacci costume, whitened my face and +dressed Marjorie as a _Pierrette_. At a given signal I sprang from +between purple curtains, put my finger to my lips, turned and beckoned +to _Pierrette_ and led her to the little stage the Baroness had built. +The songs went off very well, and the day was saved. Later I changed to +a _Dalila_ costume, and danced with the Grand Duke, dances he invented +as we went along, a favourite amusement of his. He always held his +partner to the side, with one arm about her waist, and I must say it was +very practical and comfortable. He danced beautifully and his favourite +partner was a tall Fraeulein von B---- a friend of ours. Once returning +from a concert in a little town in the Bergstrasse where I had been +singing, and which had been attended by part of the court, this same +Hofdame and a famous violinist happened to be with us. We took +fourth-class tickets which entitle you to travel with the peasants in +large wooden box-cars, with benches running round the walls. We all +danced to the violinist's playing, while the peasants looked solemnly on +from their benches. I collected _pfennige_ in a hat which the violinist +then put on his head, _pfennigs_ and all. It was a lovely trip. + +We heard some of the formal court balls were most amusing. We never went +to them as we had not had ourselves presented formally, though this +could have been easily arranged. The supper usually consisted largely of +ham and spinach, typical of the German Royal simplicity. The dancing was +conducted under difficulties. Reversing was not allowed, and all the +dancers had to go in the same direction. When the Grand Duke wished to +dance, his Chamberlain went in front of him to clear the way, as it was +always dreadfully crowded. The women were not permitted to pick up their +gowns, although trains were _de rigueur_ and no short skirts allowed. As +nearly all the men are in uniform, including spurs, the ladies have to +make frequent trips to the dressing room to repair damages. And yet it +is fatal to wear an old gown, as the Grand Duke has a terrific memory +and will say: "Oh, that is the charming gown you wore at Kiel two years +ago, isn't it?" + +All the officers and their wives above the rank of Major must be invited +to the court balls, and, in a small principality like this, those of +lower rank receive invitations too. One Lieutenant, a member of one of +the oldest and poorest Darmstadt families, brought his bride to her +first court ball. She was pretty, but beneath him in social position, +and he had forgotten to tell her the rule about the trains. She lifted +her bridal finery out of the way of the devastating spurs, and was +politely requested by a messenger from Royalty to drop it again. Alas! +She forgot the warning and again switched her train up from the floor, +upon which the oldest _Ehrendame_ (Maid of honour), requested her to +leave the dancing floor. The poor husband felt it so keenly that he +asked to be transferred to a regiment in another town, and his request +was granted. + +They have a custom of choosing an _erster Taenzer_ for every big ball. +He is usually one of the young officers of the highest birth, and his +duties are to assist the hostess in every possible way, and lead all the +dances. + +Court etiquette is really a most hampering institution. In talking to +the Grand Duke for instance, I might not introduce a topic, he had to +give all the leads. This naturally has a deadening effect on the +conversation. At first the tongue-paralyzing "Yes, Your Royal Highness," +"No, Your Royal Highness," even more paralyzing in German, "_Ja wohl, +Koenigliche Hoheit_," "_Nein, Koenigliche Hoheit_," had to be gone +through with, but after a few minutes' conversation I might follow the +simple English custom in talking with Royalty, and say "Yes, Sir," or +"No, Sir." When the Grand Duchess left a crowded ball-room it was +painful both for her and for us. As she advanced, modest and +self-conscious, one made a low _Knix_; to one lady she would give her +hand, always bristling with rings, and you had to kiss the back of it, +risking cutting your lip on the rings; to another merely a glance of the +eye, or a nod of the head, and so the slow, tortuous exit was made. In +the town on muddy days, you might come on the Grand Duke suddenly in a +narrow street and you had to back up against the wall to let him pass, +at the same time dragging your best skirt in the dirt in the +knee-straining curtsey. + +I often thought how immensely popular would be the Prince or Grand Duke +or King, who would one day say, "Oh, stop it, all of you, and give me +your hands and your eyes like human beings." But _what_ would the Kaiser +say? + +Before we went to Darmstadt the Grand Duke had had a tragedy from which +they said he had never recovered. His adored little daughter Elisabeth +was the idol of every one, and the town children's fairy princess. She +was asked to visit her aunt, the Czarina, at Petrograd. While there she +died very suddenly, though in perfect health when she left Darmstadt. +She is believed to have eaten some poisoned food prepared for the Czar's +own children. A monument to her in the _Herren Garten_ at Darmstadt, +shows a glass coffin of the fairytale type; in it lies sleeping +"Snow-White," with the gnomes around her. Above, a weeping willow +brushes soft fingers over the sleeping princess. + +We had several _Backfisch_ admirers; the English "Flapper" comes nearer +to translating this strange word than anything I know. These girls +followed us closely in the streets for a year and finally met us. At +first my sister had her band and I had mine. Finally they dwindled to +just two, very sweet, charming young girls, of whom we became very fond. +Marjorie's was the daughter of a colonel, a count, who was very strict +and military with his delicate flower of a girl. + +As I have said, strange revealing glimpses of the Hun element came to us +now and then, the spirit which now seems to engulf all the better German +people. Two of our girl friends were daughters of a famous noble house. +Their father was a very old General who lived in great seclusion. His +pretty, fair daughters L---- and E----, were often at our house, and +were very fond of my mother who lived with us then. The old General +finally died, and the girls were worn and bent with grief from his long +illness and the trials of nursing him. Their brother was with his +regiment, and for some reason could not get to them in time to make +arrangements for the funeral. The girls were left badly off, and could +not afford a pretentious ceremony. When they tried to explain this to +the undertaker, he was incredulous, but finally said with a brutal +sneering laugh: "Of course you can have a _pauper's_ funeral if you want +one." Everything was done in a way to make it all as hard as possible +for the poor girls by these brutes, and they used to come and tell us +with floods of tears of the insults they had to swallow. At last the +brother arrived, and of course as soon as he appeared in _uniform_ he +was bowed down to and served as only a uniform is served in Germany by +such brutal types. + +During the second year in October word came to us that the Czar of +Russia was coming to rest with his family at the Grand Duke's hunting +lodge, just outside Darmstadt. We were nervous at the thought of all the +Russian students who always throng the Technical School at Darmstadt. It +seemed such an easy thing to bomb a man in such a small quiet town. They +took great precautions, however, and nothing happened. + +I sang many times for the Czar, in "command performances" of _Dalila_, +etc. When he left he was good enough to send me a brooch "as a +remembrance of his wife." It is the Imperial crown, with sapphire eyes, +surrounded by a laurel wreath. He used to sit in a box nearest the stage +with the Grand Duke. In the next box were the little Grand Duchesses, +Olga, Tatiana and Marie, and sometimes Anastasia, the littlest one of +all. They would call in the intervals, "Papa, come in here; _do_ Papa +dear." They always spoke English together. He would go to them and they +would climb all over him, petting him and playing with his hair. It was +rather charming to watch. + +Prince Henry of Prussia was there too, as these three, the Grand Duke, +Czar, and Prince Henry are, or were, fast friends. When they left the +theatre a curious crowd always gathered to see them, but we never had so +much as a glimpse of them, for five black, mysterious motors, closely +hooded, left in a procession, and no one ever knew which one the Czar +was in. The Czarina never came to the theatre; she was intensely nervous +just then, and went nowhere. + +The Czar was to leave Darmstadt on the Monday, and on Sunday we were to +sing "Meistersinger" for him. The day before I had felt frightfully ill, +and suffered as I had been doing for several weeks with pains in my +side. Sunday morning I sent for a doctor, the pain being so bad I was +afraid I would not be able to get through the performance that night. +The doctor in turn sent for the surgeon, who packed me off in an hour to +the hospital for an appendicitis operation. The next morning I was +operated upon, and they told me the Grand Duke had sent to ask how I +was, as the Czar wished to know if the operation was successful before +he left town. I thought it showed a charming, kindly thoughtfulness of +others. + +The nurses were all most kind to me in the hospital, but the surgeon was +utterly uninterested in anything but the healing of the wound itself, +and paid absolutely no attention to the other rather distressing +occurrences of my illness. One could see that a highly strung, nervous +American woman would have fared badly with him. + +Sazonoff was with the Czar's suite, and I remember the Darmstadtites +were much insulted because he always took the train to Frankfurt half an +hour away, or to Wiesbaden (one hour), for luncheon or dinner, as he +said there was nothing fit to eat at the local hotels. I secretly quite +agreed with him. + +We often went ourselves to Frankfurt for tea, or a wild American craving +would come over me for lobster or chicken salad, and we would up and +away to Wiesbaden for supper. Darmstadt was very conveniently situated +for short trips, surrounded as it is by interesting towns--Heidelberg +only a short distance south of us, or Mannheim close enough for a day's +visit. I sang _Niklaus_ in "Hoffmann" in Mannheim for the first time +without a rehearsal, having learnt the part in my room at the piano +without a Kapellmeister to give me the _tempi_, and never having seen +the opera. That was a trying experience, not helped by the tenor +knocking me flat down in the Venetian scene as I rushed on to tell him +that the watch was coming. He weighed about two hundred and fifty +pounds, and colliding with him in midcareer, I gave him right of way by +going down flat on my back. + +At Frankfurt we heard a wonderful performance of "Elektra" with Richard +Strauss conducting and Bahr-Mildenburg as _Klytemnestra_. I shall never +forget her in it, nor the orchestral effects Strauss produced. I felt at +the end as if I had been watching an insane woman, so marvellous was +Bahr-Mildenburg's portrayal of the half-demented creature. Her large +face, pale, with haunting, sick eyes, her scarlet, gold-embroidered +draperies, the clutching, bony fingers on her jewelled staff, the +swaying body she seemed barely able to keep erect, the psychology of the +queen's character, all this together combined to give the exact effect +she wanted, and to convey it strongly and clearly to the farthest seat +in the big theatre. + +We grew to know very well a Russian boy, whose family had interests in +Darmstadt. He told us much of Russia and he and his sister seemed +creatures of a different world to us. She was frail and exotic looking, +with very curly, bronze hair, a skin like a gardenia petal, and the +tiniest full-lipped, blood-red mouth I have ever seen. At home she spent +most of her time in the saddle or in the stables. She had men's uniforms +made, and rode out with the officers dressed as they were. They could +both drink enormous quantities of _Bowle_ and follow it up with +champagne and Swedish punch, and never even flush pink. Only S---- used +to become very talkative and spout Greek verses by the hour. At that +time we lived in a pension, and every Saturday night or after a big +performance of mine, say "Carmen," he would arrange an elaborate fete. +Sometimes we all had to appear dressed as Romans in sheets and wreaths, +before he was satisfied. One night I remember I grew tired of our all +being so monotonously beautiful, and came down dressed as a Suffragette, +with the false nose I wear as the _Witch_ in "Haensel und Gretel," +flowing grey locks, spectacles, and some ridiculous costume, half Greek +and half witch. S---- was so horrified that he never once looked at me +during the evening and I finally saw that he was so genuinely unhappy +that I changed to something more esthetic. + +He had as much spending money apparently as he desired, but his sister +never had a cent. She had no evening gown and only shabby clothes. She +seemed blissfully unaware of any shortcomings of her wardrobe, however, +and only once felt the lack of a party dress. We arranged something for +her that time, as she had no money to spend, and her brother did not +seem to think it necessary to give her any. After a particularly +successful fete, S---- would wander the deserted streets and kneel +before fountains in the public squares, dipping water from them with +his derby hat, and pouring it on the earth as libations to Pallas +Athene, as he always called me. And he was not in the least drunk, if +you will believe me, only fearfully Russian. + +When they left the pension their luggage at the station consisted of a +pile of shabby hand-baggage, mostly newspaper parcels. The girl had no +purse but a soldier's little coin case of goatskin, so Frau von A---- +emptied her own bag, and stuffed L----'s possessions into it. Their +indifference to all these things which would all have been regulated and +in keeping with their position if they had belonged to any other country +than Russia, I believe was quite typical and seemed to me rather +sublime. + +S---- afterwards made a trip round the world. Goodness knows how he +found out whether I was singing or not, but some night after singing one +of my big roles I would receive a monstrous basket of red roses, or an +armful of orchids, cabled for from Honolulu or China. He even remembered +my _Dachshund's_ birthday, and cabled the baker to send Peter a +wonderful _Torte_ with birthday candles. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +THE GRANDMOTHERS' BALLET + + +All this time I was working very hard at the opera. Our repertoire was +very large, including nearly all the Italian operas, from Verdi to +Wolf-Ferrari, and the German operas from the time of Weber and Mozart up +to Humperdinck. Everything was given in German, some of the translations +good and some poor. At first it had seemed terribly difficult to +accustom myself to the German sounds in _Dalila_ or _Carmen,_ after the +sonorous French, but latterly German came to seem quite as natural, +though never so beautiful nor singable. Every one in the audience, +however, understood the text, and surely this is the important thing. +How can they enter into the spirit of an opera when they are guessing +whether that is a love phrase or an insult that the tenor is singing? +The prejudice against translating into the vernacular has had to be +overcome in nearly all European countries and will, I suppose, be only a +question of time with us. In Russia, operatic composers flowered and +reached their world prominence only after the Russian language was used +for the libretto. In Germany Italian was discarded for the language of +the singers only after a long struggle, but the great abundance of +German operas came after it was adopted, not before. In France also +Italian libretti were used for generations, but can any one imagine a +Debussy composing a "Pelleas et Melisande" to an Italian libretto? Each +school must find itself in its own tongue, and I question whether these +matters can be hurried. + +I have always thought a good English translation would contribute more +to the general pleasure of the audience than a misunderstood gabble of +words, even though English is perhaps lacking in the subtle charm worked +upon us by foreign speech. + +My colleagues by this time accepted me almost as a German, and I did the +routine work as though I were a German. Surely this experience is more +profitable than an occasional appearance on a more famous stage, such as +many of my own country-women aimed at. I often heard of their struggles +against intrigue, and long pauses between roles, while they waited +hoping for a chance. We all worked steadily through the season and +rehearsed every day. The scheme of rehearsals was worked out and given +to us every two weeks on a printed _Spielplan_. This showed us exactly +which operas and plays were scheduled for the next fortnight, and all +the rehearsals we should have to attend, beginning with the room +rehearsals for the soloists alone, then the stage rehearsals without +chorus, the stage rehearsal with chorus and piano, and finally the +_General Probe_, or last orchestra rehearsal on the stage, with +everything as at a performance. At the side of the _Spielplan_ was a +tentative list of works in preparation with their probable dates of +appearance. All this made the work very systematic, and I knew exactly +what time I should have for study and what for myself. If a rare week +passed without my singing at least once I grew restless and unhappy. My +constant aim was to learn and develop, and every role taught me +something. Versatility is a most useful attribute on the operatic stage, +and if you play all the way from _Fides_ to soubrette parts in operetta, +and the audience sticks to you, you may be considered fairly versatile. + +I remember one strenuous week in particular. I had to sing _Dalila_ in +Prague on Wednesday evening. "Zauberfloete" was scheduled for Tuesday in +Darmstadt, and by taking a late train I could arrive in Prague in time +to dress for _Dalila_. I had to sing the last bit of the _Third Lady_ in +"Zauberfloete" in travelling dress with a black cloak thrown over me and +then rush straight to the train. We travelled all night, changing at +Dresden in the middle of the night, and waiting at the noisy station +for some time. Arrived at Prague I went straight to the theatre, the old +one with gas lamps for footlights. "Don Giovanni" of Mozart was given +for the first time in this very theatre they told me, and was, I +believe, directed by Mozart himself. I duly sang my _Dalila_ and sped +back to Darmstadt, where I had to sing _Frau Reich_ Thursday night; and +this tiring lady has to have a certain lightness of touch no matter how +much train smoke you have swallowed. My troubles were not over yet as I +had to take the train that night for Edinboro, Scotland, where I was to +appear with the orchestra, and on the following night in Glasgow. The +journey was long and tedious, and the only bright spot I can remember +was while we crossed a bit of Belgium. We had had a lunch basket handed +in with the typical bottle of _vin rouge_, and neither Marjorie nor I +wanted it. The next time our train slowed down we happened to have an +engine beside us, and I handed the wine through the window to the +driver, who received it with true Belgian imperturbability. + +I was very tired and very sick crossing the channel. We arrived in +London in a terrible storm, feeling absolutely exhausted. Marjorie said, +"The only thing that hasn't happened is, that we have not yet lost our +baggage." We waited on the cold platform--it was November,--till all the +luggage had been taken out of the vans--no familiar trunks for us. I +went worn out to the hotel, leaving poor Marjorie to struggle. She made +the round of the stations where possible trains from the coast might be +met--all of no avail. The next day was Sunday and we could not possibly +have found a gown for me to use at the concert. We slept that night in +towels and underclothes, and if you've ever done it you know what sort +of an all-night funeral _that_ is. The next morning early the missing +trunks were found and we continued our journey. We were much amused when +we found that no trains left for Scotland during the day on Sunday, and +that they had to wait for the friendly cover of the night before they +dared nefariously to slip out and break the Sabbath calm. Monday night I +almost broke down on the platform during the concert, in one of the +hugest halls in the world. Marjorie comforted me and sent for some +whiskey which I gulped down between songs. Gradually the chilled blood +in me thawed, and my voice with it, my nerve came back and I scored a +success, as I did the following night in Glasgow. We then went back to +Darmstadt the quickest possible way, having been in six countries in as +many days. + +We walked a great deal in the beautiful country round Darmstadt, and I +sometimes rode over the miles of charming bridle paths. We made +expeditions into the beautiful Taunus country, all gold and scarlet in +autumn. The delightful custom of having _Wald Haeuse_ at convenient +distances in every direction round the city, makes these expeditions a +great pleasure. The coffee is usually good, and the cakes always so. + +Darmstadt is on the Bergstrasse, almost a highway through that part of +Germany, and we were pestered one year with a constant stream of +beggars. They were usually ex-theatre people they said, and I found they +only came to me and not to my colleagues, so word must have been passed +round that an "easy" and extremely rich American lived in the town, who +was good for at least a mark. + +The strangest stories circulated about us, and why we should choose +Germany to live in. One was that I was the illegitimate daughter of King +Edward, therefore a cousin of the Grand Duke, which explained a likeness +to him which I could see myself. They said my sister and mother were +really no relation to me, but simply paid to take care of me. + +As I have said we had several picturesque privileges because I was a +_Grossherzogliche Beamtin_--an employee of the Royal house. I used to go +on certain days to the old Schloss near the theatre, no longer the +residence of the reigning family as it was too old to be comfortable. I +passed under shadowy arches and through cobblestone courts, surrounded +by aged windows, till I came to where the _Schloss Kellermann_ lived. I +went down a steep old stone stair into the bowels of the earth, where I +was greeted by the Head Cellarman, who wore a white apron and took +orders at a candle-lit table. I told him just how much Rotwein I wanted, +or perhaps a bottle of champagne for a treat, and paid a ridiculously +small sum for it all. The Grand Duke got it duty free and at special +rates, and we, as his employes were entitled to this rate too. For a +small fee two large flunkies in _Grossherzogliche_ uniforms would +deliver it to my apartment later in the day. I believe the cellars were +very wonderful, but I never was asked to investigate. + +I think only the principals had this privilege, neither the chorus nor +the ballet sharing it, but I may be mistaken. + +Our ballet was rather pitiful. Kind-hearted directors hesitated to +dismiss faithful servants of years' standing, and the result was a +phalanx of grandmothers at the back of the stage. I used to give my old +clothes to the chorus and ballet women, and one family in particular I +almost adopted. The poor mother was a handsome creature of about +forty-five. Her eldest son was twenty-four and a carpenter, and two +babies were born while I was in Darmstadt. Children of all ages came in +between. The father drank and used to ill-treat the mother, who had to +dance gaily as a peasant boy or gypsy, and then go home to all that +misery. Little by little I told the officers' wives I knew about these +things and they were very kind about sending their worn clothing to me +to distribute amongst the women. I believe it amused them very much to +see their old evening gowns washed, always washed, and refurbished, +doing duty as "Empire" gowns, or as the latest thing in Paris creations +on the backs of the walk-on ladies in the French comedies. Eighty marks +a month is not much, even if it is paid all the year round, and somebody +has got to help. + +We had a school of forestry in the town, largely attended by American +boys. It was in the period when our Western boys padded their shoulders +tremendously and wore hump-toed boots. These boys were all husky +specimens, who dressed in the most foresty of forest clothes, boots +laced to the knee, wide western hats and flannel shirts. The woods round +Darmstadt are all most tame and well looked after, but the boys seemed +to think they were dressing the part correctly. When left to themselves +these boys were quite well behaved, but the German students tried to +bully them. The beer-drinking type of student, with his ridiculous +little coloured cap stuck on one side of his head, thinks he owns his +own particular cafe where his _Stamm-Tisch_ may happen to be. They +objected to various mannerisms of the American boys who visited these +cafes, and the American boys replied in their own western way by +knocking the Germans down. This method of fist fighting was quite +unknown to the Germans, who replied by sending a challenge to duel +according to their custom. The American boys in turn knew nothing of +duelling and refused to fight except with fists. I think a good many fat +Germans bit the dust and got up swearing vengeance. Finally, we heard, +the American boys wired to their fellow countrymen who were students in +Frankfort, "Come over tonight and clean up." Exactly what happened we +never heard, but as both sides grew to understand and respect each other +more, the trouble gradually subsided. The Russian element, usually +rather undesirable in Darmstadt, contributed largely to the +disturbances. + +There were several duelling corps in town, and an American friend of +ours, a student at the technical college, told us of witnessing their +extremely bloody combats. Part of the glory is to have yourself sewed up +without an anesthetic, and go on fighting, and we heard sickening +details. It is supposed to make your nerve tremendously steady, and the +ones who go through the stated number of duels, fighting their way +slowly through a regular course of progression, always the winner, must +indeed be shock and disgust proof. The authorities frowned on the +practice but it existed in force nevertheless. One boy killed another +while we were there; he was imprisoned, but on his return was treated as +a conquering hero by the members of his corps. That surely belongs to +Hun training. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +STAGE FASHIONS AND THE GLORY OF COLOUR + + +We played continuously nine months from September to June, and then +scattered for the holidays. I often went to Munich for the Wagnerian +_Festspiel_. We have many German relatives (though not a drop of German +blood), as three of my grandfather's sisters married German officers. +Through remote ancestors we also have dozens of cousins in the north of +Germany. The Munich relations I dearly loved. The son of the famous +court architect, von Klenze, who built nearly all the noble buildings in +Munich for the old King Ludwig of Bavaria, who abdicated his +throne--married my mother's aunt, and their descendants were always very +charming to me. The northern cousins who lived in East and North Prussia +we always heard were quite different, cold, critical, and not warm, and +artistic, and friendly, as I found our southern relations. In Darmstadt +they seem between the two peoples in character, and of course in the +theatre one meets all sorts. + +Our _Souffleuse_, "Bobberle," was from Schwabia, and her sister was a +character. She proved her elegance by wearing the most brilliant colours +on her fat little body, and plastering the family jewelry all over +herself. She screamed remarks about the members of the company to her +friends between the acts, and the remarks were not as undiscerning as +you might think. + +The top box on the right side of the house, was reserved for the humble +hangers-on of the _Personal_. My sister used often to sit up there as +she could just walk in without my having to ask for a seat, while my +mother sat in state in a specially reserved seat in the orchestra, for +which I had to ask each time. The oldest mothers and the _Souffleuse's_ +sister used to be an unending joy to my sister, in their comments. The +order of their seats was theirs by divine right, they thought, and woe +betide some comparatively new-comer who would venture to take one-eyed +Frau S----'s or fat Frau W----'s chair. It was called the _Raben's +Nest_ (the raven's nest), and we felt its influence hanging over us on +the stage. I was quite familiar with the remarks that were made nightly: + +"_Ach! unsere Kaethe spielt ja Heute!_" ("Oh! our little Katy plays +tonight"), the mother of Katy would announce rapturously, and settle +down with her chin on the rail, and her back bent like a jack-knife, +for three hours of proud but critical joy. She had probably toiled most +of the night with her little seamstress to turn out the marvels Kaethe +wore. + +There are certain props that lend an unfailing air of gorgeousness to +the provincial German mind, whether viewed from in front of, or behind +the footlights. An aigrette does duty for years and has a sure-fire +elegance; pinned on a winter hat of black velvet, or a summer leghorn, +or worn with a bow in an evening coiffure, you know its wearer belongs +to the most exclusive social set. Our coiffeur had only one eye, but +used to bring that one as close as possible to the head of her victim +and make it do duty for two. She turned out wonderful puffs and curls. +In "Dollar Prinzessin" I introduced a new style of hair dressing from +Paris: the hair parted, and a multitude of close curls at the back of +the head, the whole surrounded by a rather broad band of ribbon of the +shade one desired. This took Darmstadt by storm, and was repeated for +two years in every conceivable version. The curls I am sorry to say, +turned into tight sausages, but how much more _praktisch_! Couldn't the +curls then be worn at least three times without being re-dressed? + +A lorgnon is of course "Hoch elegant," also quite irresistibly snorty, +if you are playing an elderly Duchess type of person. If you read that +tunics are worn in Paris you put them on all your gowns, though they +may be hideously unbecoming to you. Even the time-honoured +hat-on-the-back-of-the-head outline had to be renounced one season, and +every one peered out at you from a hat or toque brim almost down on the +bridge of the nose in front, and cocked up in the back. Unbecoming--it +was admitted--, but "man" did it in Paris and should Darmstadt lag +behind? + +The problem of clothes for the actress is a terrific one, and I think +almost every one in town knows and makes allowances for this. The men go +further astray in the quest of fashion, or perhaps it is that the +slightest lapse from rigid formality is so noticeable in their dress of +today. In Metz dickeys, or small false fronts, were worn as a matter of +course in the place of evening shirts. If you were long and the dickey +was short you stuck a jaunty, flaming silk handkerchief in your vest in +front, to hide dangerous glimpses of Jaegers. And then why stick +slavishly to the bow tie of white cotton? A black or scarlet string tie +was distinctly more novel, and attracted attention at once if worn with +an otherwise conventional evening coat. + +In Darmstadt the men knew better, but some of them tried to ape the +officers in walk, monocle, or hair brushing, to the huge delight of the +officers. One clever actor always made his greatest climax by suddenly +throwing back his coat edge as he finished a "There, what do you say to +that?" speech, and so revealing the gorgeous black satin lining. This of +course was unanswerable, and never failed of its effect. You knew at +once you had a man of the world before you, a man familiar with the most +exclusive club life, valeted, perfumed and manicured irreproachably, and +you succumbed accordingly. + +The Grand Duke would sit, lynx-eyed, up in his box, and take this all +in. I always felt he never missed anything, and it was inspiring to play +to him. When his box was empty I always missed this scrutiny. + +Sometimes one gets messages that well-known people have been out in +front, and this knowledge, and the thought that some wandering +_Intendant_ in search of talent may be watching you, always spurs you on +if you are tired. Once a famous Dutch painter saw me as _Amneris_. He +was of course quite unknown to me, but sent me word later to say what +pleasure I had given him by recreating in his mind the Egyptian +silhouettes and colouring he loved. I had striven so hard to do this, it +was a great pleasure to know that I had succeeded in suggesting it. + +A dear old gentleman in town, who had travelled much, sent me many +postcards from Spain, because my _Carmen_ brought back to him his happy +days there. He sent me a real Russian "Order" for my _Orlofsky_ in +"Fledermaus," which I always afterwards wore with that gentleman's +severe court dress. Laurel wreaths and wreaths of heavy silvered leaves +were sent to me, with gold lettered inscriptions, and I kept them for +ages in my music room. + +During the last winter in Darmstadt I went up to Berlin to give a +try-out recital. It was managed by the great Wolf Bureau, and my friend +Mr. Fernow at once took an interest in me, which continued as long as I +was in Germany. I heard of Coenraad von Bos, and wanted to have him play +for me. We rehearsed the day before the concert, and I soon found I had +made another real friend in Bos. He said afterwards, when he was told I +wanted just one rehearsal for a Berlin recital, he thought to himself I +must be either very bad or very good. The truth was I could not get a +longer leave of absence from the opera and so more than one rehearsal +was impossible. I have always adored rehearsing, especially for a +concert, with such an artist as Bos to play for me, and one of the +greatest joys of my life was preparing a program with Erich Wolf for a +later Berlin recital. To go back to my concert--Bos worked very hard +that evening to make it a success, calling up all of his musical friends +to tell them of his new find. It _was_ a great success and I have never +read such notices as I received from all the papers. They told me no +foreigner had ever had such unanimous and extraordinary praise for a +first recital, and Papa Fernow kissed me in the green room. + +I should have immediately followed up that concert with two or three +more, but I was obliged to return to my duties, and so lost the +opportunity of reaping the reward of an unusual beginning. + +They wanted me to sign on in Darmstadt, but I felt that I had sung the +repertoire faithfully for three years, and that I wanted more worlds to +conquer, and a bigger town to criticize my work. + +I went to Munich to sing for Baron S----, who liked me and offered me a +contract, depending on the outcome of two _Gastspiele_, or guest +performances, to be absolved the following October, my contract then to +go into effect. + +My farewell in Darmstadt was "Carmen" and the people _were_ good to me. +After the last curtain I left the stage for a minute, and when I came +back to take my calls the stage was filled from side to side with +flowers; they were banked and grouped all round me. The curtain then +went up and down innumerable times, till I felt like weeping at leaving +all these kind friends. For some reason my cab did not come for me and +when I left the theatre the crowd waiting at the stage door followed me +home, calling out "Come back soon," "Auf Wiedersehen," and many kind +things. These are not perhaps great triumphs, but they make an artist's +life very happy, and the life I led for those three years, comes very +near being the ideal one for an opera singer. + +I think it was two years before this, on returning to Paris, that I took +part in Strauss' "Salome." We gave six performances at the Chatelet. I +took the page's small part, just for the fun of it, and so as to study +the opera. The stage manager was a German of course, and spoke very +little French. The singers were all Germans, and the "figurants," +supers, all French. Things did not go well at rehearsals. Burrian, as +the King would cry for wine or grapes, and no one moved to get what he +wished, as no one understood what he was saying, and so could not get +the musical cue. I was the only person able to speak the two languages +fluently, and finally the stage manager asked me to take charge of all +the business on my side of the stage. "_Suivez Madame!_" he would yell. +So I said "Remove throne." "Bring golden vessels." "Clear stage," etc., +to the intelligent crowd of supers, many of whom were young actors, who +wanted as I did to study the opera. I remember one hideous little girl, +who had an unattractive sore lip. Some one told her that it did not +matter much, trying to comfort her, as she seemed so depressed about +it, but she was inconsolable, and replied darkly, "it was always seven +days lost." This brave effort to create the impression of an otherwise +lurid existence deceived no one however, though they were too polite to +show their doubt. + +Destinn's voice rose thrillingly in the love phrases that _Salome_ pours +at _John_; and though she wore a costume that my young French friends +considered consisted chiefly of _chats enrages_,--mad cats,--as it had +two huge animal heads of gold, where such types of stage villainesses +are always heavily protected, the tense quality of her voice, and the +simple strength of her acting suited the character as Strauss had +painted it with his music, and she achieved results that no other singer +I know of could have done. + +I had gone back as usual to de Reszke to have my voice put in order, and +was having, at the same time, my taste put in order by my sculptor +brother Cecil, in our walks and talks about Paris and its museums. My +brother's wonderfully clear vision of art and beauty is never clouded, +and I owe much to my association with him. We used to go to all the +Salons, and I remember vividly the first time we stumbled on a specimen +of the modern Spanish school, then quite new to us. We had looked at +dreary wastes of raspberry jam Venuses, resting on the crests of most +solid waves, dozens of canvases still in the Louis XVI era, and much +pastel-coloured mediocrity, when suddenly I called out "Look, Cec, +something new!" It was a big square of flaming colour--women and a child +in red checked cotton, picking scarlet tomatoes from high-trained vines, +in the brilliant sun. It glowed and fairly zizzed with colour, and had +that radiating, vibrating quality that things have in the hot sunshine. +We had had the "confetti" and "spot" types of work for some years, but +this canvas dwarfed anything modern I had seen in Paris. We have never +found another one by the same man, and have often wondered what became +of his work. + +I think that was when I first fell in love with colour _per se_, though +I had flirted with it before. We had loved Monet and the opalescent, +shimmering lights in his water-garden series, but never had I been so +stirred and thrilled by mere paint on canvas as I was by this Spaniard's +work. It seems that a man only rarely can put colours together that will +have the living dazzling look that one sees in nature. Matisse was a +past master of it, and even though one might not agree with him +otherwise, his colour was a joy. + +Later the Cubists and Futurists invaded Paris. When I am with Cecil and +he talks to me of their work, I see their aims quite clearly, and +understand what they are trying to express, for their "line of talk" is +much more lucid than their work: but when I am not with my brother I +must confess my understanding is dimmed, and I forget the arguments he +used. + +We lived very simply in Paris, having our meals sometimes at the +_quartier_ restaurants, and sometimes getting _filets_ of fresh +mushrooms, peas, and delicious Paris potatoes, with big strawberries +shaped like little whisk-brooms, and _creme d' Isigny_ in its stubby +little earthen pots, and preparing them at home. I had a small apartment +in the same house as my mother, and my brother had his studio some +blocks from us. + +We met Spaniards, Norwegians, French, anything but Americans, of whom we +knew but few--we learnt so much more through talking with people of +other nationalities than our own. Paris is such a marvellous place for +development. As my brother said, he never knew when some one whose +opinion he must respect might not drop into the studio, and give his +work a searching inspection. The atmosphere of having to keep constantly +at your very best because of the rigid intellectual criticism you +encounter at every turn, is most stimulating. + +Rembrandt Bugatti was a great friend of my brother's, of whom I think he +was really fond, and this was a priceless association for a young +student. Bugatti was a genius, unrivalled by any other man of his age, +and very few of any other age, and his tragic death is a great loss to +the art world. His growing deafness and his acute sensitiveness must +have made life impossible for him. His recollection of the happy years +spent in Antwerp, when he and my brother were well-known figures +there--wearing long, swinging, dark blue, Italian cavalry capes, smoking +eternal pipes and working all day in the open air in the Zoo--compared +to what the Germans have made of Belgium, proved too great a spiritual +burden for him. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +ROYAL HUMOUR + + +During that summer Baron S---- died in Munich. This of course was a +great blow to me and I did not know what I could do about my contract. I +went to Berlin to see Herr Harder, who told me I must _gastieren_ +according to contract in October, but as the new _Intendant_ was not to +come into office till November, no one could really engage me, +especially as a very exacting new musical director was coming from +Vienna later in the season, and they would both undoubtedly want to +choose their own first contralto. + +However, I went and sang under trying circumstances, with a very sore +throat and a sinking heart. The colleagues thought I would be engaged, +but I did not see who was to do it, and as it turned out I was +right--and there _was_ no one to do it. This depressed me extremely, but +I resolved to return to Berlin, and devote the year to following up my +previous recital. As a matter of fact, this apparent blow turned out to +be all for the best, as so often happens, for otherwise I should have +been caught in Germany at the beginning of the war, and my career upset, +which happened to several other girls. + +The concert field is a rich one in Europe and I had made a good +beginning. I booked a tour in Holland, through the kindly offices of +Bos, where I was as well received as I had been in Berlin. The critics +wrote such eulogies that I almost blush to read them. People quite +unknown to me would go from town to town to hear me, and I would see +them at Rotterdam or Utrecht smiling up at me. I have never sung to such +adorable audiences. They seem to understand all languages, and a "Claire +de Lune" sung in French seems to please them as much as Schubert's +magnificent "Allmacht." + +The "coffee pause" half way down the program, was quite a shock to me +the first night, but I soon grew to look for it, and enjoyed the smell +of the strong smoking coffee the waiters used to carry round on trays to +the audience. It was rather disturbing, however, to have to watch the +waiters finish up the contents of the pots, at the back of the hall, +while I began on the second half of the program. Evidently to them the +coffee, and the audience, were of first importance, and the mere singer +quite secondary; all of which is point of view. + +My sister and I lived at The Hague, and Holland is so delightfully +small that we could nearly always return there, after the evening's +concert in another town. I went back in the spring for another series of +recitals and felt that I was returning to old friends. I was offered a +tour to Java, and would love to have undertaken it, but could not see my +way clear just then. + +In December I was in Berlin for a week or two, and Harder sent me word +to come and sing for Mr. Percy Pitt of Covent Garden. The two contracts +I had held so far had been closed with a minimum of delay and trouble, +and now I was to make the biggest one of my career in the same simple +way. I was not in the best of voice when I sang for Mr. Pitt, but I sang +the Siegfried _Erda_, and was disgusted with myself for singing so +badly. He asked me if I were ready to sing the list of leading roles +which he read to me, and on my answering in the affirmative engaged me +on the spot; proving, to me at least, that successful or unsuccessful +_Vorsingen_ and even _Gastspiele_ have very little to do with most +engagements. In the case of a singer of any reputation at all, the +Director has usually made up his mind pretty well beforehand what he is +going to do. If he wants you he takes you, even if you have sung badly +that particular time, and if he does not want you, nothing that I have +heard of can make him engage you. + +This contract was for the following spring. We were to give the "Ring" +of Wagner, three times, and Arthur Nikisch was to conduct. Also +"Koenigskinder" was to be given for the first time at Covent Garden, and +I was one of the few who had sung the _Witch_ at that time. "The Flying +Dutchman" completed the list of operas I was to sing in. + +After closing the contract we left for Bergen, Norway, where I had a +concert engagement. One great advantage of having my dear friends, the +Jones, back of me, was, that I could take a big journey like this; and +though it might eat up all of my profit I did not have to refuse it on +that account. + +We were fascinated by Scandinavia, and though I went to sing with the +orchestra in one concert only, I remained in Bergen to give three +recitals by myself. The trip across the Finse railway, over the snowy +glaciers, I shall never forget. The line had only recently been opened, +and very few passengers shared the trip with us. We saw a herd of +reindeer, and I fed some of them with coarse salt at one of the +stations. Bergen itself was warm and muggy and smelt of fish. Everything +in the place smelt of fish, even the hotel towels. Two kindly women +managers took charge of my concerts, and I felt far away from America +till I saw a portrait of Miss Emma Thursby in their music shop. + +The warm-hearted Norwegians were delightful to us, and we met many of +Grieg's relations, and heard tales of him. One of his cousins, I think, +came all the way to Berlin to study with me, but to my great regret I +had no time to give her. + +I was interviewed on my first day by a nice little fellow, who could +hardly speak German, and no English nor French. Our conversation was +conducted under difficulties, but was most enjoyable none the less. The +next day I received a request for a photo from him, with a card saying: +"_Seit ich Ihnen sah bin ich sterblich verliebt._"--This bad German +means approximately, "Since I saw you I am mortally in love." + +We loved our stay in Scandinavia. I remember when we first arrived in +Christiania we could not make out why the streets were thronged with +good looking men and women, from two o'clock till three in the +afternoon, and quite empty after that. We walked through the snowy, +glittering avenues, and met all these healthy red-cheeked pedestrians +talking and laughing and having a wonderful social time. We then +discovered their meal times are quite different from ours. You have an +early cup of coffee, then a light breakfast at eleven o'clock, then +dinner at three or four, preceded sometimes by this walk. Supper is +served at eight-thirty or nine, and is usually laid out on a long table +in the centre of the room. There are cold meats and salads; cold fish +and pickled fish; queer breads; and, of course, you go first for the +wonderful _hors d'oeuvres_ of countless varieties, for this is where +they grow. + +A Swede once told me you could always tell a German travelling in +Sweden, because when the _Schwedische Platte_ or _hors d'oeuvres_ were +passed to him, he made a meal of the dainty mayonnaise and savoury +morsels, instead of eating them as an appetizer, as is intended. In the +beautiful station of Copenhagen, decorated in the old Norse style, with +scarlet-painted wooden carved beams, we were served with all we could +eat of these dainties with bread and butter, for about forty cents--and +I wished I were a German! + +On the way home, we were storm-bound at Copenhagen, and I at once fell +in love with that city, and its wonderful blond race of big men and +women. We heard stories of divorces and passionate love affairs, that +made other nations pale by contrast. One delightful man told us he had +had no objection to his wife having _one_ lover, but when he found she +had seven, he thought it time to get a divorce! He still quite often saw +her, and said they were the best friends in the world. He liked to take +her out to dinner and the theatre and tell her all about everything. He +called us "The Misses Chickens Howard," and was only restrained by +business engagements from following us from place to place. That was a +hobby of his, he said, when he found a sympathetic artist. + +We crossed back to Germany, and I sang with Nickisch for the first time, +in Hamburg. His room behind the stage swarmed with ladies, in the +_entr'acte_, and the concert master told me it was always so. A valet +looked him over carefully before he went on the stage, pulled down his +coat, and patted the Herr Professor's shoulders. I remembered the cuff +story in Metz and watched through the crack of the door to see if it +still held good--and it did! + +Later I sang with Mengelberg in Frankfort. He said to me, eating apples +the while: "I engaged you because friends of mine in Holland told me you +could sing. Can you?" After the concert he came to me again, still +eating apples, and said: "_Es is wahr. Sie haben eine Prachtvolle +Stimme, und koennen prachtvoll singen_," and kissed my hand. + +To hear Mengelberg direct "Tod und Verklaerung" of Strauss, with his own +orchestra is one of the most tremendous things I have ever experienced. +One is transported. A little man with a tight mouth and an aureole of +fair hair, he is feared by his men, but _how_ he is respected! That +winter he spent almost every night in the train, as he conducted +regularly in Holland, Germany and Russia. + +I have always been able to get on with really great musicians, and have +found only the second best _difficile_ and small. The path seems +suddenly smooth when in rehearsal, you feel this wealth of absolute +knowledge and authority supporting, leading and inspiring you. Anxiety +vanishes and one's best pours from one without effort, only with the +sensation of wringing every last drop of beauty from the phrase. + +We returned to Sweden to concerts with Stenhammer, and I should have +crossed to Helsingfors to sing _Dalila_, but had to return on account of +engagements in Germany. + +Through our forbears, as I have said, we have many relations in Germany; +and in Berlin we enjoyed immensely knowing our cousins the von M---- s. +The General had just been moved back to Berlin to fill an extremely high +military position, and as he was musical we, of course, had much in +common. The daughters were all beautifully brought up; simple girls, +frank and natural as German aristocrats are. They gave a musical, at +which the General and I both sang. Their apartment was very large, but +was so crowded for the concert that I felt as though the Duchess of +Dalibor sat almost in my throat as I sang, and her enormous pearls +distracted me in the "Sapphische Ode." I have never seen such +unbelievably huge pearls. We were asked to stay to _Abendessen_ after +the concert, and it consisted chiefly of the sandwiches and refreshments +left over from the party. This showed us again the absolute simplicity +of the well-born German of irreproachable position. + +The girls were very intimate with the Kaiser's only daughter, Princess +Victoria Louise, and when her marriage to the Duke of Brunswick's son, +was celebrated, Irma was one of the bride's-maids. Onkle Geo, as we +called him, told us about the Kaiser, to whom he was devoted. At the +dinner table, he said, His Majesty would usually talk only with the men +present, ignoring completely the ladies who might be present. + +When the General made his re-entry into court for the first time after +receiving his high office, all the courtiers present watched to see just +how he would be received by His Majesty, which would then give the +keynote for his treatment by the whole court. After the general +reception, General von M---- was invited to go into a more private room +with several more gentlemen. This promised well, as it was in this room +that the Kaiser talked more intimately with the guests of his choosing. + +The General held his helmet with its _Feder-busch_, or crest of white +feathers on his arm, and felt the eyes of all assembled on him as the +Kaiser came quickly into the room, and made his way to him. Now was the +critical moment that might have everlasting consequences. Onkle Geo +confessed to nervousness, but His Majesty guessed the situation, and +said, "Hum! _You_ need a new helmet, that _Feder-busch_ is shabby," in a +bantering tone. The courtiers knew this was meant for friendly, humorous +comment, and was intended to be laughed at, so they laughed accordingly +at Onkle Geo's confusion, and the ice was broken. "And my helmet was +quite new!" said Onkle Geo, half indignantly, half laughing. + +The court was very simple, and we heard stories of this through other +friends who had the _entree_. A Graefin D----, returning one evening +from a court ball given in honor of the then Regent of Bavaria, gave me +a bon-bon done up in silver paper, with a little photo of the Kaiserin +on it. The bon-bon was white, and the Graefin said as long as any one +could remember, these had been the official souvenirs of court dinners: +only the photo varied. + +One charming girl we knew, a great favourite of the Empress, came back +from the Palace one Christmas day, and told us what she had received +from Her Majesty as a Christmas greeting--a small, old-fashioned tippet +and muff of woolly white Angora, and two small, cheap Japanese vases, +that some one had given the Empress the year before. The Royal +magnificence one would expect gave way to--extreme simplicity let us +call it. + +The Kaiser took a keen interest in the opera, and gave wonderful +presents to his favourite singers. We saw a spectacle at the opera house +that he was supposed to have inspired, and which was carried out under +his direction. It was a sort of panorama of scenes in Corfu, where he +spent much time. It must have been horribly expensive, for I never saw +so much scenery at any performance, and it really was exquisite to see +those beautifully reproduced scenes unfold before one. + +Such things, however, as painted castles and woods and flowers always +seem to me excessively naive. The Russian idea of a wonderful +imaginative back-drop is infinitely more stimulating to a performance. +Of course, there are places where it cannot be used. If the scene is +laid in a Childs' restaurant a back-drop might perhaps be comic to a +mind not yet used to making its own pictures; but I hope and believe the +aim is towards simplicity in this direction; but the simplicity must be +carried out by artists, and first-rate ones. Who, who has seen the +leaping figures of the Russian Ballet in "Prince Igor," has felt a lack +on the scenic side because the tents with their feather of smoke were +suggested on a flat back-drop? Who longed for real, that is, one-side +real, tents--with steam escaping from a semi-hidden pipe through the +top? The luridness was suggested by colour far more skilfully than if +rocks, thinly swaying and lit by red lights, had cluttered up the wings. +Make the audience do the thinking, blend stimulation with simulation, +and if your artist has been a true one no one will cry for flapping +pillars, or crumpled leaves on a net. + +"Boris Goudonow," as it used to be given at the Metropolitan, is a good +example of what real artist vision can do with colour. Those who saw +those figures in brilliant green, kneeling with their backs to the +audience, barring off the procession scene, while the towering minaret +of the cathedral carried the eye up and up at the back, will surely +never forget the light and shade grouping. It has since, I am sorry to +say, lost some of its skilful arrangement, which I suppose is +unavoidable, but the performance is still homogeneous and a unit, as to +_decors,_ score and costumes. + +It was on the Kaiser's birthday that we saw "Corfu," and afterwards we +went to the newly-opened Hotel Esplanade for supper. I have never seen +such a sight. All imaginable uniforms were there, on all types of +officers and foreign diplomats. Some looked magnificently romantic, and +some as if they had stepped from the comic opera stage. The women, as +usual in Germany, though plentifully be-jewelled, looked dull and +inadequate beside the men. + +One summer night in Berlin, we went to Max Reinhardt's small theatre, +the Kammerspiel, to see "Fruehlingserwachen." My dear friend, Oscar +Saenger, was in town, and I had happened to see him in a box at the +opera the evening before. He had come to see Berger, the giant baritone +whom he had transformed into a tenor, in his first performance of +_Siegmund_. I think Putnam Griswold, that splendid type of the best +American singer, sang the _Wanderer_ that night. Saenger asked us to go +to the theatre with him, as we had not met in years, and by chance we +chose "Fruehlingserwachen" of Wedekind. Never shall I forget that +evening. The quiet, dark wooden walls of the theatre, and the +comfortable box they showed us into, in which we sat, seeing but unseen +in the obscurity; the lack of applause when the curtain fell, and +then--the performance. German actors lead the world, in my opinion, and +the intensity of those players, the skill with which they played those +most unhappy children, the tremulous, inadequate mother, that dark scene +with its girl-women shriek, left us breathless and dazed. + +The highest possible tribute I pay to German actors, and to some of +those gathered together that winter in that theatre. Such a _Falstaff_ +I never saw as we saw there in "Henry V," nor such marvellous +presentations of Shakespeare. Moissy as _Prince Hal_ in his father's +deathbed scene; the _Doll Tearsheet_; the collection of hangers-on in +the Inn Scene, the understanding of the spirit of Shakespeare--all these +were priceless joys. Shakespeare does not spell bankruptcy in Germany, +and the people really love it, and perhaps there is a reason why. + +The next night in the same house, you might see a translation of a +French drawingroom comedy. With the exception of one or two, these +people were quite as at home in that as in classic drama. That I had +never believed possible till I saw it proven. It had always seemed to me +that the French were absolutely unrivalled in such things as "Mlle. +Georgette, ma femme"; but they were even more sincerely, yet just as +lightly done by Reinhardt's people. It was always such a joy in Europe +to go to the theatre in London, Paris or Berlin. To see Lavalliere with +her inimitable _gamine_ ways, was the most delicious of pleasures; and +the polish of the older actors of the French stage, the _Marquis_ or +_Marquise_, or old butler or housekeeper, as the case may be, is a +wonderful model for the student. French actors seem to be able to come +into a room, sit down at a table and talk for half an hour, using almost +no gestures, without becoming in the least boresome or monotonous. When +scenes of strong passion are wanted, the Germans, I think, excel their +French rivals. A Frenchman, or, for that matter, any Latin, is inclined +to rant just a bit, and become unconvincing, at least to an Anglo-Saxon +mind; but the German, when called upon for strength and power of +passion, rises thrillingly and gloriously, and completely sweeps you +away. + +Even in Darmstadt we had many notable performances. That of the +"Versunkene Glocke," for instance, was most memorable. We had a splendid +old actor for the _Well Spirit, Nickelmann,_ and nothing could have been +wetter or more unearthly than his sloshing slowly up from the depth of +the well, his webbed, greenish fingers appearing clutchingly first, and +then his grating, fishy croak, "_R-r-r-rautendelein! R-r-r-r-rautendelein!_" +The faun was also excellently done by a young fellow with marvellous +faun-like agility; altogether these unpretentious people realized the +fairy-tale spirit, the wood feeling of the story, in a most imaginative, +subtle way. Where in America in a town of Darmstadt's size could you see +such a performance? + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +COVENT GARDEN AND--AMERICA + + +In due time we set out for London. One of our cousins had found us +delightful diggings in M---- Street, which I was able to enjoy, as dear +Mr. and Mrs. Jones sent me an extra cheque to impress London with. We +were waited upon by an old butler, and his wife did the cooking. Such +legs of lamb, and deep plum tarts, with lashings of clotted cream! Such +snowy napery, and silver polished as only English butlers can polish it. + +It was not by any means my first visit to London, professionally. I had +sung in private drawingrooms in previous seasons, and had also given a +recital. Her Royal Highness Princess Christian of Schleswig-Holstein, +and her daughter, Princess Victoria, graciously consented to be my +patronesses at this concert. I had not the slightest idea how to arrange +for them, after they had kindly consented to be present, but I gathered +that a special pair of comfortable chairs must be put directly below the +stage, with a little table. Then I thought "Flowers or no flowers?" I +should have loved to send them, but English Royalties are so simple and +natural I instinctively felt that any ostentation would be distasteful. +Somehow one hates to do the wrong thing in the presence of Personages; +it is an un-American feeling, but a human one. + +They applauded me a great deal, and after a bow of acknowledgment to the +nice audience I gave the Princesses each time an English, +straight-up-and-down curtsey, and I hope that was right. In Germany a +back-swaying, one-toe-pointed-in-front curtsey was demanded. These +things are at once trivial and vastly important. + +The decent getting Their Royal Highnesses in and out of the hall I left +to the capable manager, to whom Princess Christian said as she passed, +"She ought to be singing in Covent Garden." I very soon was. + +I was rather nervous at the beginning at Covent Garden. Most of the +others were so famous, and all of them so much older than I. However, I +soon got recognition and they were all very nice to me. I enjoyed +especially talking to Van Rooy. He told me all about the wonderful +armour he wore in the "Ring." Never have I seen his equal as the +_Wanderer_. As he himself said, the old line of singers, the giants, the +de Reszkes, Terninas, Lehmanns and Brandts, seemed to have died out. I +often look for the grand line, the dignity, the flowing, noble breadth +of gesture one saw in the older Wagnerian singers, but how often does +one see it now? Of course, my memories of them are those of a very young +girl, but I saw the same thing in Van Rooy, though his voice showed +wear, and the bigness of their impersonations is stamped indelibly on my +memory, dwarfing the lesser ones. + +Nikisch came for the last few rehearsals. He took that raw, +English-sounding orchestra, with its unrelated sounds of blaring brass, +and rough strings, and unified and dignified it by his personality, his +work and his brain power till it produced what he would have--Wagner in +his glory. His gestures were like a sculptor's. My brother, who came to +stay with us, also noticed this. Nikisch seemed to sculpt the phrases +out of the air, and brought home again to us both the close relation +between the lines of music and the lines of noble sculpture. The +Parthenon freeze--is it not music? My brother says the Air of Bach is +absolutely one with the outlines of this masterpiece, just as pure, +noble and majestically simple, moving in slow, stately rhythm. + +We gave the "Ring" three times and I sang the _Erdas_ and _Fricka_ and +_Waltrautes_. The latter in "Goetterdaemmerung" I enjoyed doing so much +with Nikisch. We only rehearsed it at the piano, and he said as he sat +down: "_Jetzt bin ich neugierig. Entweder kann die Waltraute +wunderschoen sein, oder sehr langweilig._" ("Now I am curious. +_Waltraute_ can either be very beautiful or very uninteresting.") He did +not find it _langweilig_ however. + +I had one of my fits of depression I so often get after singing, (when I +feel I must leave the stage, I am so hopelessly bad, and nothing any one +can do or say cheers me inwardly), and it was particularly abysmal, the +day after _Waltraute_. One never sings just as one would like to, and in +my head I hear the phrase so much more beautifully done than any one but +Caruso can do it. That day I sat at lunch with my faithful Marjorie, who +always puts up with me. We were lunching in a little place near us, and +I was deep in the blues. Marjorie's eye fell on the _Daily Telegraph_ +and we saw a wonderful criticism by Robin Legge; just a few words, but +so sincere and appreciative. It helped such a lot. Criticism can mean so +much to one for good or evil. The thought of a cruelly amusing phrase +the critic has coined, unable to resist the very human temptation, will +come winging to you the next time you step out on the stage to sing the +same role, and you feel that sardonic wave striking you afresh and +jangling your already quivering nerves. It takes courage after that to +go on. On the contrary, a few words of appreciation of what you have +tried so hard, through such long years to do, will tide you over many +black hours of discouragement, and you think: "I can't be so absolutely +rotten, didn't X---- write that about me? and he's supposed to know +something about it." An intelligent constructive criticism is the most +helpful thing possible, and stimulates one to work to correct one's +faults. Personal remarks wound one's feelings deeply, and one is obliged +to swallow hard and go bravely on, but the policeman's life is not a +happy one. + +[Illustration: CARUSO'S CARICATURE OF KATHLEEN HOWARD] + +The Royal Opera is in the middle of the vegetable market, and on the +days when produce arrives, the streets are full of cockney porters. It +was rather amusing one day, going to rehearsal. I was dressed in my new +black satin suit from Paris, and a smart little white hat. A porter +caught sight of me, pushed back the other men on both sides of me, and +said, "Get out of the loidy's wy, cahn't yer, Bill? That's roight, Miss, +I always loikes to see the lydies wen Ahm workin', that's right, Miss, +very neat, too." The next day it was raining and I was not so smart, and +the same man saw me and said with an air of disappointment, "Ah don't +like it 'aaf so well as yisterdy, Miss." + +I have often heard of American singers who could "bluff" or "hypnotize" +directors into giving them chances which they thought they were entitled +to, and from which they always emerged with flying colours. This is the +tale of how I once, and only once, tried to "bluff," and how I nearly +got caught at it. + +When the list of roles for Convent Garden was submitted to me in Berlin +I had actually sung on the stage all of them but one, _Brangaene_. I +always found this lady so weak, compared to _Isolde_, that she had never +interested me especially, and I had never studied her. I decided, +however, that having sung ninety-nine per cent. of the roles they wanted +I could risk the one per cent., _Brangaene_, hoping that Kirkby-Lunn +would not relinquish her. I learned the role, though, in record time +between concert dates, and trusted to "luck." The season was drawing to +a close, and all the operas had passed off well, when, just as we were +going to dinner one evening, I was called to the 'phone and told Madame +Kirkby-Lunn had been taken suddenly ill at the beginning of the first +act of "Tristan," would probably not be able to go on in the second, and +would I please come right down and make up. + +In a nervous tremor, for _Brangaene_ is not easy without orchestra +rehearsal, and I was not quite sure of all the business cues, I went +down, hunted out something to wear, put on my trusty "beauty" wig, +hurriedly went over the second act with an assistant conductor, finding +my memory was standing the strain, and then stood trembling in the +wings. I thought to myself "Nemesis!" and shivered. What I hoped +was--that if Madame really was going to have to give up it might be just +before the lovely "Warnung" behind the scenes, because I had always +wanted to sing that. + +There I stood and the rouge soaked into my face as it always +mysteriously does, when one is not at one's best, leaving me pale and +anxious--a real _Brangaene_. Poor Madame Kirkby-Lunn sang just as +beautifully as ever though, but fainted after the second act. I went +into her dressing room and offered to do the last bit and let her go +home after her plucky fight. She, however, said she realized it was a +thankless task for a singer to finish another singer's performance, and +that she would not think of asking me to do it. She rested awhile, I +still hovering, as requested by the management, till all was over; and I +then went home, more exhausted than if I had sung a performance, but +resolved to sin no more, and thanking my gods that I had not had to face +that critical assemblage without adequate preparation. + +The Italian season was to come directly after ours, and they all came +drifting in during our last days, to report for rehearsal. One day as I +was up in my dressing room, preparing for a matinee, I heard a golden +droning below me, rising and falling on half breath--Caruso at a room +rehearsal. Words cannot describe the beauty of it, but it gave me +exquisite pleasure. A day or two later I was at the Opera House on some +errand and chanced to hear the rehearsal of "Pagliacci." Caruso was +strolling about the stage, beautifully dressed as usual, with a pale +grey Derby hat, gloves of wash-leather and light-coloured cane. The time +came for his famous solo. He stood near the footlights with his eyes on +the conductor, as we usually do when running over a familiar role with +an unfamiliar conductor. He began softly with his wonderful effortless +stream of tone, so characteristic, and so impossible of imitation. As +the music worked on his emotions, always just below the surface with +this great artist, his voice thrilled stronger and stronger in spite of +him, till suddenly in full flood it poured out its luscious stream--and +one thanked God anew for such a voice. + +Covent Garden on the night of a Court ball holds the most brilliant +audience I have ever seen. The English woman is at her best in evening +dress, the jewels are fabulous and the whole affair most dazzling. I +remember one evening seeing King Manoel of Portugal in a box. It was +shortly after his hasty flight from his own country, and by an odd +chance his box was just under a very large "Exit" sign, the pertinence +of which was striking. + +Destinn was our _Senta_ in "Hollaender." She was just back from America, +and at rehearsal she had to cut out several portamenti which, she said, +she had contracted from the Italians, but which infuriated the German +conductor. At the stage rehearsals she directed everything in accordance +with Bayreuth tradition, which attaches the utmost importance to every +slightest stage position; and the other singers followed her directions +with an almost reverent devotion. At the performance she was wonderful, +as usual. She wore a real Norwegian bridal headdress, a sort of basket +of flowers. A Cockney super, on his way out, remarked in passing me, "I +s'y, wot price Destinn's hat?" + +It was strange, coming from Germany, where every word almost is +understood by the audience, to sing to people whose facial expression +did not respond to the text; one feels that the inner meaning of the +words is lost, is going for nothing, and this leads to a vague sense of +irritation, if one allows the impression to dominate. + +There were several young Americans with us with glorious voices, +straight from Jean de Reszke's studio. They were to sing the +_Rheintoechter_, and some of the _Walkueren_ in the "Ring." One or two +were full of ambition and thankful for the experience they were +receiving, while being paid. Some of them, however, showed a quite +extraordinary attitude, not rare among students of the moneyed class. +The air was filled with their complaints at the length of rehearsals, at +the discomfort of the swings for the _Rhinemaidens_, at anything and +everything. I was present one day when one of them called Mr. Percy Pitt +aside and gravely took him to task for not having the swings adjusted to +her comfort--thereby incidentally killing her chances with the +management, for a beginner is before anything a beginner in a great +Opera House, and is supposed to find her level and make no fuss about +it. These girls constantly spoke loftily of their displeasure at the way +things were run. When they were offered an extension of their contracts, +owing to the repetitions of the "Ring," they could hardly be brought to +consider signing on. I said to them, knowing the game, "Girls, some day +you will be on your knees to get such engagements as you now hold. You +have the chance of singing difficult parts with a great Master in a +great Opera House, and you don't seem in the least to realize what that +means." + +I regret to say my prophecy was nearly correct, for I think only one, a +really serious girl, has prospered in her career. The attitude one +assumes to one's operatic work in early years is surely reflected later, +and the best advice a student can follow is that given me by +Schumann-Heink, "Sing everything, no matter what they ask you to do." + +It was very amusing to hear the discussions as to what the audience +should wear. We gave the performances more or less on the Bayreuth plan, +beginning early and with one unusually long pause. As it was broad +daylight at the hour set for the curtain to go up, and as the perfect +Londoner loathes to be about after dark in anything but evening dress, +the problem bothered many. Besides, evening dress is _de rigueur_ at +Covent Garden. Some rushed home in the longest pause to dress and dine; +some frankly omitted the first acts and came late, splendidly +be-jewelled; some wore evening dresses and kept on their evening coats +till the sun was decently down; and then bared their suitably naked +shoulders. Others were just dubby and high-necked, and brought +sandwiches in their pockets, feeling the holier and more Germanly +reverent in consequence. + + * * * * * + +It is a great help to be able to afford to have some one with you in +opera life. Home surroundings are the most conducive to good work, and +it is hard to make a home alone; but you do not absolutely _need_ any +one, if this is not possible. My "morals" were never in danger--no +"infamous proposals" were made to me by agent, conductor or director. In +my first engagement, one or two of the giddier members of the company +had affairs with young officers--in no case a flagrant scandal, as with +a married man. Their relations to each other in the theatre were all +that could be demanded. The most exaggeratedly correct behaviour was +exacted from me. One day in Metz, for example, we went for a walk in the +country with the lyric baritone, a nice little chap, who was a great +friend of ours. It was a lovely, frosty day in autumn, and we were +walking fast through a forest road, when we passed a carriage with the +very prim wife of an officer sitting in it. The next day, an +acquaintance of ours told us, as a joke, that the same woman had said +that afternoon to her, "I thought you told me that Fraeulein Howard was a +lady?" "So she is," said our friend. "Oh, no," said the other, "she +can't be. I saw her and her sister walking with one of the singers from +the theatre, and they were behaving very badly." "What were they doing?" +asked our friend. "They were all three holding on to his stick!" said +she, in a horrified tone! + +I went abroad to learn my business and I learned it. There is much talk +about it not being necessary to go abroad to prepare oneself for an +operatic career, but the time has not yet come in America when the +student can find the same opportunity to practice, or work out _on the +stage_ her beginner's faults. In Europe you can do this in blissful +semi-obscurity. I hope and believe the time will come when a girl will +not have to go through all I went through in order to develop her +talent, but may do it in her own country. But the wonderfulness of +Europe for those whose eyes are open cannot yet be replaced by America, +and a real artist will surely flower more perfectly on that side of the +water. + +To those who go I can only say that I hope they may have the tremendous +advantage of fairy god-parents, as I had, and perhaps a sister Marjorie. + +After the season closed at Covent Garden I met the manager of the new +Century Opera, soon to be opened in New York. He offered me a long +contract, and I finally decided to return to America. I saw a photograph +of Edward Kellogg Baird in a musical paper at this time, and read of his +connection with the enterprise. I said to myself, "That is the type of +man I shall marry--if I ever do marry." + +I came to the Century, met my husband, E. K. B., and worked with him for +the success of the opera, which lay very near our hearts; but the war +and other unfortunate circumstances proved too much to overcome, and we +were forced to suspend. I finally attained the Metropolitan Opera, which +I find the most absorbingly interesting house with which I have ever +been connected, and which is the greatest school of all. + + + + +REPERTOIRE + + + 1. Carmen In French, German, English. + + 2. Amneris (Aida) French, German, English, Italian. + + 3. Azucena (Trovatore) Italian, German, English. + + 4. Fides (Prophete) French, German. + + 5. Dalila (Samson et Dalila) French, German, English. + + 6. Martha (In Faust) French, German, English. + + 7. Siebel (In Faust) French, German, English. + + 8. Maddalena (In Rigoletto) Italian, German, English. + + 9. Nancy (In Marta) Italian, German, English. + +10. Ortrud (Lohengrin) German, English. + +11. Lucia (Cav. Rus.) Italian, German, English. + +12. Lola (Cav. Rus.) Italian, German, English. + +13. Mary (Flieg. Hollaender) German. + +14. Erda (Siegfried). + +15. Erda (Rheingold). + +16. Schwertleite (Walkuere). + +17. Grimgerde (Walkuere). + +18. Waltraute (Walkuere). + +19. Waltraute (Goetterdaemmerung). + +20. Erste Norn (Goetterdaemmerung). + +21. Fricka (Walkuere). + +22. Flosshilde (Goetterdaemmerung). + +23. Flosshilde (Rheingold). + +24. Hexe (Haensel und Gretel) German, English. + +25. Nicklaus (Hoffman) German, English. + +26. Valencienne (Merry Widow). + +27. Frederika (Waltzertraum). + +28. Dritte Dame (Zauberfloete). + +29. Oeffentliche Meinung (Orpheus in der Unterwelt). + +30. Orfeo (Gluck). + +31. Molly (Geisha). + +32. Georgette (Gloeckchen). + +33. Pamela (Fra Diavolo). + +34. Graefin (Trompeter). + +35. Orlofsky (Fledermaus). + +36. Frau Reich (Lustige Weibe). + +37. Page (Salome). + +38. Olga (Dollar Prinzessin). + +39. Magdalena (Meistersingers). + +40. Graefin (Heilige Elisabeth) German, English. + +41. Martha (Undine). + +42. Hedwig (Wilhelm Tell) German, English. + +43. Gertrude (Hans Heiling). + +44. Marzellina (Figaro) Italian, German. + +45. Graefin (Wildschuetz). + +46. Ascanio (Benvenuto Cellini). + +47. Jacqueline (Arzt wieder willen) German, English. + +48. Gertrude (Romeo and Juliet) German. + +49. Stephano (Romeo and Juliet) German, English. + +50. Hexe (Sieben Schwaben). + +51. Ulrica (Masken Ball) Italian, German. + +52. Hexe (Koenigskinder). + +53. Cleo (Kuhreigen). + +54. Suzuki (Butterfly) English, Italian, German. + +55. Magdalena (Evangelimann). + +56. Carmela (Jewels of the Madonna) English, Italian, German. + +57. Mother (Louise). + +58. Cieca (Giaconda) German, English, Italian. + +59. Nutrice (Boris). + +60. Blumenmaedchen (Parsifal). + +61. Annina (Rosenkavalier). + +62. Albine (Thais). + +63. Mistress Benson (Lakme). + +64. Margarethe (Weisse Dame). + +65. Cypra (Zigeuner Baron). + +66. Fattoumah (Marouf). + +67. Amelfa (Le Coq d'Or). + +68. Mrs. Everton (Shanewis). + +Etc., etc. + + +STUDIED NOT SUNG + + Brangaene (Tristan). + + Mutter Gertrud (Haensel und Gretel) + + Etc., etc. + + +THE END + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Confessions of an Opera Singer, by Kathleen Howard + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CONFESSIONS OF AN OPERA SINGER *** + +***** This file should be named 32980.txt or 32980.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/9/8/32980/ + +Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was +produced from scanned images of public domain material at +The Internet Archive.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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