alcibiades—continued
hestia now interrupted alcibiades with the question whether all the women in nebulous britannia were as grotesque as those that he had described.
alcibiades smiled and said:
"not all of them, but all at times. women must necessarily adapt themselves to the nature of their men, as clerks do to that of their patrons, or soldiers to that of their generals and officers. the englishman buys his liberty at the expense of much human capital; which cannot but make him eccentric and grotesque. the women attune themselves to him, although no foreigner has a clearer nor a more depreciative idea of englishmen's angularity than have english women. as women they do not, as a rule, care for liberty at all, and hence consider the sacrifices made by men for liberty as superfluous and uncalled-for. a woman wants in all things the human note, which the average englishman hates. hence the surprising power of continental men over english women. a hundred picked greeks from athens, sicyon and syracuse could bring half of all english women to book—for cytherea. how could it be otherwise? the animated, passionate, direct talk of a greek is something so novel to an english woman that she is as it were hypnotised by it. she[pg 102] thinks it is she and her personality that has given her continental admirer that verve of expression which she has never before experienced in the men of her circle. this alone is such flattery to her that she loses her head.
"if one resolutely goes on scraping off the man-made chalk from the manners and actions of english women, one is frequently rewarded with the pleasure of arriving at last at the woman behind the chalk. this is more especially the case in women of the higher classes. the only time in england i felt something of that painful bliss that mortals call love, was in the case of a lady friend of mine who, under mountains of london clay, hid away a passionate, loving woman. she was tall and luxuriously built. her hands were of perfect shape and condignly continued by lovely arms, that attached themselves into majestic shoulders with the ease of a rivulet entering a lake by a graceful curve. over her shoulders the minaret of her neck stood watch. in charming contrast to the legato cantabile of her body was the staccato of her mind. her words pecked at things like birds. sometimes there appeared amongst the latter an ugly vulture or two; but there were more colibris and magpies. i had met her for months before i surmised that there was something behind that london clay. but when the moment came and the bells began sobbing in her minaret, then i knew that here was a heart aglow with true passion and with the dawn of hope divine. like all women that do truly love, she would not believe me that i sincerely felt what i said. doubt is to women what danger is to men: it sharpens the delight of love. she never became really tender; ay, she was[pg 103] amazed and moved to tears at my being so. her heart was uneducated; it was gauche at the game of love.
"amongst the persons dressed in female attire i also met a number of beings whom, but for my long stay at sparta, i should hardly have recognised as women. a french friend of mine remarked of them: 'ce ne sont pas des femmes, ce sont des américaines.' the species is very much in evidence in london. they reminded me violently of the spartan women. they are handsome, if more striking than beautiful. i noticed that in contrast to european women, american females gain in years what they lose in dress at night. they look older when undressed. they have excellent teeth, and execrable hands; they jump well, but walk badly. their great speciality is their voice, which is strident, top-nasal, falsetto, disheartening. the most beautiful amongst them is murdered by her voice. it is as if out of the most perfect mouth, set in the most charming face, an ugly rat would jump at one. that voice, the english say, comes from the climate of america. (this i do not believe at all; for i have noticed that in england everything is ascribed to the climate, as to the thing most talked about by the people. climate and weather are the most popular subjects in england; the one that is never out of fashion.) as a matter of fact it comes from the total lack of emotionality in the americans;[pg 104] just as amongst musical instruments the more emotional ones, like the 'cello, have more pectoral tonality, whereas the fife, for instance, having no deep emotions at all to express, is high and thin toned.
"nothing seemed to me more interesting than the way in which the american female reminded me of the spartans and the amazons. could anything be more striking than the coincidence between two conversations, one of which i had, far over two thousand years ago, with the queen of an amazonian tribe in thracia, and the other with the wife of an american flour dealer settled in london? when i called on thamyris in her tent, one of her first questions was as to the latest dramatic piece by sophocles. i at once saw that the queen wanted to impress her entourage with her great literary abilities. i gave her some news about sophocles, whereupon she turned round to her one-breasted she-warriors and said with a superior smile:
"'you must know that sophocles is the latest star in athenian comedy.'
"she mixed you up, o sophocles, with aristophanes. with the american flour dealer's wife my experience was as follows: he had made my acquaintance in a bar-room, and invited me to his house. on the way there he said to me:
"'my missus is quite a linguist. she talks french like two natives. do talk to her french.'
"when we arrived at the house and entered the drawing-room, a rather handsome woman rose from an arm-chair, and stepping up to me said something that sounded like 'monsieur, je suis ravie de faire votre connaissance'; i thanked her, also in[pg 105] french, when suddenly she bowed over me and whispered in american fifes:
"'don't continue, that's all i know.'
"when i left, the husband accompanied me to the door. before i took leave, he twinkled with his right eye, and asked me with a knowing look, 'well, sir, what do you think of the linguistic range of my madame?'
"i did not quite know what to reply. at last i said: 'like a true soldier she fights on the borderland.'
"one of the strangest things to note in london society is the fascination exercised by american women on englishmen. many of the really intelligent men among the english are practically lost as soon as the american woman begins playing with the little lasso of thin ropes which she carries about her in the shape of an acquired brightness and a studied vivacity. the most glaring defects of those women do not seem to exist for the average englishman. he takes her loud brightness for french esprit dished up to him in intelligible english. her total lack of self-restraint and modesty he takes for a charming abandon. the real fact is that he is afraid of her. she may have many a bump: she certainly has not that of reverence. her irreverent mind makes light of the grandezza of englishmen, and thus cows him by his fear of making himself ridiculous.
"the first american woman (—sit venia verbo, as you would say, o cicero—) i met in london was one married to an english lord. she was tall, well-built, with rich arms and hips, an expressive head, very fond of the arts, more especially of[pg 106] music. even her head, which was a trifle square, indicated that. when she learnt that i really was the famous alcibiades, her excitement knew no bounds. she was good enough to explain it to me:
"'just fancy that! alcibiades! (they pronounce my name elkibidees.) i am simply charmed! i have so far every year introduced some new and striking personage into drawing-rooms, in order to stun the natives of this obsolete island. i have brought into fashion one-legged dancers; three-legged calves; single-minded thought-readers; illusionists; disillusionists; disemotionists; dancers classical, medi?val, and hyper-modern; french lectures on the isle of lesbos, after a series of discourses on the calves of the legs of greek goddesses in marble; not to forget my unique course of lectures given at the drawing-room of the dearest of all duchesses, on the history of décolletage.
"'this year, to be quite frank with you, mr elkibidees, i meant to arrange in the magnificent drawing-room of an oriental english lady, the uniquest and at the same time the boldest exhibition ever offered to the dear nerves of any class of women. i cannot quite tell you what it was going to be. i can only faintly indicate that it was to be a collection of all the oldest as well as latest inventions securing the tranquillity of enjoying just one child in the family. this, i have no doubt, would have been the greatest sensation of the season.
"'the city of manchester and the town of leeds would have publicly protested against so "immoral" an exhibition. of course their councillors would[pg 107] have done so after careful study of the things exhibited. three bishops would have threatened to preach publicly in hyde park; while five archdeacons would have volunteered to be the honorary secretaries of so interesting an exhibition.
"'i communicated the idea to father bowan, a virulent jesuit, who in the creepiest of capucinades, delivered on most sundays during the season, gives us the most delightful shivers of repentance, and likewise many an inkling of charming vice of which we did not know anything before we learned it from his pure lips. he was delighted. "do, my lady, do do it. i am just a little short of horrors, and your exhibition will give me excellent material for at least four sundays. i hope you have not forgotten to illustrate by wax figures certain methods, far more efficient than any instrument can be, and most completely enumerated and described in the works of members of our holy order, such as suarez, sanchez, escobar, and others. should you not have these works, i will send you an accurate abridgment of their principal statements of facts."
"'when i heard the rev. father talk like that, i could scarcely control myself with enthusiasm in anticipating the huge sensation my exhibition was sure to make. it would have been the best fed, the best clad, and the most enlightened sensation ever made in england since the battle of hastings. i really thought that nothing greater could be imagined.
"'and yet, when i now come to think what a draw you will be, mr elki, if properly taken in hand, duly advertised, adroitly paragraphed, con[pg 108]stantly interviewed, and occasionally leadered,—when i think of all that, i cannot but think that i shall have in you the greatest catch that has ever been in any country under any sun. in fact, i have my plan quite ready.
"'i will announce a big reception, "to meet" you. some ladies will, by request, arrive in greek dress. the public orator of one of the great universities will address you in greek, and you will reply in the same language. then three of the prettiest daughters of earls and marquesses will dance the dance of the graces, after which there will be a dramatic piece made by hall caine and shaw, each of them writing alternate pages, the subject of which will be the thirty years' war, in which you excelled so much.'
"i interrupted her," said alcibiades, "remarking that the thirty years' war was two thousand years after my time; my war was the peloponnesian war.
"'very well,' she exclaimed, 'the peloponnesian war. i do not care which. hall caine will praise everything in connection with war, in his best daily nail style. he is, you know, our leading light. he always wants to indulge in great thoughts, and would do so too, but for the awkward fact that he cannot find any.
"'shaw, on the other hand, will cry down in choicest gaelic all the glories of war. it will be the biggest fun out.
"'and then, entre nous, could you not bring with you a lais, a phryne or two, in their original costumes as they allured all you naughty greeks in times bygone? it would be charmingly revolting.[pg 109] when i dimly represent to myself how the young eagles of society will tremble with pleasure at the thought of adding to their lists of conquests, in pink and white, a corinthian or athenian demi-mondaine of two thousand years ago, i feel that i am a personality.
"'if i could offer such an unheard-of opportunity i should get first leaders in the manchester guardian and mild rebukes, full of secret zest, in the godly guardian; let alone other noble papers read by the goody-goody ones. the record would send me a testimonial signed by the leading higher critics. i should be the heroine of the day and of the night.'"
the gods and heroes encouraged alcibiades by their gay laughter to tell them all that happened at the "at home" of his american lady friend, and he continued as follows:
"when the evening of the greek soirée came, i went to the drawing-room in company with phryne and lais, who were most charmingly dressed as flute-girls. when we entered the large room we saw a vast assembly of women and men, mostly dressed in the preposterous fashion of the little ones. the women looked like zoological specimens, some resembling brazilian butterflies, others reptiles, others again snakes or birds of prey. the upper part of their bodies was uncovered, no matter whether the rest of the body had gone through countless campaigns enlivened by numerous capitulations, or whether it had just expanded into the buds of rosy spring. the men looked like the clowns in our farces. they wore a costume that no greek slave would have donned. it was all black and all of the same cut. instead of looking enterprising, they all looked like[pg 110] undertakers. each of them made a nervous attempt to appear as inoffensive, and as self-effacing as possible; just like undertakers entering the house where a person had died.
"when we entered the room the whole assembly rose and cried: 'cairo—cairo!' (they were told to cry chaire—but in vain). i could distinctly hear remarks such as these: 'how weird!'—'is it not uncanny?'—'it makes me feel creepy!' after a few minutes there was a deep silence, and an elderly gentleman came up through the middle of the room and, bowing first to us and then to the people assembled, stepped up to the platform and began a speech in a strange language, which i vaguely remembered having heard before.
"phryne suddenly began to giggle, and so irresistible was her laughter that both lais and i could not but join her, especially when in words broken by continuous laughter she told us:
"'the old gent pretends to speak athenian greek!'
"it was indeed too absurd for words. there was especially that vulgar sound i constantly recurring where we never dreamt of using such a sound; and our beautiful ypsilon (γ) he pronounced like the english u, which is like serving champagne in soup-plates. when he stumbled over an ou, he pronounced it with a sound to which dentists are better accustomed than any athenian ever was, and our deep and manly ch (χ) he castrated down to a lisping k. i remember carians in asia minor who talked like that. our noble and incomparable language, orchestral, picturesque, sculptural, became like the palace of minos which they are excavating at[pg 111] present: in its magnificent halls, eaten by weather and worm, one sees only poor labourers and here and there a directing mind.
"i imagined that the good man meant by his speech to welcome me back into the world, and so when my turn to answer him came, i got up and, leaning partly on phryne and partly on lais, who stood near me, i replied as follows, after speaking for a little while in attic, in the language of the country:
"'it is indeed with no ordinary satisfaction that i beg to thank you, o sophist, and you here present for the pleasant reception that you have given us. my lot has on the whole not been altogether bad. your studious men, it is true, affect to condemn me, my policy, and my private life. perhaps they will allow me to remark that the irregularity of my past morals is a matter of temptations. diogenes used to tell us that one of my sternest historian-critics in syracuse left his wife, children and house on being for once tempted by the chamber-maid of one of my passing caprices; and the historians of your race who so gravely decry a madame de montespan would, did madame only smile at them, incontinently fall into a fit of hopeless moral collapse.
"'but if your men write against me, irrespective of what they really feel about me, i am sure your women take a much more lenient view of the case.'
"(discreet applause.)
"'they feel that ambition did not eat up all the forces of my soul, and that in worshipping ares (mars), i never forgot the cult of aphrodite (venus) either. we hellenes ventured to be humans, and that is why now we have become demi-gods. you,[pg 112] my friends, do not even venture to be humans, and that is why you remain the little ones.
"'i notice in the northern countries of europe men do not, or to a very small degree care for women. perhaps that is the reason why the roman catholic idea of the holy virgin has had no lasting hold on these nations.
"'i have seen,' continued alcibiades, 'too many faces, masks, and pretences to be much impressed by the apparent indifference of the northerner to the charms of women. it never meant more than either an unavowed inclination towards his own sex, or sheer boorishness. even we hellenes had very much to suffer from our political and social neglect of women outside emancipated ones. the romans acted much more wisely in that respect; while the nation of our hostess has practically become what we called a gyn?cocracy or women's rule, where man is socially what our greek women used to be: relegated to the background. i hear, this is the privilege of englishmen. i understand. when i was young i learnt but too much about that privilege.
"'but if i should be asked for advice i would tell your men to take your women much more seriously. i know that englishmen are much more grave than serious; yet with regard to women they ought to be much more intent on considering them in everything their mates, and in several things their superiors. of course, this is an unmilitary nation; and such nations will always remain boors in sunday dress.
"'one of your great writers who, being outside the academic clique, has always been maligned by the officials, has written a beautiful essay on the[pg 113] influence of women. poor buckle—he treated the problem as a schoolroom paper. he came to the result that women encourage the deductive mode of thinking. however, women are more seductive than deductive, and their real influence is to charm the young, to warm the mature, and not to alarm the old.
"'i, being now above the changes of time, i only, contemplate their charm. and what greater potentialities of charm could one wish for than those that your women possess? if those magnificently cut and superbly coloured eyes learned to be expressive; if the muscles of those fine cheeks knew how to move with speedier grace; if that purely outlined mouth were more animated—what possibilities of fascination, like so many fairies, might rise over the dispassionate surface of those silent lakes! as they are, their several organs are positively hostile, or coldly indifferent to one another. the forehead, instead of being the ever-changing capital of the human column, setting off their beautiful hair, as ivory sets off gold; the shoulders, the seat of human grace, instead of giving to the head the pedestal of the charites; and the arms and hands, instead of giving by their movements the proper lilt and cadence to everything said or done;—all these hate one another respectively. the arms do not converse with the face; theirs is like other conversations: after a few remarks on the weather all communication stops. so sullen is the antipathy of the arms, that as a rule they hide on the back, as if begrudging the face or the bust their company. it is in that way that english women who might be as beautiful and charming as the maidens of thebes or of[pg 114] tanagra, have made themselves into walking caryatides, whom we invariably represented as doing a slavish labour, with their arms on their backs, and with a heavy load on their heads.
"'remove the arms, o women of england, from your badly swung back and bring them into play in front of your well-shaped bust and your beautiful faces! let the consciousness of your power electrify your looks, your dimples, and your gait; and when from musing graces you will have changed into graceful muses, your men too will be much superior to what they used to be.
"'see how little your influence is, as your language clearly indicates. is not your language the only idiom in europe that has completely dropped that fine shade of sweet intimacy which the use of thou and thy is giving to the other languages? is not a new world of tenderest internal joy permeating the french, german or italian woman who for the first time dares to tutoyer her lover? you women of england, the natural priestesses of all warmth and intimacy, you have suffered all that to decay.
"'to your men we hellenes say: "imitate us!" to you women, we do not say so. we ask you to exceed us, to go beyond us, and then alone when women will be what we hellenic men were, that is, specimens of all-round humanity, then indeed you too will rise to the higher status, and the golden age will again fill the world with light and happiness!'
"after that speech of mine," continued alcibiades, "there was much applause. i mingled with the public, and was at once interpellated by one of the american ladies present:
"'most interesting speech,' she said. 'what i[pg 115] especially liked were your remarks about thou-ing. and what i want to know most is whether caryatides were thou-ing one another?'
"i was a little perplexed, and all that i could answer was: 'their dimples did,' and this seemed to satisfy my american lady marvellously well.
"another lady asked me how many muses we had, and on hearing that their number was nine, she was highly astonished. 'only nine? why in london there are mews in every second street. how strange!'
"a third lady asked me what i meant by shoulders being a pedestal. her shoulders, she was sure, were no pedestals, and she would not allow anyone to stand on them. she added, that she was aware of my having said that the shoulders were the pedestal of the charites, but with her best intention she could not allow even charity to be extended to her shoulders. i smiled consent.
"a fourth lady, whose name was valley, but who was a mountain of otherwise rosy flesh, asked me what i had meant by maidens of podagra? she was sure that young maids never suffered from that ugly disease. i told her that i really meant chiragra. this satisfied her marvellously well.
"during that time phryne and lais were the heroines of the evening, lionised by women, and courted by men. the women asked them all sorts of questions and seemed extraordinarily eager to be instructed. one of them, a brilliant duchess—(who had three secretaries providing her with the latest information about everything, the first preparing all the catch-words from a to g, the second from h to n, and the third from o to z)—asked phryne[pg 116] whether she would not permit her to convince herself of the accuracy of the estimate in which hyperides held the exquisite form of phryne's bosom. (a middle-class woman thereupon asked mr gox, m.p., what hyperides meant. mr gox told her it was the greek for rufus, son of abraham.) phryne volunteered to do so at once, and the women disappeared in a special room, from where very soon cries of amazement could be heard. the pure beauty of phryne enchanted the women. the sensation was immense, ay immensest.
"the representative of the daily nail offered first ￡2000, then ￡3000, finally ￡5000 for permission to kodak phryne.
"the bad times at once prepared a folio edition of the engravers' engravings, payable in 263 instalments, or preferably at once.
"the daily marconigraph started a public discussion in its columns: 'shall the lower part of the upper anatomy of the female trunk be unveiled?'
"the excitement became so universal that mr gigerl see at once convened a national meeting for the erection of ten new statues to shakespeare; and general booth ordered an absolute fast of 105 hours' duration.
"all the directors of music halls, the next day, stormed hotel ritz where phryne had a suite of six lovely rooms, and offered impossible prices for a performance of five minutes. phryne, after consulting me, consented to appear at the palace theatre, in the immortal scene when, in presence of the entire population of athens, she descended into the sea. half of the proceeds were to be given to a fund for poor women in childbed. endless advertisements[pg 117] soon filled every available space on london's walls, parks, newspapers, 'buses, railways, and shops. tickets sold at tenfold their original prices.
"at last the evening came. in the first two rows there were practically nothing but clergymen. the following rows were filled with lawyers, m.p.'s and university professors. in the boxes one could see all the aristocracy of the country. when phryne's turn came, the orchestra played wagner's 'pilgrim's chorus,' toward the end of which the curtain rolled up, and the scene represented the pir?us with apparently countless people, all in greek dress. when the expectation was at its height, phryne appeared clad only with the veil of her perfect beauty, and descended into the sea. before she entered the water she said her prayers to aphrodite, and then slowly went into the waves.
"everyone in the audience had come to the theatre expecting to be badly shocked. to their utmost astonishment they found that there was not only nothing shocking in the scene, but even much to fill the people with awe. like all the barbarians, the little ones deem nudity a shocking sight. what shocked them that night was the fact that they were not shocked. they felt for a moment that many of their notions and views must be radically wrong, and that was the only shock they received. phryne triumphed over londoners, as she did over the athenians.
"my american lady friend was in raptures. the incredible sensation her elki and his athenian women had caused in blasé london society made her the centre of all social centres for a fortnight. she received innumerable letters from innumerable[pg 118] people. the greatest writers that the world has ever seen, such as miss cora morelli, wrote to her saying, that:
"'she had from her infancy onward taken a deep interest in alcibiades and his time, and that now, having actually seen him, she would forthwith publish a novel under the attractive title of "the mighty elki," let alone another novel, full of the most delightful shivers, called "phry, the pagan."'
"mr hall caine, in a thundering article, fulminated against the row made over phryne, and solemnly declared that the charms of his manxman were incomparably greater. one day mr caine called on me. he implored me to become a christian, and assured me that the shortest way to that effect would be to attend a performance of his piece of that name. i thanked him for his kind offer, but politely declined it. whereupon mr caine remained musing, until at last he surprised me with the question: 'mr alcib, you are the man to solve the problem of my life. do you not think i bear a remarkable resemblance to lord bacon?'
"i answered that i could discern no resemblance between him and the witty chancellor, but that i was bound to confess that there was a striking resemblance between him and shakespeare.
"mr caine smiled a superior smile. 'i wonder,' he said, 'you are not aware of the fact that shakespeare was written by lord bacon.'
"'very strange—very strange,' i replied. 'we in olympus think that shakespeare was written by the victory over the armada, and published by elizabeth and co.'
"'do you really think such stuff in olympus?'[pg 119] exclaimed mr caine; 'then i do not wonder that i have never been invited to that place. what has the armada to do with hamlet or king lear? you might just as well say that my novels were written by our victory at colenso and spion kop. it is revoltingly absurd. a book is a book and not shrapnel or bombs. sir, i am ashamed of you; the purple of red indignation rises swellingly into my distended physiognomy, and my thought-fraught forehead sinks under the ignominy of such life-bereft incoherences!'
"i advised mr caine to drink perrier; he thanked me profusely, and assured me that he had always done so. he evidently mixed it up with the pierian sources of literature which, i learn, provide the innumerable papers of the associated press with the necessary water under the name of perrier.
"in my honour my american lady friend gave, a few days later, a concert. the little ones call a concert a series of instrumental and vocal pieces played for sheer amusement, and without any relation to poetry, dance, or religion. i have these three to four hundred years accustomed myself to their music, which is thoroughly different from ours, being polyphonous, whereas ours was never so. dionysus, who presides at their music, has often told us that he introduced it into the modern world in order to show his exceeding power even in times when the men and women have lamentably fallen from the height of[pg 120] our grecian culture. our music was essentially apollinic; that of the moderns is dionysiac. you remember, o zeus, that even apollo was moved when three of the moderns had the honour to perform before him. even he praised mozart, chopin, and some pieces of weber. you need not blush, frédéric, and you might help me to entertain and charm our holy circle by playing us one of your compositions in which beauty of form is married in tender love to truth of feeling."
thereupon, at a sign of zeus, milo of crotona, the olympian victor of all victors, carried a piano on his mighty back, and put it down gently in one of the mystic barks. chopin, bowing to the gods, and more particularly to juno and diana, sat down to the instrument and played the second and the third movement of his e minor concerto. round him waved the three graces, while dionysus laid an ivy wreath on his blessed head. even the gods were moved, and when frédéric had ended, they applauded him with passionate admiration.
"i wish, o chopin," continued alcibiades, "i had known you in my mortal time. what terpander and thaletas, the great musicians, did for sparta, you might have helped me to do for athens. it was not to be. the thought saddens me still. more than sophocles and aristophanes or socrates, your incomparable music would have helped to keep the kosmos of athens in due proportions."
a short pause ensued, and all looked with timidity on zeus' immovable face.
"but let us drop these sorrowful reminiscences and return to the london concert given by my american hostess.
[pg 121]
"she had engaged the best-known artists. for the solo songs she engaged a woman who had to be carried into the room in a motor chair, and was not allowed to stand up, before three architects had examined the solidity of the floor. her range was from the deep p to the high l. she sang baritone, and soprano at the same time, and what her tone wanted in width her taille amply replaced. she sang nothing but wagner, whose music, it would appear, is written for two-ton women only. no smaller tonnage need apply. while she sang, three dozen violins executed the tremolos of five hundred whimpering children, while forty counter-basses gave, every three minutes, a terrible grunt in x minor. there were also fifteen fifes, and twenty-one different kinds of brass instruments, some of which had necks much longer than that of the oldest giraffe. the music was decidedly sensual and nerve-irritating. it was full of chords, both accords and discords, and what little melody there was in it was kneaded out into a tapeworm of prodigious length and such hydralike vitality, that no matter how frequently the strings throttled off its head, it yet constantly recurred bulging out a new head.
"the men present liked the singer; the women adored the music. it gave them all sorts of shivers, and although they did not understand it at all, they yet felt that here was a new shiver. or as one of them, the bright mrs blazing, remarked: 'quel artiste que ce m. wagner! he has translated into music the grating noise of a comb on silk, the creaking of a rusty key in an old lock, and the strident rasp of a skidding sleigh or motor on hard-frozen snow.'
[pg 122]
"the next artist was a belgian violinist. for reasons that you alone, o zeus, could tell us, the belgians are credited with a special gift for pulling strings in general, and those of the violin in particular. being a nation midway between the germans and the french, they are believed to possess much of german musical talent and something of french elegance. this would easily make them good 'cello players. but not satisfied with the 'cello, in which they have excelled more than one nation, they must needs be great violinists too. however, the violin, while not at all the king of instruments, is yet the most vindictive and jealous amongst them. it is like the lorelei: it allures hundreds, only to dash their bones against the rock of failure. it wants the delicacy of a woman and the strength of a man. it requires the soul of spring and the heart of summer to play it well.
"a belgian is eo ipso debarred from reaching the height of violin-playing; just as a chinaman, with his over-specialised mind, can never well play the orchestral piano. a belgian heart is moving in a colourless and slouching andante; the violin moves in a profoundly agitated adagio or allegro. the violin is the instrument of luckless nations, such as were formerly the italians, the poles, and the hungarians who gave us paganini, wienavski and joachim. the belgians have nearly always enjoyed the embonpoint of fat prosperity. 'leur jeu bedonne,' as mrs blazing would say.
"the belgian played your chaconne in d minor, o bach."
at these words of alcibiades all the thinkers and poets present rose from their seats and bowed to[pg 123] john sebastian, who stood near strabo and aristotle, being exceedingly fond of geographical lore. even the gods applauded and polyhymnia allowed him to kiss her hands.
"you remember, o john sebastian, when i met you near lützen at one of your solitary walks and you spoke to me of your chaconne. i listened with rapt attention and told you that your composition, which you then played to me on a violin which the old inn-keeper lent you and which had just arrived from steiner in tyrol, rendered as perfectly as possible the sentiments i had felt when for the first time in my life i went to the oracle at dodona, where the winds rush through the high oak-trees with a fierce power such as can be heard in no other spot in europe. i re-imagined my awe-struck meditations in the holy grove; i heard the stormy music of zeus' winds in zeus' trees; i again felt all through me the soul-moving chorus of the priests which ends in a jubilating mood, and finally i left with deep regret at having to re-enter my life of stress after having spent a day in sacred and mystic seclusion.
"when the belgian artist played it, i listened in vain for dodona. what i heard was the rustling of silken tones through the wood of the chairs and tables at the carlton. where was the oracle? where the chorus of the priests? where their jubilation? the only thing that i found were my regrets. but the public was charmed. it is imperative to admire the chaconne, chiefly because it is played violin solo. mrs blazing explained the matter to me with her wonted rapidity of mind: 'why wonder at our admiration of the chaconne? do we not say: "chacun à son go?t?"'
[pg 124]
"the next artist was a pianist, whose name sounded like pianowolsky or forterewsky. he was of course a pole. the english have long found out that -welsky or -ewsky goes with the name of a great pianist, as the pedal goes with the piano. it was for this reason that liszt, the orpheus of the last century, never had any success in england. he ought to have called himself franzescowitch lisztobulszky, and then, no doubt, he would have scored heavily. rubinstein had indeed much success in england, but it is patent that most english took his official name as a mere abbreviation of ruben ishnajewich stonehammercrushowsky. the english taste in music is remarkable; it is somewhat like their taste in fruit. they prefer hothouse grapes to natural ones. in the same way they prefer the piano music of mendelmeier, called bartholdy, to that of stephen heller or volkmann. what they more particularly like are the 'songs without words' of that composer, which in reality are words without songs. his piano music is nothing but congealed respectability, or frozen shockingitis."
aristoxenus, interrupting alcibiades, exclaimed: "do not, o son of clinias, forget the man's marvellous compositions for the violin as well as for the orchestra. diana frequently commands his midsummer night's dream when she dwells with her nymphs in the mystic forest near farnham common, where bartholdy composed it under the trees of canute."
"you are quite right, o master of all harmony, and i want to speak only of his piano music. the pianist at the concert had a very fine profile and beautiful hair. this helped him very much in a country where the sense of stylishness is exceedingly[pg 125] acute. a coachman must have a broad back; a pianist, a fine profile; a violinist, long legs; a 'cellist, beautiful hands; and a lady singer, a vast promontory. once these indispensable qualities are given, his or her music is practically a matter of indifference.
"the pianist then performing played well, as long as he played forte and staccato; but he had neither a legato nor, what was fatal, a piano, let alone a pianissimo. fortunately his sense of rhythm was very well developed; otherwise he did not rise above a first prizeman of a conservatory.
"he played a transcription or two by liszt. this the english condemn; it appears unlegitimate to them. to please them, one must play one of the last sonatas of beethoven, preferably those composed after his death, that is, those that the man wrote when he had long lost the power of moulding his ideas in the cast of a sonata, and when his vitality had been ebbing away for years. a transcription stands to the original as does an engraving of an oil-colour picture or a statue to its original. most people will enjoy a fine engraving of the transfiguration or of our lady of milo much more readily than they would the original; just as i now know that you gave us, o zeus, great artists like scopas, praxiteles, lionardo, or domenichino, because we could not bear, nor comprehend the sight of the originals of their divine art, as long as we still move in our mortal coil. the transcription of some of the ideas of mozart's don juan by liszt is the best and most illuminating commentary on that incomparable opera.
"more interesting than the play were the remarks which i overheard from among the public. the men dwelt exclusively on the big sums of money the pianist[pg 126] made by his 1526 recitals in 2000 towns of the united states. the profits they credited him with ranged from ￡15,000 to ￡100,000. a viennese banker present drily remarked that he wished he could play the difference between the real and the imagined profits of the virtuoso on a fine erard piano. the women made quite different remarks. said one:
"'herr pianoforterewsky has been painted by royalty.'
"'is that so?' said her neighbour. 'what an interesting face! i wish i could procure a photo of the picture.'
"'do you know,' said a third, 'that herr pinaforewsky practises twenty-three hours a day? i know it on the best authority; his tuner told me so.'
"'which tuner? herr pinacothekowsky, my dear, has three tuners: one for the high notes, the second for the middle ones, and the third for the low notes.'
"'how interesting! but suppose one of the tuners falls ill. what does he do then?'
"'why, it's simple enough. in that case he only plays pieces requiring two of the three ranges of notes.'
"'how intensely interesting! but pray, if you do not take it amiss, my dear, i learnt that herr pedalewsky has only two tuners: one for the black keys, the other for the white ones.'
"'my dear, that was so in bygone times when he played sometimes a whole concert on the black keys alone, being 231 variations on chopin's etude on the black keys. but it made such a sad impression that some nasty critics said his piano was in mourning[pg 127] black; other critics said that he was paid to do so by mr jay of regent street.'
"'how excruciatingly interesting! do you know, my dear, i was told that herr polonorusky plays practically all the time, and even when he travels he carries with him a dumb piano on which he practises incessantly.'
"'how touching! i have heard that too, and believed it, until that atrocious man who writes for the bad times destroyed all my illusions. he said that if herr pantyrewsky did that, he would for ever spoil his touch. just fancy that! it is not the touch, but the pose of that languid, chopinesque profile over a dumb piano in a rattling car that was so interesting. and now that horrid journalist spoils it all. nay, he added that the whole story was deliberately invented by the artist's manager.'
"'how distressingly interesting! you know, my dear, i will not believe the story about the manager. i know too much about the wonderful pianist. i have learnt at marienbad that he had ten teachers at a time, one for each of his fingers, and that for five years he lived in a tiny village in bavaria, because, don't you see, it was so central for the ten different cities where his teachers lived. for the thumb he rushed off to frankfort on the maine. there is no town like frankfort for the study of the thumb. that's why they make such excellent sausages there which resemble a thumb to perfection. for the index he went to rome. and so forth and so on. it is most marvellous.'
"all during that time," alcibiades continued, "the pianist was playing the moonlight sonata of beethoven. at the end of the piece, the ladies who[pg 128] had carried on the lively conversation applauded wildly. 'was it not marvellous?' said one to the other. 'oh—delightful!' was the answer.
"so ended the concert. on leaving my seat i met mrs blazing.
"'o mon cher,' she said, 'why do all these women pretend to enjoy music? they very well know that not one of them cares for it in the least. i frankly admit that music to me is the anarchy of air, the french revolution of sounds, acoustic bankruptcy. all our lives we have been taught to suppress our emotions, and to consider it ungenteel to express them in any way whatever. we were told that we must hide and suppress them—which we have done so successfully that after some time we resemble to a nicety the famous safe of madame humbert. and then, in flagrant contradiction to all this genteel education, we are supposed to accept with joy the moanings, cries, sobs, sighs, and other unsuppressed emotions of some middle-class dutchman or teuton dished up to us in the form of a sonata. it is too absurd for words.
"'if that lower-middle-class dutchman beethoven (or as my cynthia calls him: "bête au vent") wants to exhale his moral distress and sentimental indigestion, let him do so by all means, but in a lonely room. why does he interfere with the even tenor of our well-varnished life? if my charming japanese china figures, or my pretty girls and shepherds in vieux saxe suddenly began to roar out their sentiments, i should have them destroyed or sold without any further ado. why should i accept such roarings from an ugly, beer-drinking, unmannered teuton? why, i ask you?'
[pg 129]
"'music is the art of poor nations and poor classes. outside a few jews, no great musician came from among the rich classes; and jews are socially impoverished. i can understand the attraction of ditties nursed in the music halls. they fan one with a gentle breeze of light tones, and here and there tickle a nerve or two. but what on earth shall we do with such plesiosauri as the monsters they call symphonies, in which fifty or sixty instruments go amuck in fifty different ways? the flute tries to serpentine round the bassoon in order to instil in it drops of deadly poison; the violins gallop recklessly à la mazeppa against and over the violas and 'celli, while the brass darts forth glowing bombs falling with cruelty into the finest flower-beds of oboes and harps. it is simply the hoax of the century. would you at athens ever have endured such a pandemonium?'
"'you are quite right, ma très charmante dame,' i said, 'we never had such music and we should have little cared for it. our way of making symphonies was to write epics, crowded with persons, divine and human, and with events and incidents of all colours and shades. the continental nations have lost the epic creativeness proper, and must therefore write epics in sound. just as your languages do not allow you to write very strictly metred poetry such as we have written without impairing the fire and glamour of poetry, and the only way left for you of imitating the severe metres of archilochus, alc?us or sappho is in the form of musical canons, fugues, or other counterpointed music. it seems to me that you english have not done much by way of music epics, because, like ourselves, you were busily engaged in writing epics of quite a different kind: the epic of[pg 130] your empire. the nations that have written musical epics, did do so at a time when these were the only epics they could write,—the symphony of empire being refused them.'
"'i see,' said mrs blazing. 'you mean to say that our mozarts and beethovens are lord chatham, clive, nelson and wellington?'
"'in a manner, yes. few nations, if any, can excel both in arts and in empire-making, and had you english been able to hold in your imperial power considerable parts of europe, say, of france, germany or spain, you would never have had either walter scott or byron, shelley or tennyson. for the efforts required to conquer and hold european territory would have taxed all your strength so severely that no resources would have been left for conquests in the realm of the arts and literature.
"'this is why the romans, who conquered, not coloured races, but the mightiest white nations, could never write either great epics or great dramas. they wrote only one epic, one drama of first and to this day unparalleled magnitude: the roman empire. i meant to do a similar thing for athens, but i failed. i now know why. my real enemies were not in the camp of my political adversaries, but in the theatre of dionysus and in the schools of the philosophers. do not, therefore, ma chère amie, begrudge the germans their great musicians. they are really very great, and not even your greatest minds surpass, perhaps do not even equal them. your consolation may be in this, that the germans too will soon cease writing music worth the hearing. they now want to write quite different epics. and no nation can write two sorts of epics at a time.'
[pg 131]
"'i am so glad to hear you say so,' said mrs blazing. 'it relieves me of a corvée that i hitherto considered to be a patriotic duty. i mean, i will henceforth never attend the representations of the new school of soi-disant english music. inwardly i never liked it; it always appeared to me like an englishwoman who tries to imitate the grace and verve of a parisian woman, with all her easy gestures, vivacious conversation, and delicate coquetry. it will not do.
"'we english women do not shine in movement; our sphere is repose. we may be troublesome, but never troublante.
"'even so is english academic music. and i now see why it must be so. it is not in us, because another force takes its place. like all people we like to shine in that wherein we are most deficient, and the other day i was present at a scene that could hardly be more painful. at the house of a rich and highly distinguished city man i met the famous sir somebody hangar, the composer. the question arose who was the greatest musician? thereupon sir somebody, looking up to the beautiful ceiling of the room, exclaimed dreamily: "music is of very recent origin...." one of the gentlemen present then asked sir somebody whether he had ever heard the reply given to that question by the great gounod? sir somebody contemptuously uttered: "gounod? it is not worth hearing." i was indignant, and pointedly asked the gentleman to tell us gounod's reply. the gentleman, looking at sir somebody with a curious smile, related:
"'gounod, on being asked who in his opinion was the greatest musician, said: "when i was a boy of twenty, i said: moi. ten years later i said: moi et[pg 132] mozart. again ten years later i said: mozart et moi. and now i say: mozart."'
"this reply," said alcibiades, "has attic perfume in it. having suffered so much, as i have, at the hands of musicians in my time, when dramatic writers were as much musicians as dramatists, i have in my olympian leisure carefully inquired into the real causes of the rise of modern music.
"'you said a few moments ago, ma très spirituelle dame, that music is the art of poor classes. there is this much truth in that, that modern music has indeed been almost entirely in the hands of middle-class people. this being so, everything depends on the nature and dispositions of the middle class in a given country. in england, for instance, the middle class is totally different from that of france or that of south germany, the home of german music. the english middle class is cold, dry, gaffeur to the extreme, afflicted with a veritable rage for outward respectability, unsufferably formalist, and deeply convinced of its social inferiority. in such a class nothing remotely resembling german or french music can ever possibly arise. such a class furnishes excellent business men, and reliable sergeants to the officers of imperial work. but music can no more grow out of it than can a rose out of a poker.
"'this middle class is the result of british imperialism, and this is how imperialism has prevented and will, as long as it lasts, always prevent the rise of really fine music in the higher sense of the term. this is also why we hellenes never achieved greater results in music. like the english, or the americans, we never had a real bourgeoisie, or the only possible foster-earth of great music. however, bourgeoisie[pg 133] is only a historic phenomenon, one that is destined to disappear, and with it will disappear all music. mr richard strauss is singing its dirge.'"
when alcibiades had finished his entertaining tale of women and music in england, the gods and heroes congratulated him warmly, and zeus ordered that, under the direction of mozart, all the nymphs and goddesses of the forests and seas shall sing one of the motets of bach. this they did, and all venice was filled with the magic songs, which were as pure as those produced by the nymph echo in the baptistry at pisa. all the palaces and the churches of venice seemed to listen with melancholy pleasure, and st mark's hesitated to sound the hour lest the spell should be broken. when the motet was ended, the gods and heroes rose and disappeared in the heavens.
