The Adventures of Gil Blas of Santillane, Alain René le Sage [most read books .txt] 📗

>tennis-court. I found him at play, and saw that he won; for he

was not one of those impenetrable gamesters who make or mar a

fortune without moving a muscle. In prosperity he was flippant

and overbearing, but quite peevish on the losing side. He left

the tennis-court in high spirits, and went for the Prince’s

Theatre. I followed him to the boxdoor, then putting a ducat into

my hand— Here, Gil Blas, said he, as I have been a winner to-day, you shall not be the worse for it; go, divert yourself with

your friends, and come to me about midnight at Arsenia’s, where I

am to sup with Don Alexo Segiar. He then went in, and I stood

debating with whom I should disburse my ducat, according to the

pious will of the founder. I did not muse long. Clarin, Don

Alexo’s servant, just then came in my way. I took him to the next

tavern, and we amused ourselves there till midnight. Thence we

repaired to Arsenia’s house, where Clarin had orders to attend. A

little footboy opened the door, and showed us into a room down-stairs, where Arsenia’s waiting-woman, and the lady who held the

same office about Florimonde, were laughing ready to split their

sides, while their mistresses were above-stairs with our masters.

 

The addition of two jolly fellows just come from a good supper,

could not be unwelcome to abigails, and to the abigails of

actresses too; but what was my astonishment when in one of these

lowly ladies I discovered my widow, my adorable widow, whom I

took for a countess or a marchioness! She appeared equally amazed

to see her dear Don Caesar de Ribera metamorphosed into the valet

of a beau. However, we looked at one another without being out of

countenance; indeed, such a tingling sensation of laughter came

over us both, as we could not help indulging in. After which

Laura, for that was her name, drawing me aside while Clarin was

speaking to her fellow-servant, held out her hand to me very

kindly, and said in a low voice — Accept this pledge, Signor Don

Caesar; mutual congratulations are more to the purpose than

mutual reproaches, my friend. You topped your part to perfection,

and I was not quite contemptible in mine. What say you? confess

now, did not you take me for one of those precious peeresses who

are fond of a little smuggled amusement? It is even so, answered

I, but whoever you are, my empress, I have not changed my

sentiments with my paraphernalia. Accept my services in good

part, and let the valet-de-chambre of Don Matthias consummate

what Don Caesar has so happily begun. Get you gone, replied she,

I like you ten times better in your natural than in your

artificial character. You are as a man what I am as a woman, and

that is the greatest compliment I can pay you. You are admitted

into the number of my adorers. We have no longer any need of the

old woman as a blind, you may come and see me whenever you like.

We theatrical ladies are no slaves to form, but live higgledy-piggledy with the men. I allow that the effects are sometimes

visible, but the public wink hard at our irregularities; the

drama’s patrons, as you well know, give the drama’s laws, and

absolve us from all others.

 

We went no further, because there were bystanders. The

conversation be came general, lively, jovial, inclining to loose

jokes, not very carefully wrapped up. We all of us bore a bob.

Arsenia’s attendant above all, my amiable Laura, was very

conspicuous; but her wit was so extremely nimble, that her virtue

could never overtake it. Our masters and the actresses on the

floor above, raised incessant peals of laughter, which reached us

in the regions below; and probably the entertainment was much

alike with the celestials and the infernals. If all the knowing

remarks had been written down, which escaped from the

philosophers that night assembled at Arsenia’s, I really think it

would have been a manual for the rising generation. Yet we could

not arrest the chaste moon in her progress; the rising of that

blab, the sun, parted us. Clarin followed the heels of Don Alexo,

and I went home with Don Matthias.

 

CH. VI. — The Prince’s company of comedians.

 

My master getting up the next day, received a note from Don Alexo

Segiar, desiring his company immediately. We went, and found

there the Marquis de Zenette, and another young nobleman of

prepossessing manners, whom I had never seen. Don Matthias, said

Segiar to my protector, introducing the stranger, give me leave

to present Don Pompeyo de Castro, a relation of mine. He has been

at the court of Portugal almost from his childhood. He reached

Madrid last night, and returns to Lisbon to-morrow. He can allow

me only one day. I wish to make the most of the precious moments,

and thought of asking you and the Marquis de Zenette to make out

the time agreeably. Thereupon my master and Don Alexo’s relation

embraced heartily, and complimented one an other in the most

extravagant manner. I was much pleased with Don Pompeyo’s

conversation, it showed both acuteness and solidity.

 

They dined with Segiar; and the gentlemen, after the dessert,

amused themselves at play till the theatre opened. Then they went

all together to the Prince’s House, to see a new tragedy, called

The Queen of Carthage. At the end of the piece they returned to

supper, and their conversation ran first on the composition, then

upon the actors. As for the work, cried Don Matthias, I think

very lightly of it. Eneas is a more pious blockhead there than in

the Eneid. But it must be owned that the piece was played

divinely. What does Signor Don Pompeyo think of it? He does not

seem to agree with me. Gentlemen, said the illustrious stranger

with a smile, you are so enraptured with your actors, and still

more with your actresses, that I scarcely dare avow my dissent.

That is very prudent, interrupted Don Alexo with a sneer, your

criticisms would be ill received. You should be tender of our

actresses before the trumpeters of their fame. We carouse with

them every day, we warrant them sound in their conceptions: we

would give vouchers for the justness of their expression if it

were necessary. No doubt of it, answered his kinsman, you would

do the same kind office by their lives and their manners, from

the same motives of companionable feeling.

 

Your ladies of the sock and buskin at Lisbon, said the Marquis de

Zenette, laughing, are doubtless far superior? They certainly

are, replied Don Pompeyo. They are some of them at least perfect

in their cast. And these, resumed the Marquis, would be warranted

by you in their conceptions and expressions? I have no personal

acquaintance with them, rejoined Don Pompeyo. I am not of their

revels, and can judge of their merit without partiality. Do you,

in good earnest, think your company first-rate? No, really, said

the Marquis, I think no such thing, and only plead the cause of a

few individuals. I give up all the rest. Will you not allow

extraordinary powers to the actress who played Dido? Did she not

personate that queen with the dignity, and at the same time with

all the bewitching charms, calculated to realize our idea of the

character? Could you help admiring the skill with which she

seizes on the passions of the spectator, and harmonizes their

tone to the vibrations she purposes to produce? She may be called

perfect in the exquisite art of declaiming. I agree with you,

said Don Pompeyo, that she can touch the string either of terror

or of pity: never did any actress come closer to the heart, and

the performance is altogether fine; but still she is not without

her defects. Two or three things disgusted me in her playing.

Would she denote surprise? she glances her eyes to and fro in a

most extravagant manner, altogether unbecoming her supposed

majesty as a princess. Add to this, that in swelling her voice,

which is of itself sound and mellifluous, she goes out of her

natural key, and assumes a harsh ranting tone. Besides, it would

seem as if she might be suspected in more than one passage, of

not very clearly comprehending her author. Yet I would in candour

rather suppose her wanting in diligence than capacity.

 

As far as I see, said Don Matthias to the critic, you will never

write complimentary odes to our actresses! Pardon me, answered

Don Pompeyo. I can discover high talent through all their

imperfections. I must say that I was enchanted with the

chambermaid in the interlude. What fine natural parts! With what

grace she treads the stage! Has she anything pointed to deliver?

she heightens it by an arch smile, with a keen glance and

sarcastic emphasis, which convey more to the understanding than

the words to the ear. It might be objected that she sometimes

gives too much scope to her animal spirits, and exceeds the

limits of allowable freedom, but that would be hypercritical.

There is one bad habit I should strongly advise her to correct.

Sometimes in the very crisis of the action, and in an affecting

passage, she bursts in all at once upon the interest with some

misplaced jest, to curry favour with the mob of barren

spectators. The pit, you will say, is caught by her artifice;

that may be well for her popularity, but not for their taste.

 

And what do you think of the men? interrupted the Marquis; you

must give them no quarter, since you have handled the women so

roughly. Not so, said Don Pompeyo. There are some promising young

actors, and I am particularly well pleased with that corpulent

performer who played the part of Dido’s prime minister. His

recitation is unaffected, and he declaims just as they do in

Portugal. If you can bear such a fellow as that, said Segiar, you

must be charmed with the representative of Eneas. Did not you

think him a great, an original performer? Very original, indeed,

answered the critic; his inflections are quite his own, they are

as shrill as an hautboy. Almost always out of nature, he rattles

the impressive words of the sentence off his tongue, while he

labours and lingers on the expletives; the poor conjunctions are

frightened at their own report as they go off. He entertained me

excessively, and especially when he was expressing in confidence

his distress at abandoning the princess; never was grief more

ludicrously depicted. Fair and softly, cousin, replied Don Alexo;

you will make us believe at last that good taste is not greatly

cultivated at the court of Portugal. Do you know that the actor

of whom we are speaking is esteemed a phenomenon? Did you not

observe what thunders of applause he called down? He cannot

therefore be contemptible. That therefore does not prove the

proposition, replied Don Pompeyo. But, gentlemen, let us lay

aside, I beseech you, the injudicious suffrages of the pit; they

are often given to performers very unseasonably. Indeed, their

boisterous tokens of approbation are more frequently bestowed on

paltry copies than on original merit, as Phedrus teaches us by an

ingenious fable. Allow me to repeat it as follows: — The whole

population of a city was assembled in a large square to see a

pantomime played. Among the performers there was one whose feats

were applauded every instant. This buffoon, at the end of the

entertainment, wished to close the scene with a new device. He

came alone upon the stage, stooping clown, covering his head with

his mantle, and began counterfeiting the squeak of a pig. He

acquitted himself so naturally as to be suspected of having the