PASSAGES IN THE LIFE OF A DUTCH POET.
The name of Wilhelm Bilderdyk is scarcely known beyond the boundaries of his own country; and yet those who are conversant with the Dutch language place him in a very high rank as a poet. The publication of his first poem, Elicus, formed quite an era in the history of Dutch literature. It was speedily followed by a faithful and spirited translation of the Œdipus of Sophocles, and versions of other Greek writers. Besides his imaginative pursuits, he engaged with ardor in the study of geology, and almost rivalled Cuvier in his acquaintance with natural history. War and invasion, however, interrupted the labors of Bilderdyk. He quitted Holland, travelled through Germany, crossed over to England, and finally spent some time amongst the Scottish Highlands, where he employed himself in translating Ossian's poems into Dutch verse. He then went to the principality of Brunswick, and there composed a very extraordinary work, The Maladies of Wise Men, a poem whose mild, lofty sublimity, unearthly interest, and grasp of gloomy thought, entitle it to rank with the Inferno of Dante.
Bilderdyk at length was able to return to his country. Louis Napoleon, who then reigned at the Hague, chose him as his instructor in the Dutch language, and named him president of the second class in the Institute of Amsterdam. About this time he married a beautiful and clever girl, named Wilhelmina; and for several years they enjoyed together as perfect happiness as this world can give—she occupied in domestic and maternal duties, and he adding to his fame and fortune by the publication of several works. But at length death visited their dwelling, and removed within a brief space three lovely children. Their loss was commemorated in two poems—Winter Flowers, and The Farewell. Not long afterwards, public misfortune came to aggravate his private sorrows. Louis Napoleon left Holland, and Bilderdyk took refuge at Groningen, where he stayed for some time, and then, rejecting a liberal offer of employment made him by William of Orange, he set out for France, accompanied by his wife.
When they entered the diligence, they found it occupied but by one person, a young female of mild and engaging appearance. No sooner did the heavy machine begin to move than she began to scream, and testified the most absurd degree of terror. Public carriages then were certainly far inferior, both in safety and accommodation, to those of modern times; yet the probable amount of danger to be apprehended did not by any means justify the excessive apprehension manifested by the fair traveller. On arriving at Brussels, the lady was so much overcome that she announced her intention of stopping some days in that city to recruit her strength before venturing again to encounter the perils of a diligence; and taking leave of Bilderdyk and his wife, she gratefully thanked the latter for the kind attention she had shown her during the journey. The two Hollanders proceeded on their way to Paris, laughing heartily from time to time at the foolish cowardice of a woman who saw a precipice in every rut, and a certain overturn in every jolt of the wheels.
Arrived at their journey's end, the travellers took up their abode in a humble dwelling in the Rue Richelieu, and commenced with the utmost delight visiting all the wonderful things in Paris. Bilderdyk soon found himself completely in his element. He breakfasted with Cuvier at the Jardin des Plantes, passed his afternoon at the Bibliothèque Richelieu, dined in the Faubourg St. Germain with Dr. Alibert, and finished the evening at the play or the opera. One day he and his wife were given excellent places for witnessing the ascent in a balloon of a young woman, Mme. Blanchard, whose reckless courage enabled her to undertake aërial voyages, despite the sad fate which befell Pilastre de Rosiers, her own husband, and several other aëronauts. Our Hollanders amused themselves for some time with watching the process of inflating the balloon, and following with their eyes the course of the tiny messenger-balloons sent up to ascertain the direction of the upper currents of wind. At length all is ready, the band strikes up a lively air, and Mme. Blanchard, dressed in white and crowned with roses, appears, holding a small gay flag in her hand. With the most graceful composure she placed herself in the boat, the cords were loosed, and the courageous adventuress, borne rapidly upwards in her perilous vehicle, soon appeared like a dark spot in the sky.
When he returned to his lodging, Bilderdyk composed a poem in honor of the brave woman who adventured her life so boldly, rivalling the free birds of heaven in her flight, and beholding the stars face to face. Next morning he hastened to get his production printed, and without considering that Mme. Blanchard most likely did not understand Dutch, he repaired to her lodgings with a copy of the poem in his hand, intending to ask permission to present it to her. He was courteously invited to enter the drawing-room, and there, to his great amazement, he found himself tête-à-tête with the silly, frightened lady, whose nervous tremors in the Brussels diligence had afforded so much amusement to him and his wife. Surprised and disconcerted, he was beginning to apologize, when the lady interrupted him.
"Monsieur," she said, "you are not mistaken. I am Mme. Blanchard. You see how possible it is for the same person to be cowardly in a coach, and courageous in a balloon."
A good deal of conversation ensued, the poem was timidly offered, and graciously accepted; and the fair aëronaut accepted an invitation to dine that day with Bilderdyk and his wife. In the course of the evening Mme. Blanchard related to them some curious circumstances in her life. Her mother kept a humble wayside inn near La Rochelle, while her father worked in the fields. One day a balloon descended near their door, and out of it was taken a man, severely but not dangerously bruised. Her parents received him with the utmost hospitality, and supplied him with all the comforts they could give. He had no money wherewith to repay them, but as he was about to depart, he remarked that the mistress of the house was very near her confinement, and he said: "Listen, and mark my words. Fortune cannot always desert me. In sixteen years, if alive, I will return hither. If the child who will soon be born to you should be a boy, I will then adopt him; if a girl, I will marry her!"
The worthy peasants laughed heartily at this strange method of paying a bill; and although they allowed their guest to depart, they certainly built very little on his promise. The aëronaut, however, kept his word, and at the end of sixteen years re-appeared at the inn, then inhabited by only a fair young girl, very lately left an orphan. She willingly accepted Jean Pierre Blanchard as a husband, and for a short time they lived happily together; but during an ascent which he made in Holland, he was seized with apoplexy, and fell to the ground from a height of sixty feet. The unhappy aëronaut was not killed on the spot, but lingered for some time in frightful torture, carefully and fondly attended by his wife, whom at length he left a young and penniless widow.
Marie Madeleine Blanchard, despite her natural timidity, resolved to adopt her husband's perilous profession. Pride and necessity combined do wonders; and not only did she succeed in maintaining perfect composure while in the air, but she also displayed wonderful presence of mind during the time of danger. On one occasion she ascended in her balloon from Nantes, intending to come down at about four leagues from that town, in what she believed to be a large meadow. While rapidly descending, the cordage of the balloon became entangled in the branches of a tree, and she found herself suspended over a vast green marsh, whose treacherous mud would infallibly ingulf her. Drawn to the spot by her cries, several peasants came to her assistance, and with considerable difficulty and danger succeeded in placing her on terra firma.
On the day following the one on which she dined with M. and Mme. Bilderdyk, Mme. Blanchard left Paris, promising her two friends, as she bade them farewell, that she would soon return. Time passed on, however, and they heard nothing of her. They were preparing to return to Holland, when some of Bilderdyk's countrymen residing in Paris resolved to give him a banquet on the eve of his departure.
The entertainment took place at a celebrated restaurant, situated at the angle formed by the Rue Cauchat and the Rue de Provence. While enjoying themselves at table, the guests suddenly perceived the windows darkened by the passing of some large black object. With one accord they rose and ran out: a woman lay on the pavement, pale, crushed, and dead. Bilderdyk gave a cry—it was Mme. Blanchard! In what a guise to meet her again! Encouraged by the constant impunity of her perilous ascensions, the unhappy aëronaut (the word I believe has no feminine), finding a formidable rival in Mlle. Garnerin, resolved to surpass her in daring by augmenting the risk of her aërial voyages. For this purpose she lighted up her balloon car with colored lamps, and carried with her a supply of fireworks. On the sixth of July, 1819, she rose from amid a vast concourse of spectators. The balloon caught in one of the trees in the Champs-Elysées, but without regarding the augury, Mme. Blanchard threw out ballast, and as she rose rapidly in the air she spilled a quantity of lighting spirits of wine, and then sent off rockets and Roman candles. Suddenly, with horror, the mass of upturned eyes beheld the balloon take fire. One piercing shriek from above mingled with the affrighted cries of the crowd below, and then some object was seen to detach itself from the fiery globe. As it came near the earth, it was recognized as the body of the ill-fated Mme. Blanchard.
Weeping and trembling, Bilderdyk aided in raising the disfigured corpse, and wrapped it up in the net-work of the balloon, which the hands still grasped firmly. The shock, acting on his excitable temperament, threw him into a dangerous illness, from which, however, he recovered, and returned to his native country. There he published an admirable treatise, "The Theory of Vegetable Organization," and a poem entitled, "The Destruction of the Primeval World." A French critic has placed this latter work in the same rank with "Paradise Lost," and says: "Old Milton has nothing finer, more energetic, or more vast, in his immortal work." An English critic, however, would probably scarcely concur in this judgment.
Bilderdyk died in the town of Haarlem on the 18th of December, 1831.