As I say, it was ebb tide in the lessons. So my husband tried his hand at writing. The war correspondence published in the Presse had been much praised, and in producing it he had discovered in himself a talent for writing a light and picturesque style. He now composed some descriptive articles on the Caucasus and its people, and sent them to various German weeklies. These contributions were gladly accepted and paid for.
Was it envy or was it imitativeness? I wanted to see if I could not write something too. I had never felt the call within me. When I was sixteen—at that time it was envy and imitativeness, awakened by Elvira’s successes—I had indeed written a short story entitled Erdenträume im Monde, and a periodical which long since had suspended publication, Die deutsche Frau, had brought it out and through the editor’s correspondence department had asked for further contributions: “I should not bury my talent.” Since that time, however, with the exception of letters (which I was tremendously fond of writing), I had written nothing.
So now, in the year 1878, I made my first (the Erdenträume did not count) attempt as an author. I composed in all secrecy a feuilleton entitled Fächer und Schürze—“Fans and Aprons”—and sent it to the old Presse at Vienna, and lo and behold! almost by return mail I received a copy of the paper containing it, and twenty florins. Oh, that first honorarium of an author! What a proud satisfaction its receipt gives—indescribable! The little work was signed with the pseudonym B. Oulot, a word formed from the nickname “Boulotte,” which had been given to me at the Suttners’; and when I saw these six letters in print under the feuilleton, which really seemed to me a very good one, I had the impression that about that time Central Europe must be stirred by the question, Now who can this B. Oulot be?
And from that moment I have gone on writing without interruption up to this day.
XIX
TIFLIS
Another summer in Gordi · Business projects · Removal to Tiflis · Princess Tamara of Georgia · Our manner of life · Double position · Continued authorship · Illness
In the summer of 1878 we were again guests at the Mingrelian summer residence.
The two sons for whom the Dedopali had trembled had now come to Gordi also, decorated with various orders; likewise Prince Niko’s wife Mary. And, in addition to these, Achille Murat with his wife and their two boys. It afforded me great pleasure to see my friend Salomé once more, and we had again a delightful time in this dear and merry circle. Count Rosmorduc contributed not a little to the entertainment. This old Frenchman had the gift of relating endless anecdotes from his life, exciting, witty, and touching, and of never repeating himself.
We still found that nothing came of the position for My Own. There was all the more of making plans and building castles in Spain. Businesses were to be taken over, colonists to be imported, a trade in wood to be started. Niko and Rosmorduc were especially inventive of such projects, in which my husband was always to have lucrative functions. Various things were actually entered upon: negotiations were begun, extended correspondence was carried on, but in the end nothing came of it.
So winter approached again, the colony at Gordi separated, and this time we decided to try our fortune at Tiflis; it was there that we could avail ourselves of the best recommendations. Here was the home of Princess Tamara, the widow of Heraclius of Georgia. He had died after a long illness, during which he is said to have been unendurably capricious, and his beautiful young widow had the most important house in Tiflis next to the grand-duke-governor’s. There we were received with the greatest kindness.
Tiflis is a city half Oriental, half West-European. In the European quarter the same sort of life prevails as in our great cities: European toilets, European manners, French cooks, English governesses, jours, soirées, conversation in Russian and French. Princess Tamara had her own palais, furnished with exquisite taste, and in her salons met the cream of the local society, consisting of dignitaries of the grand-ducal court,—the grand duke himself often used to come there,—of various governors and generals, and the great people of the city. Tamara’s younger sister, as beautiful as she herself, had married a general and also lived in Tiflis.