Mme. Géraldy is a tall, dark-haired, middle-aged woman, with an interesting face and a charming French manner. She wears mourning for her mother, who died in 1891.
"My mother," she said, "was a remarkable woman; she ought to be as well known as my father is. I would rather my father were not known at all," she continued, "than to be known as he is in your country, that is, as a professor of gymnastics."
She said she had heard of the American "Delsarte gymnastics" while in Paris (Americans passing through the city had often come to her and asked questions), but she had no idea, until she came here, that they were pushed so far. She was quite amused at having dumb-bells given her at one of her lectures in a town in Pennsylvania. "In a gymnasium, as usual," she said, smiling. Anybody who had ever been through the Delsarte gymnastics and afterward followed the course of lessons that Mme. Géraldy gave to a class while in New York, would have been struck by the beauty and simplicity of her father's method, and her clear and direct exposition of it. Here was no affectation. "I abhor all that is affected," she said. There were no intricate convolutions, no flourishes, and, above all, no "decomposing exercises."
An interesting fact to note is that Mme. Géraldy began by teaching her pupils the expressions of the eyes, and when she gave them attitudes or gestures, she always called for the facial expression to accompany them. A woman, well-known in her profession throughout the country, is said to have made the remark that Mme. Géraldy was wrong in beginning with the eyes; she should begin with the feet. Only after showing the possibilities of expression by face, head, hands, arms and shoulders, did Mme. Géraldy give the basic attitudes. She was very patient and painstaking with her pupils, and showed herself interested in every one. She would often pause, while showing some expressive gestures, and say, smiling: "But you Americans do not express yourselves in gestures. You do not 'move' as much as we do." And again, when insisting on the expressiveness of the shoulders when raised ("the shoulders are the thermometer of passion," said Delsarte) she would conclude: "But all this is not American; you Americans do not shrug your shoulders."
In giving the gesture of caress, she quoted her father as saying that the attitude of the hands in prayer is a certain form of caress. In our desire to have the thing we pray for, we clasp our hands together and press them to our bosom as if we already held it.[10]
She was sometimes amused at the numerous questions that were asked her during the lessons. "What searching minds you Americans have!" she would remark, admiringly. "You must know the why and the wherefore of everything. We French people are of much lighter mind and take things more for granted."
During the lesson on basic attitudes, the following question was put: "In the attitude of repose is the mind in a passive state, and in the attitude expressive of vehemence is the mind in an active state?" The simple answer was: "It is the mind that governs the feet and not the feet that govern the mind."
Mme. Géraldy always insisted on the law of opposition in movements, nature's and her father's great law. She gave, for example, an interesting series of gestures, which might be called the ascending scale from doubt to conviction, in which the head moves simultaneously with the arms and in an inverse direction. The figure on page 547* represents the angles made by the arms and shoulders and, at the same time, those made by the head and shoulders to express the accompanying ideas.
Delsarte used to say: "When I am speaking, stop me in the moment of my greatest exaltation, and I defy you to find me, from my head to my feet, in a position contrary to my method."
"Voice-culture for the speaking-voice is not an art that is cultivated in France," Mme. Géraldy said, "What can you do to change your voice? It was given to you by nature; you cannot change your vocal cords."