A Wanderer in Paris

by E. V. Lucas

Other work here that one recalls is the charming group by Frémiet, "Pan and the Bear Cubs," Dubois' fascinating "Florentine Singing-boy of the Fifteenth Century," a peasant by Dalou, a Great Dane and puppies by Le Courtier, and the very beautiful head in the doorway to Room I.—"Femme de Marin," by Cazin the painter. But other visitors, other tastes, of course.

Before entering Room I. there are two small rooms on the right of the sculpture gallery which should be entered, one given up to the more famous Impressionists and one to foreign work. The chief Impressionists are Degas, Renoir, Monet, Sisley and their companions, almost all of whom seem to me to have painted better elsewhere than here. Monet's "Yachts in the River" rise before me, as I write, with the warm sun upon them, and I still see in the mind's eye the torso of a young woman by Legros: but this room always depresses me, the effect largely I believe of the antipathetic Renoir. The other room has a floating population. Recently the painters have been Belgian: but at another time they may be German or English, when the Belgians will recede to the cellars or be lent to provincial galleries.

The pictures in the Luxembourg are many, but the arresting hand is too seldom extended. Cleverness, the bane of French art, dominates. In the first room Rodin's "Baiser" is greater than any painting; but Harpignies' "Lever de Lune" is here, and here also is one of Pointelin's sombre desolate moorlands. In a glass case some delicate bowls by Dammouse are worth attention; but I think his work at the Arts Décoratifs at the Louvre is better. The second room is notable for the Fantin-Latour drawings in the middle, with others by Flandrin and Meissonier; the third for Carolus-Duran's "Vieux Lithographe" and a case of drawings by modern black and white masters, including Legros and Steinlen; here also is another Pointelin. In Room IV. is a coast scene—"Les Falaises de Sotteville," in a lovely evening light, by Bouland, which falls short of perfection but is very grateful to the eyes. In Room V. is a portrait group by Fantin-Latour recalling the "Hommage à Delacroix," which we saw in the Collection Moreau, but less interesting. The studio is that of Manet at Batignolles. Here also is a beautiful snow scene by Cazin—an oasis indeed. In Room VI. we find Cazin again with "Ishmael," and two sweet and misty Carrières, a powerful if hard Legros, Carolus-Duran's portrait of the ruddy Papa Français the painter, Blanche's vivid group of the Thaulow family, with the gigantic Fritz bringing the strength of a bull-fighter to the execution of one of his tender landscapes, and finally Whistler's portrait of his mother, which I reproduce on the [opposite page]—one of the most restful and gentlest deeds of his restless, irritable life.

PORTRAIT DE SA MÈRE
WHISTLER
(Luxembourg)

Room VII. is remarkable for Rodin's "Bellona" and Tissot's curious exercises in the genre of W. P. Frith—the story of the Prodigal Son. But the picture which I remember most clearly and with most pleasure is Victor Mottez's "Portrait of Madame M.," which has a deep quiet beauty that is very rare in this gallery. In the same room, placed opposite each other, although probably not with any conscious ironical intention, are a large scene in the Franco-Prussian War by De Neuville, and Carrière's "Christ on the Cross". In Room VIII. are a number of meretricious Moreaus, Caro-Delvalle's light and, to me, oddly attractive, group, "Ma Femme et ses Sœurs," and the portrait of Mlle. Moréno of the Comédie Française by Granié, which is reproduced [opposite page 308], a picture with fascination rather than genius.

In the doorway between Room VIII. and Room IX. hangs a small water-colour by Harpignies, but in Room IX. itself is nothing that I can recollect. Room X. has Picard's charming "Femme qui passe," Harpignies' Coliseum, very like a Moreau Corot, and a Flandrin; and in Room XI. are Bastien Lepage's "Portrait of M. Franck," Le Sidaner's "Dessert," Vollon's "Port of Antwerp," very beautiful, and Carolus-Duran's famous portrait of "Madame G. F. and her children".

On leaving the Musée it is worth while to take a few steps more to the left, for they bring us to another sinister souvenir of the Reign of Terror—to St. Joseph des Carmes, the Chapel of the Carmelite monastery in which, in September, 1792, the Abbé Sicard and other priests who had refused to take the oath of the Constitution were imprisoned and massacred, as described by Carlyle in Book I., Chapters IV. and V. of "The Guillotine," with the assistance of the narrative of one of the survivors, Mon Agonie de Trente-Huit Heures, by Jourgniac Saint-Méard. In the crypt one is shown not only the tombs but traces of the massacre.

A walk in the Luxembourg gardens would, if one had been nowhere else, quickly satisfy the stranger as to the interest of the French in the more remarkable children of their country. In these gardens alone are statues, among many others, in honour of Chopin, Watteau, Delacroix, Sainte-Beuve, Le Play the economist, Fabre the poet, George Sand, Henri Murger, the novelist of the adjacent Latin Quarter, and Théodore de Banville, the modern maker of ballades and prime instigator of some of the most charming work in French form by Mr. Lang and Mr. Dobson and W. E. Henley. There are countless other statues of mythological and allegorical figures, some of them very striking. One of the most interesting of all is the "Marchand de Masques" by Astruc, among the masks offered for sale being those of Corot, Dumas, Berlioz and Balzac.