A CABARET OF MONTMARTRE
He made his début at the Chat Noir in 1890. It was there that an incident occurred which illustrates Montoya’s remarkable memory.
“Phryné,” the shadow play by Maurice Donnay, was performing when its author became involved in a duel with Catulle Mendes. Donnay was wounded, and therefore he was unable to return to the Chat Noir to recite the play. Salis in this extremity turned to Montoya for aid. The latter in one afternoon learned the twelve hundred lines of “Phryné” and recited them the same evening without a mistake.
To Paul Delmet Paris owes many of her popular songs. This veteran chansonnier has composed volumes of exquisite ballads, parodies and satires. His songs, such as “Stances à Manon,” “Brunette aux Yeux Doux,” and his amusing “L’Escalier,” every Parisian knows. They are sung everywhere.
The late chansonnier, Aristide Bruant, was as extravagant and impractical as the great Balzac. He lived like a prince through good and bad luck in his château outside of Paris, and, dressed in black velvet, drove daily to and from his cabaret in Montmartre in a smart turnout. De Bercy, his friend, tells the following anecdote of Bruant:
He came banging at De Bercy’s door early one morning. “I have just been chosen as a candidate for election at Belleville Saint Fargeau,” cried Bruant excitedly, waking up the sleepy De Bercy. “Get into your clothes in a gallop; you will have to make my speech for me and we have just time to catch the train. We will breakfast at Belleville. I have accepted an invitation for both of us. We’ll breakfast first and you will have time to write your speech afterwards.”
Bruant could sing all night, but speech-making was not in his line.
The two hurried to Belleville and breakfasted, and afterwards De Bercy wrote madly for three hours and finished the address. Bruant knew that if he would ingratiate himself in the hearts of the Bellevillians he must do so by expressions indicating his sympathy with the current wrongs of the community. He must touch upon the rights of the widows and orphans, the wrongs of the working man, and other kindred topics.
It happened that Bruant had in his repertoire a lot of songs upon these very topics, none of which the good people of Belleville had ever heard.
The hour arrived and before a large and enthusiastic audience De Bercy launched into his speech. Each time he finished a portion of his discourse upon the widows or orphans, Bruant would burst into a song relative to the subject. He had one ready upon every question upon which his confrère spoke. The Bellevillians cheered and Bruant was elected by an overwhelming majority amid a furor of good-fellowship and an outpouring of the red wine of Belleville Saint Fargeau!