It was she who said one day to Chopin: "Si j'etais jeune et jolie, mon petit Chopin, je te prendrais pour mari, Hiller pour ami, et Liszt pour amant." And it was at her house that the interesting contention of Chopin with Liszt and Hiller took place. The Hungarian and the German having denied the assertion of the Pole that only he who was born and bred in Poland, only he who had breathed the perfume of her fields and woods, could fully comprehend with heart and mind Polish national music, the three agreed to play in turn, by way of experiment, the mazurka "Poland is not lost yet." Liszt began, Hiller followed, and Chopin came last and carried off the palm, his rivals admitting that they had not seized the true spirit of the music as he had done. Another anecdote, told me by Hiller, shows how intimate the Polish artist was with this family of compatriots, the Platers, and what strange whims he sometimes gave way to. One day Chopin came into the salon acting the part of Pierrot, and, after jumping and dancing about for an hour, left without having spoken a single word.
Abbe Bardin was a great musical amateur, at whose weekly afternoon gatherings the best artists might be seen and heard, Mendelssohn among the rest when he was in Paris in 1832-1833. In one of the many obituary notices of Chopin which appeared in French and other papers, and which are in no wise distinguished by their trustworthiness, I found the remark that the Abbe Bardin and M.M. Tilmant freres were the first to recognise Chopin's genius. The notice in question is to be found in the Chronique Musicale of November 3, 1849.
In Franck, whose lodgings Chopin had taken, the reader will recognise the "clever [geistreiche], musical Dr. Hermann Franck," the friend of many musical and other celebrities, the same with whom Mendelssohn used to play at chess during his stay in Paris. From Hiller I learned that Franck was very musical, and that his attainments in the natural sciences were considerable; but that being well-to-do he was without a profession. In the fifth decade of this century he edited for a year Brockhaus's Deutsche allgemeine Zeitung.
In the following letter which Chopin wrote to Franchomme—the latter thinks in the autumn of 1833—we meet with some new names. Dr. Hoffmann was a good friend of the composer's, and was frequently found at his rooms smoking. I take him to have been the well-known litterateur Charles Alexander Hoffmann, [Footnote: This is the usual German, French, and English spelling. The correct Polish spelling is Hofman. The forms Hoffman and Hofmann occur likewise.] the husband of Clementina Tanska, a Polish refugee who came to Paris in 1832 and continued to reside there till 1848. Maurice is of course Schlesinger the publisher. Of Smitkowski I know only that he was one of Chopin's Polish friends, whose list is pretty long and comprised among others Prince Casimir Lubomirski, Grzymala, Fontana, and Orda.
[Footnote: Of Grzymala and Fontana more will be heard in the sequel. Prince Casimir Lubomirski was a passionate lover of music, and published various compositions. Liszt writes that Orda, "who seemed to command a future," was killed at the age of twenty in Algiers. Karasowski gives the same information, omitting, however, the age. My inquiries about Orda among French musicians and Poles have had no result. Although the data do not tally with those of Liszt and Karasowski, one is tempted to identify Chopin's friend with the Napoleon Orda mentioned in Sowinski's Musiciens polonais et slaves—"A pianist-composer who had made himself known since the events of 1831. One owes to him the publication of a Polish Album devoted to the composers of this nation, published at Paris in 1838. M. Orda is the author of several elegantly-written pianoforte works." In a memoir prefixed to an edition of Chopin's mazurkas and waltzes (Boosey & Co.), J.W. Davison mentions a M. Orda (the "M." stands, I suppose, for Monsieur) and Charles Filtsch as pupils of Chopin.]
It was well for Chopin that he was so abundantly provided with friends, for, as Hiller told me, he could not do without company. But here is Chopin's letter to Franchomme:—
Begun on Saturday, the 14th, and finished on Wednesday, the
18th.
DEAR FRIEND,—It would be useless to excuse myself for my
silence. If my thoughts could but go without paper to the
post-office! However, you know me too well not to know that
I, unfortunately, never do what I ought to do. I got here
very comfortably (except for a little disagreeable episode,
caused by an excessively odoriferous gentleman who went as
far as Chartres—he surprised me in the night-time). I have
found more occupation in Paris than I left behind me, which
will, without doubt, hinder me from visiting you at Coteau.
Coteau! oh Coteau! Say, my child, to the whole family at
Coteau that I shall never forget my stay in Touraine—that so
much kindness has made me for ever grateful. People think I
am stouter and look very well, and I feel wonderfully well,
thanks to the ladies that sat beside me at dinner, who
bestowed truly maternal attentions upon me. When I think of
all this the whole appears to me such an agreeable dream that
I should like to sleep again. And the peasant-girls of
Pormic! [FOOTNOTE: A village near the place where Chopin had
been staying.] and the flour! or rather your graceful nose
which you were obliged to plunge into it.
[FOOTNOTE: The remark about the "flour" and Franchomme's "nez
en forme gracieuse" is an allusion to some childish game in
which Chopin, thanks to his aquiline nose, got the better of
his friend, who as regards this feature was less liberally
endowed.]
A very interesting visit has interrupted my letter, which was
begun three days ago, and which I have not been able to
finish till to-day.
Hiller embraces you, Maurice, and everybody. I have delivered
your note to his brother, whom I did not find at home.
Paer, whom I saw a few days ago, spoke to me of your return.
Come back to us stout and in good health like me. Again a
thousand messages to the estimable Forest family. I have
neither words nor powers to express all I feel for them.
Excuse me. Shake hands with me—I pat you on the shoulder—I
hug you—I embrace you. My friend—au revoir.
Hoffmann, the stout Hoffmann, and the slim Smitkowski also,
embrace you.
[FOOTNOTE: The orthography of the French original is very
careless. Thus one finds frequent omissions and misplacements
of accents and numerous misspellings, such as trouvais
instead of trouve, engresse instead of engraisse, plonge
instead of plonger. Of course, these mistakes have to be
ascribed to negligence not to ignorance. I must mention yet
another point which the English translation does not bring
out—namely, that in addressing Franchomme Chopin makes use
of the familiar form of the second person singular.]
The last-quoted letter adds a few more touches to the portraiture of Chopin which has been in progress in the preceding pages. The insinuating affectionateness and winning playfulness had hitherto not been brought out so distinctly. There was then, and there remained to the end of his life, something of a woman and of a boy in this man. The sentimental element is almost wholly absent from Chopin's letters to his non-Polish friends. Even to Franchomme, the most intimate among these, he shows not only less of his inmost feelings and thoughts than to Titus Woyciechowski and John Matuszyriski, the friends of his youth, but also less than to others of his countrymen whose acquaintance he made later in life, and of whom Grzymala may be instanced. Ready to give everything, says Liszt, Chopin did not give himself—
his most intimate acquaintances did not penetrate into the
sacred recess where, apart from the rest of his life, dwelt
the secret spring of his soul: a recess so well concealed
that one hardly suspected its existence.
Indeed, you could as little get hold of Chopin as, to use L. Enault's expression, of the scaly back of a siren. Only after reading his letters to the few confidants to whom he freely gave his whole self do we know how little of himself he gave to the generality of his friends, whom he pays off with affectionateness and playfulness, and who, perhaps, never suspected, or only suspected, what lay beneath that smooth surface. This kind of reserve is a feature of the Slavonic character, which in Chopin's individuality was unusually developed.