Another fresh acquaintance that I made in those days was with three French painters, Hammon, Sain and Benner, who had studios adjoining one another. Hammon and Sain both died long since, but Benner, whom I met again in Paris in 1904, died, honoured and respected, in 1905. I was later on at Capri in company with Sain and Benner, but Hammon I saw only during this visit to Rome. His pretty, somewhat sentimental painting, Ma soeur n'y est pas, hung, reproduced in engraving, in every shop-window, even in Copenhagen. He was painting just then at his clever picture, Triste Rivage.
Hammon was born in Brittany, of humble, orthodox parents, who sent him to a monastery. The Prior, when he surprised him drawing men and women out of his head, told him that painting was a sin. The young man himself then strongly repented his inclination, but, as he felt he could not live without following it, he left the monastery, though with many strong twinges of conscience.
Now that he was older, he was ruining himself by drink, but had manifested true talent and still retained a humorous wit. One day that I was with him, a young man came to the studio and asked for his opinion of a painting; the man talked the whole time of nothing but his mother, of how much he loved her and all that he did for her. Hammon's patience gave out at last. He broke out: "And do you think, sir, that I have murdered my mother? I love her very much, I assure you, not enough to marry her, I grant, but pretty well, all the same." After that he always spoke of him as "the young man who loves his mother."
IX.
I felt as though this April, this radiant Spring, were the most glorious time in my life, I was assimilating fresh impressions of Art and Nature every hour; the conversations I was enjoying with my Italian and French friends set me day by day pondering over new thoughts; I saw myself restored to life, and a better life. At the beginning of April, moreover, some girls from the North made their triumphal entry into the Scandinavian Club. Without being specially beautiful or remarkable, they absolutely charmed me. It was a full year since the language of home had sounded in my ears from the lips of a girl, since I had seen the smile in the blue eyes and encountered the heart-ensnaring charm, in jest, or earnest, of the young women of the North. I had recently heard the entrancing castrato singing at St. Peter's, and, on conquering my aversion, could not but admire it. Now I heard once more simple, but natural, Danish and Swedish songs. Merely to speak Danish again with a young woman, was a delight. And there was one who, delicately and unmistakably and defencelessly, showed me that I was not indifferent to her. That melted me, and from that time forth the beauties of Italy were enhanced tenfold in my eyes.
All that I was acquainted with in Rome, all that I saw every day with Georges Noufflard, I could show her and her party, from the most accessible things, which were nevertheless fresh to the newcomers, such as the Pantheon, Acqua Paola, San Pietro in Montorio, the grave of Cecilia Metella, and the grottoes of Egeria, to the great collections of Art in the Vatican, or the Capitol, or in the wonderful Galleria Borghese. All this, that I was accustomed to see alone with Noufflard, acquired new splendour when a blonde girl walked by my side, asking sensible questions, and showing me the gratitude of youth for good instruction. With her nineteen years I suppose she thought me marvellously clever. But the works of Art that lay a little outside the beaten track, I likewise showed to my compatriots. I had never been able to tolerate Guido Reni; but his playing angels in the chapel of San Gregorio excited my profound admiration, and it was a satisfaction to me to pour this into the receptive ear of a girl compatriot. These angels delighted me so that I could hardly tear myself away from them. The fine malice, the mild coquetry, even in the expression of the noblest purity and the loftiest dignity, enchanted us.
I had been in the habit of going out to the environs of Rome with Georges Noufflard, for instance, to the large, handsome gardens of the Villa Doria Pamfili, or the Villa Madama, with its beautiful frescoes and stucco-work, executed by Raphael's pupils, Giulio Romano and others, from drawings by that master. But it was a new delight to drive over the Campagna with a girl who spoke Danish by my side, and to see her Northern complexion in the sun of the South. With my French friend, I gladly joined the excursions of her party to Nemi, Albano, Tivoli.
Never in my life had I felt so happy as I did then. I was quite recovered. Only a fortnight after I had risen from a sick-bed that had claimed me four months and a half, I was going about, thanks to my youth, as I did before I was ill. For my excursions, I had a comrade after my own heart, well-bred, educated, and noble-minded; I fell in love a little a few times a week; I saw lakes, fields, olive groves, mountains, scenery, exactly to my taste. I had always a permesso for the Vatican collections in my pocket. I felt intoxicated with delight, dizzy with enjoyment.
It seemed to me that of all I had seen in the world, Tivoli was the most lovely. The old "temple of the Sibyl" on the hill stood on consecrated ground, and consecrated the whole neighbourhood. I loved those waterfalls, which impressed me much more than Trollhättan [Footnote: Trollhättan, a celebrated waterfall near Göteborg in Sweden.], had done in my childhood. In one place the water falls down, black and boiling, into a hollow of the rock, and reminded me of the descent into Tartarus; in another the cataract runs, smiling and twinkling with millions of shining pearls, in the strong sunlight. In a third place, the great cascade rushes down over the rocks. There, where it touches the nether rocks, rests the end of the enormous rainbow which, when the sun shines, is always suspended across it. Noufflard told me that Niagara itself impressed one less. We scrambled along the cliff until we stood above the great waterfall, and could see nothing but the roaring, foaming white water, leaping and dashing down; it looked as though the seething and spraying masses of water were springing over each other's heads in a mad race, and there was such power, such natural persuasion in it, that one seemed drawn with it, and gliding, as it were, dragged into the abyss. It was as though all Nature were disembodied, and flinging herself down.
Like a Latin, Noufflard personified it all; he saw the dance of nymphs in the waves, and their veils in the clouds of spray. My way of regarding Nature was diametrically opposite, and pantheistic. I lost consciousness of my own personality, felt myself one with the falling water and merged myself into Nature, instead of gathering it up into figures. I felt myself an individuality of the North, conscious of my being.