Later Queens of the French Stage

by H. Noel Williams

“The Celebrated Mademoiselle G——rd, or Grimhard, from Paris. Published by Thomas Humphrey, May 26, 1787.”

The leanness of the ballerina, of which we have spoken elsewhere, seems to have increased with years, and was the theme of jests innumerable at her expense and that of her lovers, most of them, however, good-natured enough, for Madeleine Guimard had few enemies, and even the chroniclers of contemporary scandal generally have a good word to say for her.

In the etching in question one sees, under a toque with sky-blue plumes, a woman, with a death’s head crowned with false hair, and a bony neck, raising in the air a consumptive leg and waving her arms, at the ends of which are phalanxes of little bones in place of fingers.[91]

On her return to Paris, from England, in the summer of 1789, Mlle. Guimard married Jean Étienne Despréaux, the dancing-master and poet, who had been for some years an intimate friend, though not, it would appear, a lover.[92] The marriage took place on August 14, at the church of Sainte-Marie du Temple, the age of the bride being forty-six and that of her husband thirty-one. The acte de mariage, cited by Jal, states that the two had received the nuptial benediction, “after having renounced their profession,” and, to the great sorrow of her countless admirers, the Opera knew Madeleine Guimard no more.

It is not altogether easy to determine the reasons which induced Mlle. Guimard to take this step; a step which, as we have mentioned, entailed the renunciation of her profession. Certainly it could not have been any interested motive, since Despréaux was in far from affluent circumstances, while the danseuse was in possession of a comfortable little fortune, as fortunes went, in theatrical circles, in those days.[93] Nor is it at all likely that she was consumed with any very violent passion for the dancing-master, who, on his own confession, was insignificant of figure and remarkably plain of face.[94] The probability is that she was by this time heartily tired of the stage and of a life of gallantry, and desired to spend the remainder of her days in retirement and the odour of sanctity, with a man who, if he had no physical attractions to boast of, “possessed all the little agreeable talents calculated to assure the affection of a woman of pleasure whose youth was dead.”[95]

However that may be, the ménage appears to have been a happy one, and that notwithstanding the fact that the danseuse and her husband were very far from enjoying the life of comfort and tranquillity to which they had looked forward. For the Revolution had begun; and the Revolution meant to themselves and hundreds of other pensioners of the State an abrupt descent from comparative affluence to poverty. Their circumstances were, of course, superior to most of their colleagues, as Madeleine Guimard had saved money, a very small proportion, it is true, of the enormous sums which had passed through her hands, but still sufficient to save them from actual want.

When, in 1792, the municipality entrusted the management of the Opera to Celerier and Francœur, Despréaux was nominated by them a member of the administrative council and stage-manager. These posts would have more than compensated him for the loss of his pensions, but, unfortunately, the directors were shortly afterwards accused of embezzlement and arrested; and in September 1793, Despréaux, perhaps fearful of sharing their fate, resigned.

He and his wife now retired to a little house on the summit of Montmartre, to reach which, he tells us, it was necessary to traverse a road so steep that the Jacobin patrols neglected to ascend it, and they were, in consequence, left undisturbed. Here they appeared to have lived for some three years, and it was here that Despréaux composed most of the poems which he published later, under the title of Mes Passe-Temps. “I composed these chansons,” he says, “to find some distraction from the terrible evils that beset us, and as a little surprise for my wife, whom I adored.”[96]

Notwithstanding the disparity in years between them, there can be no doubt that Despréaux was devoted to his wife, and in a poetical “bouquet” entitled Un Bon Ménage, published in 1806, he informs the world of the profound happiness which he has found in his union with the danseuse:

. . . . . . . . . .
“Ah! mon Dieu! combien j’étais fou!
Je redoutais le mariage;
Et j’avais lu, je ne sais où:
‘Le bonheur n’est pas en ménage.’
Erreur! ta bonté, ta raison
M’ont enfin prouvé le contraire,
Et je vois, dans l’heureux garçon
L’heureux imaginaire (bis).