In one Bavarian regiment, if you had debts, you were liable to be summoned at literally a moment's notice before your Colonel, and ordered to pay your debts in so many days, or leave the regiment. The usual thing was then to obtain the hand in marriage of the most attractive girl you knew with the most attractive bank-account. Sometimes they disappeared to America. Frau Seebold told us once, while she was singing in New York one winter, with an Austrian prima donna, that a man applied at the door for work during a heavy fall of snow. She told him to clear it away, and then come in for his money. He came, and noticing her strong accent, asked if she had long left the Fatherland. On her replying "no," he burst into a flood of German, and told her his pitiful story, while she made him hot coffee and tried to comfort him. He had been a lieutenant in a smart regiment, had gotten into trouble through a brother officer betraying his trust in him, and had had to disappear to America for the honour of the regiment. The poor fellow put his head on the kitchen table and sobbed as he told her how he sank lower and lower, till finally he shovelled snow. He also told her there was a club in New York where ex-officers who were coachmen, truck drivers, or waiters by day, could be gentlemen and comrades by night. He said their crests were carved above their places on the wall, and no one could belong except those of high birth. All this was years ago, and I have no idea whether such a place still exists.
When a sudden silence falls on a party in Germany they say, "A Lieutenant pays his debts." Promotion is very slow, and to arrive at a decent income takes years. A Bavarian Colonel has only eight thousand marks a year. The equipment of an officer is very expensive; their Parade uniforms must always be spotless, and though you may wear tricot cloth every day, your parade uniform must be of finest broadcloth, and your sword knots of shining silver though a dash of rain ruins both. The scarlet collars are more extravagant even than the white cloth ones, as white may be cleaned at least once with gasoline, but scarlet is too delicate, and the slightest perspiration makes a lasting stain. This was all before the war, though, and perhaps the dazzling uniforms have given place for ever to dull khaki. If so Germany is the drabber, for the colour was a thing to make one's heart leap. In Darmstadt the first four rows in the orchestra were reserved for officers at reduced rates, and that beautiful border of colour always framed the stage in a brilliant band on opera nights.
In Metz the rule against appearing in "Civil" on the street was very strict, and F—— used to come to see us in a full set of tennis flannels brandishing a racket, though he had never played in his life! In Darmstadt the same strictness prevailed. A friend of ours, a Major holding a very high position, had to dodge round corners, when he was out of uniform, in case the terrible General Plueskow should see him, and order him twenty-four hours' room arrest! By the way, when General Plueskow, who was about six feet seven, was in France as a young man, the French made a quip about him, "Who is the tallest officer in the German army?" was the question, and the answer was "Plueskow, because he is Plus que haut."
CHAPTER XVIII
GEESE AND GUESTS
I WAS on the whole very happy in Darmstadt. All the leading contralto work came to me by right, and it was brightened by an occasional rôle in operetta. They found they could use me for smart ladies in such things as "Dollar Prinzessin," and I greatly enjoyed the dancing and gaiety of those performances. We had many operas in the repertoire that are seldom or never heard of in this country, "Evangelimann," "Hans Heiling," "Sieben Schwaben," all the Lortzings, "Undine," "Wildschuetz," "Zar und Zimmermann," "Weisse Dame," etc. Such things as "Fra Diavolo," and "Lustige Weiber," were always delightful to play.
We gave "Koenigskinder" the first year it was brought out in Germany. Our clever Kempin designed charming sets for it, lit in the modern way, and the soprano, though a plain little thing, had a heavenly sympathetic voice, with a floating quality most appealing in the high part. During the Première at the end of the last act, just as we were taking our calls from an enthusiastic public, a strange bearded man stepped out of the wings and joined us. Humperdinck, of course, whom I recognized in a minute from his photos. He said nothing to any of us, and we often speculated as to why he did not. He must have been pleased with the production, or he would not have shown himself; indeed we heard he was pleased, but no word was vouchsafed us.
For our geese we had grey Pomeranian beauties and immense white birds from Italy. The Italians, besides being bigger were more numerous; they saw their opportunity to bully the Teutons within an inch of their lives, and they took it. There was a tank of real water on the stage, in which they loved to splash, but do you suppose a German goose was ever allowed to go near it? Ominous hisses kept them away, and they hated hissing as all actors do. The foreigners gobbled up all the food, before the others could get it, and the only time that there was any unanimity among them was when they were doing something they should not. One night the largest Italian stepped into a depression near the footlights, caught his foot, squawked loudly and passed on. The second largest immediately followed suit; there were eleven of them, and they all in turn caught a foot, squawked and waddled on, to the great delight of the audience. It was agonizing for us on the stage, waiting for each squawk.
Animals were always a trial to the performers, though considered to lend a sure magnificence from the manager's point of view. We used to have a pack of hounds in the first act finale of "Tannhäuser." They always behaved beautifully and were allowed to run without leashes. One night, however, our little round Souffleuse, as the prompter is called, named "Bobberle" by the tenor as she was as broad as she was long, had taken her bread and sausages into her tiny pen. The dogs suddenly winded this, made a dive for the Souffler Kasten (prompter's box), scratched out the package, devoured the contents and then politely left their cards on the box; poor Bobberle in helpless rage prompting the while. Since that night the dogs have been chained two and two.
We often had famous guests. Edith Walker sang several times with us, and Knote quite as often. Schumann-Heink, a great friend of the Grand Duke's (she told me she would go through fire for him), sang Azucena. She had always been my girlhood's idol, and my ideal of an artist, so I embraced the opportunity to send her a wreath. They said she was much pleased by the attention from a contralto! She used some of my Schmink to make up with, and I proudly have the stubs to this day. She made us all laugh in rehearsal. When she says in the last act that they will find only a skeleton when they come to drag her from her prison, she passed her hands over her ample contours and emitted a spontaneous chuckle that was irresistibly infectious. Bahr Mildenburg came to us also and revealed to me what Ortrud might be. Especially in the first act is she overwhelming. In playing the part later I always felt her influence, and many things I do in that act were inspired by thoughts she gave me. Watch most Ortruds in that scene. They simply stand in what they consider mantled inscrutability, trying to portray evil in a heavy, unsubtle manner; and then see Bahr Mildenburg, if you can. All the really great people I have ever met are unpretentious and absolutely charming to work with. Only the near-great seem to consider it necessary to remind you all the time that they are other than you. The greater the man the simpler his manner, I have always found, and I think many will agree with me.