With all his dignity, he is an old person with a temper, and an obstinacy hard to subdue. During one of his recent illnesses he absolutely refused to be shaved; also, what was more important, to eat. The entire palace was in despair, when Mademoiselle Z—— arrived one afternoon on her daily visit. She is a homely lady (formerly a great actress) of almost as many years as the Emperor, and comes every day to play chess with him. When she heard of his stubborness on this particular occasion, she marched into the imperial presence with a bowl of soup and some biscuits, and called out: “Come, Franz Joseph, don’t be a fool! Sit up and eat.”
The Emperor gave her one furious look—and obeyed; afterwards meekly suffering himself to be shaved and put in proper order as an invalid. He and the doughty old artiste have been close friends for forty years, and he is fond of remarking that there is one woman in the world who makes up in brains what she lacks in features. I should like to see the two shrewd old heads over their chess.
Instead, I must remember my responsibilities, and come back to Patsy and her hauptmann. He is bending towards her solicitously; suggesting a walk in the Garden, a cup of chocolate at Demel’s, the concert at the Volksgarten after lunch, perhaps in the evening some skating at his club? Patsy finds time to whisper to me that she thinks the Viennese not too dull, after all. She hears they even have balls—masked balls, in fancy dress, on the ice. Doesn’t Uncle Peter think waltzing on ice sounds rather nice?
Uncle Peter, who has rheumatism, feebly agrees that it does sound very nice; and falls into his proper background as chaperone, while the young people dart ahead down the narrow street to the Garden. Here, in the fashionable short promenade, an exhilarating sense of prosperity fills the air. There is the soft elegance of furs, the scent of violets, the occasional gleam of scarlet lining an officer’s picturesque white cloak; brilliant shops draw their knots of pretty women to the windows, well set-up men stroll by in long fur coats or drive their own superb horses to and fro: all is easy, gay and care-free, betokening an idle happiness.
“And there are no beggars,” sighs Patsy contentedly, “I am glad of that!”
It is true—and rather extraordinary for a city of almost two million inhabitants; but, on the surface at least, there seem to be no actually poor people in Vienna. The more one knows the place the more one is impressed with the fact that, while the upper classes are extravagant and show-loving, the lower seem to have imbibed a spirit of cheerful thrift which keeps them from real poverty. They have enough to eat and to wear, and for an occasional bit of pleasure; what more, their good-humoured faces seem to ask, could they want?
Only the very wealthy Viennese can afford a house to himself. The great majority of people rent a story, or half a story, of the huge residence buildings that give the city its monotonously gloomy look. Row after row of these line the streets, all the same height and the same style; but in no way do they resemble the typical “apartments” of England, America or France. Each dwelling in itself is the size of a house of moderate dimensions, with its own inner stairways and separate floors. There are certain conveniences in the arrangement, but I cannot say I find it on the whole satisfactory. One has constantly the feeling of having strayed into a public building to eat and sleep; which causes one to do both under a depressing sense of apology.
The people unconsciously admit this lack of home attraction by their incessant attendance at cafés. While the Frenchman or the Spaniard spends an hour a day in his favourite café, chatting with friends, the Viennese spends an entire morning, afternoon or evening—or all three. Coffee or chocolate with whipped cream (the famous Wiener Mélange) is the usual drink with which he pays for his seat, and the illustrated papers that are his obsession. He, or Madame his friend, will remain in a comfortable corner of the window hour after hour, reading and smoking, smoking and reading; only looking up to sip chocolate, or to stare at some newcomer. The café, also the constant cigarette-smoking, is as much a habit with the women of Vienna as with the men. And one is not surprised to hear that there are over six hundred of these (literally) “coffee-houses” in the city, and that all of them are continually full.
Some of the larger establishments provide excellent music—and here we are fingering the edges of Viennese character and culture: next to (or along with) love of gayety go a love and understanding of music, that amounts almost to a passion. Besides the café concerts, there are military concerts, philharmonic concerts and symphony concerts; to say nothing of the host of notable recitals crowding one another for attention.
One is struck by the enormous and enthusiastic patronage given to these affairs, each and all. In Anglo-Saxon countries the ventures of a concert-manager are at best precarious, and, in spite of the high price of tickets, frequently result in a dead loss. An Anglo-Saxon audience is tepid, for both music and drama, being roused to fervour not by either art in itself, but only by a great name made actual upon the stage. In Germany music is a religion; in Vienna there is added a fire and dash which make it no less pure, while more seductive. From operette to concerto, the Viennese run the gamut of musical expression, in every phase pre-eminent.