I had almost finished my group, but I had done neither the feet nor the hands of the grandmother. She was holding her little dead grandson on her knees, but her arms had no hands and her legs had no feet. I looked in vain for the hands and the feet of my ideal, large and bony. One day when my friend Martel came to see me at my studio and to look at this group which was much talked of, I had an inspiration: Martel was big, and thin enough to make Death jealous. I watched him walking round my work. He was looking at it as a connoisseur. But I was looking at him. Suddenly I said:
“My dear Martel, I beg you ... I beseech you ... to pose for the hands and feet of my grandmother.”
He burst out laughing, and with perfectly good grace took off his shoes and took the place of my model.
He came ten days running and gave me three hours each day. Thanks to him I was able to finish my group. I had it molded and sent to the Salon (1876) where it had a veritable success. Is there any need to say that I was accused of having got some one else to make this group for me? I asked one critic to meet me. This was no other than Jules Claretie, who had declared that this work, which was very interesting, could not have been done by me. Jules Claretie excused himself very politely and that was the end of it.
The jury, after being fully informed on the subject, awarded me “honorable mention,” and I was wild with joy.
I was very much criticised, but also very much praised. Nearly all the criticisms were directed to the neck of my old Breton woman—that neck on which I had worked with such eagerness.
The following is from an article by Réné Delorme:
“The work of Mlle. Sarah Bernhardt deserves to be studied in detail. The head of the grandmother, well worked out as to the profound wrinkles it bears, expresses that intense sorrow in which everything else counts as nothing. The only reproach I have to bring against this artist is that she has brought too much into prominence the muscles of the neck of the old grandmother. This shows a lack of experience. She is pleased with herself for having studied anatomy so well and is not sorry for the opportunity of showing it. It is,” etc., etc....
Certainly this gentleman was right—I had studied anatomy eagerly and in a very amusing manner. I had had lessons from Doctor Parrot who was so good to me. I had continually with me a book of anatomical designs, and when I was at home I stood before the glass and said suddenly to myself, putting my finger on some part of my body: “Now, then, what is that?” I had to answer immediately, without hesitation, and when I hesitated I compelled myself to learn by heart the muscles of the head or the arm and did not sleep till this was done.
A month after the exhibition there was a reading of Parodi’s play, “Rome Vaincue,” at the Comédie Française. I refused the rôle of the young vestal Opïmia, which had been allotted to me, and energetically demanded that of Posthumia, an old blind Roman woman with a superb and noble face. No doubt there was some connection in my mind between my old Breton weeping over her son, and the august patrician claiming pardon for her granddaughter.