CHAPTER XXX
END OF MY AMERICAN TOUR
I had to play two days at Pittsburg, and then go on to Bradford, Erie, Toronto, and arrive at Buffalo on Sunday. It was my intention to give all the members of my company a day’s entertainment at the Falls, but Abbey, too, wanted to invite them. We had a discussion on the subject which was extremely animated. He was very dictatorial and so was I, and we both preferred giving the whole thing up rather than yield to each other. Jarrett, however, pointed out the fact to us that our autocracy would deprive the artistes of a little festivity about which they had heard a great deal and to which they were looking forward. We therefore gave in finally, and in order to settle the matter we agreed to share this fête between us. The artistes accepted our invitations with the most charming good grace, and we took the train for Buffalo, where we arrived at ten minutes past six in the morning. We had telegraphed beforehand for carriages and coffee to be in readiness and to have food provided for us, as it is simply madness for thirty-two persons to arrive on Sunday in an American town without giving notice of such an event. We had a special train going at full speed over the lines that were entirely free on Sundays, and it was decorated with festoons of flowers. The younger artistes were as delighted as children, those who had already seen everything before, told about it; then there was the eloquence of those who had heard of it, etc., etc., and all this together with the little bouquets of flowers distributed among the women and the cigars and cigarettes presented to the men, made everyone good-humored, so that all appeared to be happy. The carriages met our train and took us to the Hotel d’Angleterre which had been kept open for us. There were flowers everywhere and any number of small tables upon which were coffee, chocolate, or tea. Every table was soon surrounded with guests. I had my sister, Abbey, Jarrett, and the principal artistes at my table. The meal was of short duration and very gay and animated. We then went to the Falls, and I remained more than an hour on the balcony hollowed out of the rock. My eyes filled with tears as I stood there for I was deeply moved by the splendor of the sight. A radiant sun made the air around us iridescent. There were rainbows everywhere lighting up the atmosphere with their soft silvery colors. The coulées of hard ice hanging down along the rocks on each side looked like enormous jewels. I was sorry to leave this balcony, and we went down in narrow cages which glided gently into a tube arranged in the cleft of the enormous rock. We arrived in this way under the American Falls. They were there almost over our heads, sprinkling us with their blue, pink, and mauve drops. In front of us, protecting us from the Falls, were a heap of icicles forming quite a little mountain. We climbed over this to the best of our ability. My heavy fur mantle tired me and about half way down I took it off and let it slip over the side of the ice mountain to take it again when I reached the bottom. I was wearing a dress of white cloth with a satin blouse and everyone screamed with surprise on seeing me. Abbey took off his overcoat and threw it over my shoulders. I shook this off quickly and Abbey’s coat went to join my fur cloak below. The poor impresario’s face looked very blank. As he had taken a fair quantity of cocktails he staggered, fell down on the ice, got up and immediately fell again to the amusement of everyone. I was not at all cold as I never am when out of doors. I only feel the cold inside houses or in any place where I am inactive. Finally, we arrived at the highest point of the ice and the cataract was really most threatening. We were covered by the impalpable mist which rises in the midst of the tumultuous noise. I gazed at it all, bewildered and fascinated by the rapid movement of the water which looked like a wide curtain of silver, unfolding itself to be dashed violently into a rebounding, splashing heap with a noise unlike any sound I had ever heard. I very easily turn dizzy and I know very well that if I had been alone I should have remained there forever with my eye fixed on the sheet of water hurrying along at full speed, my mind lulled by the fascinating sound, and my limbs numbed by the treacherous cold which encircled us. I had to be dragged away, but I am soon myself again when confronted by an obstacle.
FOYER IN MADAME BERNHARDT’S THEATER, PARIS.
We had to go down again and this was not as easy as it had been to climb up. I took the walking stick belonging to one of my friends and then sat down on the ice. By putting the stick under my legs I was able to slide down to the bottom. All the others imitated me and it was a comical sight to see forty people descending this ice hill in this way. There were several somersaults and collisions and plenty of laughter. A quarter of an hour later we were all at the hotel where luncheon had been ordered.
We were all cold and hungry; it was warm inside the hotel and the meal smelled good. When luncheon was over, the landlord of the hotel asked me to go into a small drawing-room, where a surprise awaited me. On entering, I saw on a table protected under a long glass box, the Niagara Falls in miniature with the rocks looking like pebbles. A large glass represented the sheet of water and glass threads represented the Falls. Here and there was some foliage of a hard, crude green. Standing up on a little hillock of ice was a figure intended for me. It was enough to make anyone howl with horror, it was all so hideous. I managed to raise a broad smile for the benefit of the hotel keeper by way of congratulating him on his good taste, but I was petrified on recognizing the man servant of the Th—— brothers of Pittsburg. They had sent this monstrous caricature of the most beautiful thing in the world. I read the letter which their domestic handed me and all my disdain melted away; they had gone to so much trouble in order to explain what they wanted me to understand and they were so delighted at the idea of giving me any pleasure. I dismissed the valet after giving him a letter for his masters, and I asked the hotel keeper to send the work of art to Paris packed carefully. I hoped that it might arrive in fragments. The thought of it haunted me, though, and I wondered how my friend’s passion for the Falls could be reconciled with the idea of such a gift. While admitting that his imaginative mind might have hoped to be able to carry out his idea, how was it that he was not indignant at the sight of this grotesque imitation? How had he dared to send it to me? How was it that my friend loved the Falls, and what had he understood of their marvelous grandeur? Since his death I have questioned my own memory of him a hundred times, but all in vain. He died for them, rolling about in their waters, killed by their caresses, and I cannot think that he could ever have seen how beautiful they really were. Fortunately, I was called away, as the carriage was there and everyone waiting for me. The horses started off with us, trotting in that weary way peculiar to tourists’ horses.
When we arrived on the Canadian shore we had to go underground and array ourselves in black or yellow mackintoshes. We looked like so many heavy, dumpy sailors who were wearing these garments for the first time. There were two large cells to shelter us, one for the women and the other for the men. Everyone undressed more or less in the midst of wild confusion, and making a little package of our clothes we gave this into the keeping of the woman in charge. With the mackintosh hood drawn tightly under the chin hiding the hair entirely, an enormous blouse much too wide covering the whole body, fur boots with rough soles to prevent broken legs and heads, and immense mackintosh breeches in Zouave style, the prettiest and slenderest woman was at once transformed into a huge, cumbersome, awkward bear. An iron-tipped cudgel to carry in the hand completed this becoming costume. I looked more ridiculous than the others for I would not cover my hair, and in the most pretentious way I had fastened some roses into my mackintosh blouse. The women went into raptures on seeing me. “How pretty she looks like that!” they exclaimed. “She always finds a way to be chic, quand-même!” The men kissed my bear’s paw in the most gallant way, bowing low and saying in low tones: “Always and quand-même the queen, the fairy, the goddess, the divinity,” etc., etc.... And I went along purring with content and quite satisfied with myself until, as I passed by the counter where the girl who gives the tickets was sitting, I caught sight of myself in the glass. I looked enormous and ridiculous with my roses pinned in and the curly locks of hair forming a kind of peak to my clumsy hood. I appeared to be stouter than all the others because of the silver belt I was wearing round my waist, as this drew up the hard folds of the mackintosh round my hips. My thin face was nearly covered by my hair which was flattened down by my hood. My eyes could not be seen and only my mouth, which is rather large, served to show that this barrel was a human being. Furious with myself for my pretentious coquetry and ashamed of my own weakness for having been so content with the pitiful, insincere flattery of people who were making fun of me, I decided to remain as I was as a punishment for my stupid vanity. There were a number of strangers among us who nudged each other, pointing to me and laughing slyly at my absurd get-up, and this was only what I deserved.
We went down the flight of steps cut in the block of ice in order to get underneath the Canadian Falls. The sight there was most strange and extraordinary. Above me I saw an immense cupola of ice hanging over in space, attached only on one side to the rock. From this cupola thousands of icicles of the most varied shapes were hanging. There were dragons, arrows, crosses, laughing faces, sorrowful faces, hands with six fingers, deformed feet, incomplete human bodies, and women’s long locks of hair. In fact, with the help of the imagination, and by fixing the gaze when looking with half-shut eyes, the illusion is complete, and in less time than it takes to describe all this, one can evoke all the pictures of nature and of our dreams, all the wild conceptions of a diseased mind or the realities of a reflective brain.
In front of us were small steeples of ice, some of them proud and erect, standing out against the sky, others ravaged by the wind which gnaws the ice, looking like minarets ready for the muezzin. On the right a cascade was rushing down as noisily as on the other side, but the sun had commenced its evolution toward the west and everything was tinged with a rosy hue. The water splashed over us and we were suddenly covered with small silvery waves that fell over us, and which when shaken slightly stiffened against our mackintoshes. It was a shoal of very small fish which had had the misfortune to be driven into the current and which had come to die in the dazzling brilliancy of the setting sun. On the other side there was a small block which looked like a rhinoceros entering the water.