But genius can only do her magic work when the materials that are to serve for this wonderful transformation have been collected by erudition. M. Renan would not have been able to construct his historical monument had not German criticism prepared the way for him. Erudition occasionally arrives at astonishing results by digging, either in the earth which has swallowed up the ancient buildings or in the dust of the archives. Here is an individual who played a very important part in the fifteenth century in the struggle between France and England, who, though a stranger and fighting more especially as an adventurer greedy of spoil, helped to restore France to independence, who was almost unknown, whose name was not mentioned in any of our histories. M. I. Quicherat has brought him to life, and "Rodrigue de Villandrando" (Hachette) will see his name cited in all the histories of the reign of Charles VII. The book is a model of historical reconstruction. It is wonderful to see how, with a series of scattered indications, most of them the very driest of documents, not only the incidents of a life, but the features of a character, can be pieced together again.
Such a character as Rodrigue's is not very complicated, it is true. There are historical personages to penetrate the depths of whose nature an accumulation of documents and testimony would be necessary. Such is Napoleon, whom each day throws some new light upon, and on whom, after his having been magnified beyond all measure, posterity will, no doubt, be called to pass severe judgment. Never was such overwhelming testimony pronounced against him as in the "Mémoires de Madame de Rémusat," the first volume of which is just out. Mme. de Rémusat was so placed as to be more thoroughly acquainted than any one with the character of Napoleon. Lady-in-waiting to Josephine, and wife of one of Napoleon's "Maîtres du palais," she bowed for a long while to the ascendancy of Napoleon's genius, and the liking he testified for her was sufficiently strong to awaken, though unjustly, the momentary jealousy of Josephine. The speaker is not an enemy, therefore, but an old friend who tries to explain at once her adherence to the imperial régime and the motives that caused her to alter her political creed. She is thus in the best state of mind, according to M. Renan, for judging a great man or a doctrine, that of having believed and believing no longer. Add to this the sweetness of mind natural to a woman, and the kind of indulgence peculiar to times when sudden political changes lead to frequent changes of opinion. All these considerations only render Mme. de Rémusat's testimony the more overwhelming for Napoleon, and its value is singularly increased on its being seen to agree with that which all the sincere witnesses of the time, Ph. de Ségur, Miot de Mélito, as well as Sismondi, lead us to infer. The genius of Napoleon is not diminished, and nothing is more remarkable than the conversations related by Mme. de Rémusat, wherein he judges everything, literature, politics, and history, with a haughty originality from the point of view of his own interests and passions. Some of his sayings relative to the government of men are worthy of Machiavelli. The reasonings whereby he explains and justifies the assassination of the Duc d'Enghien would form a splendid chapter to the "Prince." But from the moral point of view Napoleon strikes us as the most perfect type of a tyrant. No moral law exists for him; he does not admit the obligation of any duty; he does not even recognise those duties of a sovereign, that subordination of the individual to the interests of the State, which constitute the greatness of a Cromwell or a Frederick II.; he recognises but one law, that of his nature, which insists on dominating and being superior to everything that surrounds him. Quia nominor Leo, is his only rule. Morals always have their revenge on those whose encroaching personality refuses to recognise laws. Writers or sovereigns, whatever their genius, relapse into falsehood and extravagance. This was Napoleon's fate. You are always conscious in him of the parvenu acting a part—the commediante tragediante, as Pius VII. put it. He had fits of goodness, of weakness even, but his human and generous sides had been crushed by his frightful egoism. He liked to make those he loved best suffer. He treated his wife and his mistresses with brutal contempt; he could no longer lament the death of those who seemed dearest to him. "Je n'ai pas le temps de m'occuper des morts," he said to Talleyrand. By the side of this great figure Mme. de Rémusat has, in her Memoirs, sketched many others—the frivolous, good, touching, and unfortunate Josephine; the amiable Hortense Beauharnais, the dry, cold Louis, Napoleon's sisters, jealous, proud, and immoral; and others—but all pale before the imperial colossus.
Besides M. Daudet's novel, M. Renan's new volume, and the Memoirs of Mme. de Rémusat, the last three months have witnessed another literary event of some consequence—the birth of an important Review, which aims at the position occupied for thirty years past by the Revue des Deux Mondes. The Nouvelle Revue was started and is edited by a woman, Mme. Edmond Adam, known as a writer under the name of Juliette Lamber. A new phenomenon this in the literary world, the strangest feature of it being that Mme. Adam has taken exclusively upon herself the bulletin of foreign politics. If the task of editing a Review be arduous for a man, who in the interest of his undertaking must brave every enmity and quench his individual sympathies, how much more so for a woman whose staff of contributors is recruited from the habitués of her salon, and who must be constantly tempted to carry into her official transactions the habits of gracious hospitality which have made her house one of the most courted political and literary centres of Paris?
The aim of the Nouvelle Revue also is to be up with the times; it is inclined to judge an article rather by the fame of the name at the end of it than by its own intrinsic merit; it will insert the superficial lucubrations of General Turr or M. Castelar, which but for the signature are worthless. It gives political questions an importance hardly appreciated by those who find all their political needs supplied by the daily press, and look to a Review for literary or scientific interests. Finally, the chief obstacle in the way of the Nouvelle Revue is that our best essayists are bound not only by chains of gratitude and habit, but also by chains of gold, to the Revue des Deux Mondes. Nevertheless there is plenty of room in our literary world for a new review, so far at least as writers are concerned. If she makes talent her aim, and not merely opinions agreeing with her own, Mme. Adam will not want for contributors. To get readers will be more difficult in a country of routine, where the Revue des Deux Mondes has become an indispensable item of every respectable family's household furniture. Until now the Nouvelle Revue has been successful; the sale has reached from 6000 to 8000 copies per number, and, without having yet published anything very first-rate, it has been fairly well supplied with pleasant articles. The recollections of the singer Duprez have hitherto been its greatest attraction. A novel by Mme. Gréville, and articles by MM. de Bornier, Bigot, and de Gubernatis also deserve mention.
Perhaps, after all, our judgment is partial, and the success of the Nouvelle Revue is due to its attention to the immediate interests of the present, and the space allotted to politics. The number of those who take an interest in literature daily grows smaller in France. Of those not absorbed by politics some forsake pure literature for erudition, and the greater number give themselves up to science. It is owing to the scholars that the Revue Philosophique is succeeding so brilliantly; all the scientific societies are flourishing, and L'Association pour l'Encouragement des Sciences again verified its growing advancement at its late meeting at Montpellier. The geographical section, recently founded, promises to become one of the most active, for geographical studies, so long neglected in France, have suddenly made an extraordinary start. The Geographical Society now has 1700 members, and has built itself a magnificent hôtel; the Alpine Club, a geographical rather than a climbing society, is increasing so rapidly in numbers that it is impossible to give the exact figure. It amounts to several thousand. If unscrupulous speculators have taken advantage of this reawakening zeal for geographical study to publish a swarm of superficial and hastily compiled handbooks, and carelessly engraved maps, some works of real merit have appeared that do credit to our French editors. And here the firm of Hachette holds the first rank. "La Tour du Monde" is an illustrated journal of travels, admirably arranged and printed; the great Historical Atlas and Universal Dictionary of Geography of M. Vivien de Saint Martin have but one fault, the excessive tardiness of their publication. M. Elisée Reclus's handsome work, "La Terre et les Hommes," on the contrary, is issued with unexceptionable regularity. The fifth volume, now approaching completion, comprises the countries of Northern Europe, principally Russia, which is now attracting the attention of historians and politicians generally. M. Reclus's point of view is especially calculated to answer to the nature of the present interest, for he enters more particularly into the relations of the people to the soil; to the administrative geography, details concerning which are to be found everywhere, he pays only secondary attention, devoting himself more especially to the physical geography, customs, and institutions. His book is more particularly a work on geology, ethnography, and sociology; and therein lies its originality and usefulness. Hachette is also engaged in publishing a map of France that exceeds in beauty and precision everything that has ever been produced of the kind until now. It is drawn by the Service des Chemins Vicinaux at the expense of the Ministry of Interior, and will consist of 467 sheets. The scale is 1⁄100000. The admirable engraver, M. Erhard, has been entrusted with the execution, which is beyond criticism alike as regards fulness of detail, clearness, and colouring. Each sheet costs only 75c., a moderate sum, considering the exceptional merit of the work, the most considerable of its kind since the Staff map. A proof of the importance attached in these days to the study of geography is the foundation of Chairs of Geography in several of our Faculties of Letters—Bordeaux, Lyons, Nancy—and a course of lectures on historical geography at the École des Hautes Études. This course will be given by M. A. Longnon, whose works on "Les Pagi de la Gaule" and "La Géographie de la Gaule au sixième siècle," have made him a European authority. By the combined use of the philological laws of the transmutation of sounds, historical documents, and archæological data, he has reached a precision it seemed impossible to attain in these matters. He may be said to have founded a new science, and the happiest results are to be expected from his teaching.
There is always a lull in the artistic as in the literary and scientific world during the summer and autumn, so that there is little of importance to be noted. The designs sent in for the monument to Rabelais, for the statue of the Republic, for a decorative curtain to be executed by the Gobelins, all public works opened to competition, have been exhibited. The question of such competitions was much discussed on the occasion. It seems at first sight the best way of securing the highest work, but practically it is not so. Artists of acknowledged merit do not generally care to enter into competition with brother artists; they shrink from the expense, often considerable, which, in case of failure, is thrown away. That incurred, for instance, by the competitors for the statue of the Republic, amounted to about 4000 francs, and the premium awarded to the three best designs to just that sum. It would evidently always be better, when a really fine work is required, to choose the artist most capable of executing it well, and leave him free to follow his own inspiration. This method seems too little democratic for the days in which we live, so under colour of democracy a number of poor devils are made to involve themselves in enormous expenses for nothing.
The most notable events of the last three months in the artistic world have been the deaths of men variously famous. M. Viollet Le Duc leaves behind him the twofold reputation of a learned archæologist of the first order and an archæological architect still more remarkable. He had fame, indeed, of a third kind—as a stirring and noisy politician, who, from having been one of Napoleon III.'s familiar associates, and a constant guest at Compiègne, became one of the most advanced members of the Municipal Council of Paris, a courtisan of the multitude. But one is glad to forget him under these unfavourable aspects and to think of him only as the author of the two great historical dictionaries of "L'Architecture" and "Le Mobilier," and the clever and learned restorer of our mediæval monuments. Thanks to him, Notre Dame has been completed and finished, and reconstituted in the very spirit of the thirteenth century; thanks to him, we have at Pierrefonds the perfect model of a feudal castle. An indefatigable worker, this Radical has allied his name in a manner as glorious as it is indissoluble to the visible memorials of Catholic and Monarchical France.
Of a slighter, but perhaps more universal kind still was the reputation of the caricaturist Cham, or, to speak more correctly, the Viscomte de Noé. Son of a French peer known for his retrograde opinions, Cham worked all his life for the Republican papers, though people say he adhered to his Legitimist opinions. But he enjoyed an independence in the Republican papers which would not have been allowed him by the reactionary press; and a caricaturist's first condition is to have plenty of elbow-room to be able to give free play to his humour. The spring of Cham's humour was inexhaustible. An indifferent and monotonous draughtsman, his mind was wholly and entirely in the story of his drawings. The war of ridicule he waged in 1848 against the Socialistic theories of Proudhon, Pierre Leroux, Cabet, and Considérant exercised an undoubted influence on the public mind. His comic reviews of the annual Salon contained, amongst many amusing follies, some just and stinging criticisms. Cham leaves no successor, Bertall, who is a cleverer draughtsman, has none of his wit; Grévin can only sketch with exquisite grace the ladies of the demi-monde and the young fops of the boulevard; Gill's political caricatures are either bitter or violent. The lively and good-natured raillery of Cham has no doubt vanished for ever.
In conjunction with these two artists the name of a man should be mentioned, who, himself an indifferent artist, was the unfailing patron, the providence of artists, Baron Taylor, who died almost at the same time as Cham. He it was who taught artists to form themselves into associations against want. He was in particular the soul of the Société des Artistes Dramatiques, and amongst the immense crowd that attended his funeral were, no doubt, hundreds indebted to him for an easy career and a sure means of existence.
We are a long way removed from the time when the life of an artist was one long struggle with misery, when men of the first class continued obscure or barely maintained themselves by their works. Many difficulties still remain no doubt, but how much smoother the road has become! Musicians, more especially, found themselves in those days condemned to obscurity and oblivion. Now, thanks to concerts and theatres, they can almost always have the public for their judges. The Opera is at present in the hands of an enterprising and intelligent director, M. Vaucorbeil, who is anxious to rescue it from the groove it has been dragging on in for so long, with its current repertory of two or three antiquated works, barely bringing out a new one in four or five years. True, we have not got beyond good intentions until now, M. Gounod still intending to retouch the "Tribu de Zamora," M. A. Thomas to finish his "Françoise de Rimini," and M. Saint-Saens still unsuccessful in getting his "Etienne Marcel" accepted. Besides the Grand Opéra there is L'Opéra Populaire located in the Gaîté's old quarters, which intends, it is said, to revive the lost traditions of the lyric theatre, and to be the theatre of the young generation and of reform. But at present it is to the Pasdeloup and Colonne Concerts that the rising musical school owes the opportunity of making itself heard, and the Parisian public its familiar acquaintance with foreign works. The great reputation M. Saint-Saens now enjoys was made at Colonne's Concerts at the Châtelet. Lately Schumann's "Manfred" was given there. At the Cirque the "Symphonie Fantastique," by Berlioz, was played with immense success, also for the first time a pianoforte concerto by the Russian composer, Tschaikovsky, and M. Pasdeloup shortly intends to give a performance of the whole of the music of "Lohengrin."