Personal Sketches of His Own Times, Vol. 2 (of 3)

THE CATACOMBS AND PERE LA CHAISE

The Catacombs of Paris – Ineffective nature of the written description of these as compared with the reality – Author’s descent into them – His speedy return – Contrast presented by the cemetery of Père la Chaise – Tomb of Abelard and Heloise – An English capitalist’s notions of sentiment.

The stupendous catacombs of Paris form perhaps the greatest curiosity of that capital. I have seen many well-written descriptions of this magazine of human fragments, yet on actually visiting it, my sensations of awe, and I may add, of disgust, exceeded my anticipation.

I found myself (after descending to a considerable depth from the light of day) among winding vaults, where, ranged on every side, are the trophies of Death’s universal conquest. Myriads of grim, fleshless, grinning visages seem (even through their eyeless sockets) to stare at the passing mortals who have succeeded them, and ready with long knotted fingers to grasp the living into their own society. On turning away from these hideous objects, my sight was arrested by innumerable white scalpless skulls and mouldering limbs of disjointed skeletons – mingled and misplaced in terrific pyramids; or, as if in architectural mockery of nature, framed into mosaics, or piled into walls and barriers with taste fantastic!

There are men of nerve strong enough to endure the contemplation of such things without shrinking. I participate not in this apathetic mood. Almost at the first step which I took between these ghastly ranks in the deep catacomb d’Enfer, (whereinto I had plunged by a descent of ninety steps,) my spirit no longer remained buoyant: it felt subdued and cowed; my feet reluctantly advanced through the gloomy mazes; and at length a universal thrill of horror crawled along the surface of my skin. It would have been to little purpose to protract this struggle, and force my will to obedience: I therefore, instinctively as it were, made a retrograde movement; I ascended into the world again, more rapidly than I had gone downward, and left my less sensitive and wiser friends to explore at leisure those dreary regions. And never did the sun appear to me more bright; never did I feel his rays more cheering and genial, than as I emerged from the melancholy catacombs, to resume the sight of man and the sensations of existence.

The visitor of Paris will find it both curious and interesting to contrast with these another receptacle for the dead – the cemetery of Père la Chaise. It is strange that there should exist among the same people, in the same city, and almost in the same vicinity, two Golgothas, in their nature so utterly dissimilar and repugnant from each other.

The soft and beautiful features of landscape which characterise Père la Chaise are scarcely describable: so harmoniously are they blended together, – so sacred does the spot appear to quiet contemplation and hopeful repose, – that it seems almost profane to attempt description, or to submit its charms in detail before the reader’s eye. All in fact that I had ever read about it fell, as in the case of the catacombs, (“alike, but ah, how different!”) far short of the reality.

I have wandered whole mornings together over its winding paths and venerable avenues. Here are no “ninety steps” of descent to gloom and horror: on the contrary, a gradual ascent leads to the cemetery of Père la Chaise, and to its enchanting summit, on every side shaded by brilliant evergreens. The straight lofty cypress and spreading cedar uplift themselves around; and the arbutus, exposing its deceptive berries, tenders to the walker at once its shade and fragrance. In lieu of the damp mouldering scent exhaled by three millions of human skeletons, we are presented with the perfumes of jasmines and of myrtles – of violet-beds or variegated flower-plats decked out by the ministering hand of love or duty; – as if benignant Nature had spread her most splendid carpet to cover, conceal, and render alluring even the abode of death, and commemorate the noblest passions and the purest sympathies of mortality.

Whichever way we turn, the labours of art combine with the luxuriance of vegetation to raise in the mind new reflections: marble, in all its varieties of shade and grain, is wrought by the hand of man into numerous bewitching shapes; while one of the most brilliant and cheerful cities in the universe seems to lie, with its wooded boulevards, gilded domes, palaces, gardens, and glittering waters, just beneath our feet. One sepulchre, alone, of a decidedly mournful character, attracted my notice – a large and solid mausoleum, buried amidst gloomy yews and low drooping willows; and this looked only like a patch on the face of loveliness. Père la Chaise presents a solitary instance of the abode of the dead ever interesting me agreeably.

I will not remark on the well-known tomb of Abelard and Eloisa: a hundred pens have anticipated me in most of the observations I should be inclined to make respecting that celebrated couple. The most obvious circumstance in their “sad story” always struck me as being – that he turned priest when he was good for nothing else, and she became “quite correct” when opportunities for the reverse began to slacken. They no doubt were properly qualified to make very respectable saints: but since they took care previously to have their fling, I cannot say much for their morality.

I am not sure that a burial-place similar to Père la Chaise would be admired in England: it is almost of too picturesque and sentimental a character. The humbler orders of the English people are too coarse to appreciate the peculiar feeling such a cemetery is calculated to excite; the higher orders too licentious; the trading classes too avaricious. The plum-holder of the city would very honestly and frankly “d – n all your nonsensical sentiment!” I heard one of these gentlemen, last year, declare that what poets and such-like called sentiment, was neither more nor less than deadly poison to the Protestant religion!

Though there is perhaps as much real refinement in London as in Paris, the French certainly mingle more mind with their vices. Those of the Englishman are merely sensual: those of the French seasoned with intellect. – The Englishman’s the result of instinct– the Frenchman’s of excitement: an Englishman is always, a Frenchman never, in earnest.

Père la Chaise would only remind a cockney of suicide: it sets a Parisian gabbling about the meadows of Elysium. A Paris shopkeeper can descant on the heathen mythology: the cockney talks of heaven from his bible and the pulpit; and if the river Styx should be mentioned, he probably considers it scaffolding at London Bridge.

As to the French ladies, they all fancy that they are saturated with refinement. A very spirited and handsome Frenchwoman told me some time since, with as much gravity as she was susceptible of, that she had more refinement than she knew what to do with, and most ardently wished that she could have the honour of transferring the balance to some of my fair countrywomen, who, she understood, considered it a particular dainty.

PEDIGREE-HUNTING

The author’s efforts to discover the source of his name and family – The Irish herald-at-arms – Reference made by him to the English professor – Heraldic speculation – Ascent of the author’s pedigree to the reign of William the Conqueror – Consultation with the Norman herald suggested – Author’s visit to Rouen – Anecdotes of French convents – Madame Cousin and her system– Traits of toleration – M. Helliot, the celebrated ancien avocat of Rouen – Practice of legal bigamy in Normandy – A breakfast party – Death of M. Helliot – Interview with an old herald, formerly of the noblesse – His person and costume described – Discovery of the town and castle of Barentin– Occurrences there – The old beggar-man – Visit to Jersey, where Drogo de Barentin was killed in defending the castle of Mont Orgueil – Return to Barentin, and singular incident at Ivetot – Conclusion.

My visit to France enabled me, besides gratifying myself by the sight and observation of the distinguished characters of whom I have in the Sketches immediately foregoing made mention, to pursue an inquiry that I had set on foot some time previously in my own country.

As I have already informed the reader in the commencement of this work, I was brought up among a sort of democratic aristocracy, which, like the race of wolf-dogs, seems to be extinct in Ireland. The gentry of those days took the greatest care to trace, and to preserve by tradition, the pedigree of their families and the exploits of their ancestors.

It is said that “he must be a wise man who knows his own father;” but if there are thirty or forty of one’s forefathers to make out, it must necessarily be a research rather difficult for ordinary capacities. Such are therefore in the habit of resorting to a person who obtains his livelihood by begetting grandfathers and great-grandfathers ad infinitum! – namely, the herald, who, without much tedious research, can, in these commercial days, furnish any private gentleman, dealer, or chapman, with as beautifully transcribed, painted, and gilt a pedigree as he chooses to be at the expense of purchasing – with arms, crests, and mottoes to match: nor are there among the nobility themselves emblazonments more gaudy than may occasionally be seen upon the tilbury of some retired tailor, whose name was probably selected at random by the nurse of a foundling hospital.

But as there is, I believe, no great mob of persons bearing my name in existence, and as it is pretty well known to be rather old, I fancied I would pay a visit to our Irish herald-at-arms, to find out, if possible to a certainty, from what country I originally sprang. After having consulted every thing he had to consult, this worthy functionary only brought me back to Queen Elizabeth, which was doing nothing, as it was that virgin monarch who had made the first territorial grant to my family in Ireland, with liberty to return two members to every future parliament, which they actually did down to my father.

The Irish herald assured me that he could not honestly carry me one inch farther back on the male line, and so (having painted a most beautiful pedigree) he recommended me to the English herald-at-arms, who, he had no doubt, could take the thread at the top, and unravel it to my satisfaction.

I accordingly took the first opportunity of consulting this fresh oracle in London, whose minister having politely heard my case, transferred it to writing, screwed up his lips, and looked steadfastly at the ceiling for some five minutes: he then began to reckon centuries on his fingers; but there being only eight of them, he applied to his thumbs; took down several large books full of emblazonments, nodded his head, and at last, cleverly and scientifically taking me up from the times of Queen Elizabeth, where I had been abruptly dropped by my fellow-countryman, delivered me, in less than a fortnight, as handsome a genealogical tree as could be reasonably desired: on this I triumphantly ascended to the reign of William the Conqueror, and the battle of Hastings, at which some of my ancestors were, it appears, fairly sped, and provided with neat lodgings in Battle Abbey, where, for aught I know to the contrary, they still remain.

The English herald-at-arms also informed me (but rather mysteriously) that it was probable I had a right to put a French De at the beginning of my name, as there was a Norman ton at the end of it; but that, as he did not profess French heraldry, I had better inquire further from some of the craft in Normandy, where that science had at the period of the crusades greatly flourished – William the Conqueror, at the time he was denominated the Bastard, having by all accounts established a very celebrated heraldic college at Rouen.

I was much pleased with his candour, and thus the matter rested until Louis XVIII. returned home with his family, when, as the reader is aware, I likewise passed over to France with mine.

I did not forget the hint given me by my armorial friend in London; and in order to benefit by it, repaired, as soon as circumstances permitted, to Rouen, in which town we had been advised to place our two youngest daughters, for purposes of education, at a celebrated Ursuline convent, the abbess whereof was considered a more tolerating religieuse than any of her contemporaries. Before I proceed to detail the sequel of my heraldic investigations I will lay before the reader one or two anecdotes connected with French nunneries.

The abbess of the convent in question, Madame Cousin, was a fine, handsome, fat old nun, as affable and insinuating as possible, and gained on us at first sight. She enlarged on the great advantages of her system; and showed us long galleries of beautiful little bed-chambers, together with gardens overlooking the boulevards, and adorned by that interesting tower wherein Jeanne d’Arc was so long confined previous to her being humanely burned alive as a witch by our Duke of Bedford, who attended the execution! The window he overlooked her tortures from is still preserved in the square at Rouen. Her table, Madame Cousin assured us, was excellent and abundant.

I was naturally impressed with an idea that a nun feared God at any rate too much to tell twenty direct falsehoods, and practise twenty deceptions in the course of half an hour, for the lucre of fifty Napoleons, – which she required in advance, without the least intention of giving the value of five for them: and, under this impression, I paid the sum demanded, gave up our two children to Madame Cousin’s motherly tutelage, and returned to the Hôtel de France, almost in love with the old abbess.

On our return to Paris we received letters from my daughters, giving a most flattering account of the convent generally, of the excellence of Madame l’Abbesse, the plenty of good food, the comfort of the bed-rooms, and the extraordinary progress they were making in their several acquirements. I was hence induced to commence the second half-year, also in advance, when a son-in-law of mine, calling to see my daughters, requested the eldest to dine with him at his hotel, which request was long resisted by the abbess, and only granted at length with manifest reluctance. Arrived at the hotel, the poor girl related a tale of a very different description from the foregoing, and as piteous as unexpected. Her letters had been dictated to her by a priest, the brother of the abbess. I had scarcely arrived at Paris when my children were separated, turned away from the show bed-rooms, and allowed to speak any language to each other only one hour a day, and not a word on Sundays. The eldest was urged to turn Catholic; and, above all, they were fed in a manner at once so scanty and so bad, that my daughter begged hard not to be taken back, but to accompany her brother-in-law to Paris. This he conceded; and when the poor child arrived, I saw the necessity of immediately recalling her sister. I was indeed shocked at seeing her, – so wan and thin, and greedy did she appear.