


Produced by David Widger





A ROMANCE OF YOUTH

By Francois Coppee


With a Preface by JOSE DE HEREDIA, of the French Academy




FRANCOIS COPPEE

FRANCOIS EDOUARD JOACHIM COPPEE was born in Paris, January 12, 1842.
His father was a minor 'employe' in the French War Office; and, as the
family consisted of six the parents, three daughters, and a son (the
subject of this essay)--the early years of the poet were not spent in
great luxury. After the father's death, the young man himself entered
the governmental office with its monotonous work. In the evening he
studied hard at St. Genevieve Library. He made rhymes, had them even
printed (Le Reliquaire, 1866); but the public remained indifferent until
1869, when his comedy in verse, 'Le Passant', appeared. From this period
dates the reputation of Coppee--he woke up one morning a "celebrated
man."

Like many of his countrymen, he is a poet, a dramatist, a novelist,
and a writer of fiction. He was elected to the French Academy in 1884.
Smooth shaven, of placid figure, with pensive eyes, the hair brushed
back regularly, the head of an artist, Coppee can be seen any day
looking over the display of the Parisian secondhand booksellers on
the Quai Malaquais; at home on the writing-desk, a page of carefully
prepared manuscript, yet sometimes covered by cigarette-ashes; upon
the wall, sketches by Jules Lefebvre and Jules Breton; a little in the
distance, the gaunt form of his attentive sister and companion, Annette,
occupied with household cares, ever fearful of disturbing him. Within
this tranquil domicile can be heard the noise of the Parisian faubourg
with its thousand different dins; the bustle of the street; the clatter
of a factory; the voice of the workshop; the cries of the pedlers
intermingled with the chimes of the bells of a near-by convent-a
confusing buzzing noise, which the author, however, seems to enjoy; for
Coppee is Parisian by birth, Parisian by education, a Parisian of the
Parisians.

If as a poet we contemplate him, Coppee belongs to the group commonly
called "Parnassiens"--not the Romantic School, the sentimental lyric
effusion of Lamartine, Hugo, or De Musset! When the poetical lute
was laid aside by the triad of 1830, it was taken up by men of quite
different stamp, of even opposed tendencies. Observation of exterior
matters was now greatly adhered to in poetry; it became especially
descriptive and scientific; the aim of every poet was now to render
most exactly, even minutely, the impressions received, or faithfully to
translate into artistic language a thesis of philosophy, a discovery of
science. With such a poetical doctrine, you will easily understand the
importance which the "naturalistic form" henceforth assumed.

Coppee, however, is not only a maker of verses, he is an artist and a
poet. Every poem seems to have sprung from a genuine inspiration. When
he sings, it is because he has something to sing about, and the result
is that his poetry is nearly always interesting. Moreover, he respects
the limits of his art; for while his friend and contemporary, M.
Sully-Prudhomme, goes astray habitually into philosophical speculation,
and his immortal senior, Victor Hugo, often declaims, if one may venture
to say so, in a manner which is tedious, Coppee sticks rigorously to
what may be called the proper regions of poetry.

Francois Coppee is not one of those superb high priests disdainful
of the throng: he is the poet of the "humble," and in his work, 'Les
Humbles', he paints with a sincere emotion his profound sympathy for
the sorrows, the miseries, and the sacrifices of the meek. Again, in
his 'Grave des Forgerons, Le Naufrage, and L'Epave', all poems of great
extension and universal reputation, he treats of simple existences, of
unknown unfortunates, and of sacrifices which the daily papers do not
record. The coloring and designing are precise, even if the tone be
somewhat sombre, and nobody will deny that Coppee most fully possesses
the technique of French poetry.

But Francois Coppee is known to fame as a prosewriter, too. His
'Contes en prose' and his 'Vingt Contes Nouveaux' are gracefully and
artistically told; scarcely one of the 'contes' fails to have a moral
motive. The stories are short and naturally slight; some, indeed,
incline rather to the essay than to the story, but each has that
enthralling interest which justifies its existence. Coppee possesses
preeminently the gift of presenting concrete fact rather than
abstraction. A sketch, for instance, is the first tale written by him,
'Une Idylle pendant le Seige' (1875). In a novel we require strong
characterization, great grasp of character, and the novelist should
show us the human heart and intellect in full play and activity. In 1875
appeared also 'Olivier', followed by 'L'Exilee (1876); Recits et Elegies
(1878); Vingt Contes Nouveaux (1883); and Toute une Jeunesse', mainly
an autobiography, crowned by acclaim by the Academy. 'Le Coupable' was
published in 1897. Finally, in 1898, appeared 'La Bonne Souffrance'.
In the last-mentioned work it would seem that the poet, just recovering
from a severe malady, has returned to the dogmas of the Catholic Church,
wherefrom he, like so many of his contemporaries, had become estranged
when a youth. The poems of 1902, 'Dans la Priere et dans la Lutte', tend
to confirm the correctness of this view.

Thanks to the juvenile Sarah Bernhardt, Coppee became, as before
mentioned, like Byron, celebrated in one night. This happened through
the performance of 'Le Passant'.

As interludes to the plays there are "occasional" theatrical pieces,
written for the fiftieth anniversary of the performance of 'Hernani'
or the two-hundredth anniversary of the foundation of the "Comedie
Francaise." This is a wide field, indeed, which M. Coppee has cultivated
to various purposes.

Take Coppee's works in their sum and totality, and the world-decree is
that he is an artist, and an admirable one. He plays upon his instrument
with all power and grace. But he is no mere virtuoso. There is something
in him beyond the executant. Of Malibran, Alfred de Musset says, most
beautifully, that she had that "voice of the heart which alone has power
to reach the heart." Here, also, behind the skilful player on language,
the deft manipulator of rhyme and rhythm, the graceful and earnest
writer, one feels the beating of a human heart. One feels that he is
giving us personal impressions of life and its joys and sorrows; that
his imagination is powerful because it is genuinely his own; that the
flowers of his fancy spring spontaneously from the soil. Nor can I
regard it as aught but an added grace that the strings of his instrument
should vibrate so readily to what is beautiful and unselfish and
delicate in human feeling.

               JOSE DE HEREDIA
             de l'Academie Francaise.




A ROMANCE OF YOUTH




BOOK 1.




CHAPTER I. ON THE BALCONY

As far back as Amedee Violette can remember, he sees himself in an
infant's cap upon a fifth-floor balcony covered with convolvulus; the
child was very small, and the balcony seemed very large to him. Amedee
had received for a birthday present a box of water-colors, with which
he was sprawled out upon an old rug, earnestly intent upon his work of
coloring the woodcuts in an odd volume of the 'Magasin Pittoresque', and
wetting his brush from time to time in his mouth. The neighbors in the
next apartment had a right to one-half of the balcony. Some one in there
was playing upon the piano Marcailhou's Indiana Waltz, which was all the
rage at that time. Any man, born about the year 1845, who does not feel
the tears of homesickness rise to his eyes as he turns over the pages of
an old number of the 'Magasin Pittoresque', or who hears some one play
upon an old piano Marcailhou's Indiana Waltz, is not endowed with much
sensibility.

When the child was tired of putting the "flesh color" upon the faces of
all the persons in the engravings, he got up and went to peep through
the railings of the balustrade. He saw extending before him, from right
to left, with a graceful curve, the Rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs, one of
the quietest streets in the Luxembourg quarter, then only half built up.
The branches of the trees spread over the wooden fences, which enclosed
gardens so silent and tranquil that passers by could hear the birds
singing in their cages.

It was a September afternoon, with a broad expanse of pure sky across
which large clouds, like mountains of silver, moved in majestic
slowness.

Suddenly a soft voice called him:

"Amedee, your father will return from the office soon. We must wash your
hands before we sit down to the table, my darling."

His mother came out upon the balcony for him. His mother; his dear
mother, whom he knew for so short a time! It needs an effort for him to
call her to mind now, his memories are so indistinct. She was so modest
and pretty, so pale, and with such charming blue eyes, always carrying
her head on one side, as if the weight of her lovely chestnut hair was
too heavy for her to bear, and smiling the sweet, tired smile of those
who have not long to live! She made his toilette, kissed him upon his
forehead, after brushing his hair. Then she laid their modest table,
which was always decorated with a pretty vase of flowers. Soon the
father entered. He was one of those mild, unpretentious men who let
everybody run over them.

He tried to be gay when he entered his own house. He raised his little
boy aloft with one arm, before kissing him, exclaiming, "Houp la!"
A moment later he kissed his young wife and held her close to him,
tenderly, as he asked, with an anxious look:

"Have you coughed much to-day?"

She always replied, hanging her head like a child who tells an untruth,
"No, not very much."

The father would then put on an old coat--the one he took off was not
very new. Amedee was then seated in a high chair before his mug, and the
young mother, going into the kitchen, would bring in the supper. After
opening his napkin, the father would brush back behind his ear with his
hand a long lock on the right side, that always fell into his eyes.

"Is there too much of a breeze this evening? you afraid to go out upon
the balcony, Lucie? Put a shawl on, then," said M. Violette, while his
wife was pouring the water remaining in the carafe upon a box where some
nasturtiums were growing.

"No, Paul, I am sure--take Amedee down from his chair, and let us go out
upon the balcony."

It was cool upon this high balcony. The sun had set, and now the great
clouds resembled mountains of gold, and a fresh odor came up from the
surrounding gardens.

"Good-evening, Monsieur Violette," suddenly said a cordial voice. "What
a fine evening!"

It was their neighbor, M. Gerard, an engraver, who had also come to take
breath upon his end of the balcony, having spent the entire day bent
over his work. He was large and bald-headed, with a good-natured face,
a red beard sprinkled with white hairs, and he wore a short, loose coat.
As he spoke he lighted his clay pipe, the bowl of which represented
Abd-el-Kader's face, very much, save the eyes and turban, which
were of white enamel.

The engraver's wife, a dumpy little woman with merry eyes, soon joined
her husband, pushing before her two little girls; one, the smaller of
the two, was two years younger than Amedee; the other was ten years old,
and already had a wise little air. She was the pianist who practised one
hour a day Marcailhou's Indiana Waltz.

The children chattered through the trellis that divided the balcony in
two parts. Louise, the elder of the girls, knew how to read, and told
the two little ones very beautiful stories: Joseph sold by his brethren;
Robinson Crusoe discovering the footprints of human beings.

Amedee, who now has gray hair upon his temples, can still remember the
chills that ran down his