Artists Wives | Page 3

wish to show herself a little on his arm? Is it not
quite natural? The husband, on the contrary, growing intolerant of
society as his talent progresses, finding time short, and art engrossing,
refuses to be exhibited. Behold them both miserable, and whether the

man gives in or resists, his life is henceforward turned from its course,
and from its tranquillity. Ah! how many of these ill-matched couples
have I known, where the wife was sometimes executioner, sometimes
victim, but more often executioner, and nearly always unwittingly so!
The other evening I was at Dargenty's, the musician. There were but a
few guests, and he was asked to play. Hardly had he begun one off
those pretty mazurkas with a Polish rhythm, which make him the
successor of Chopin, when his wife began to talk, quite low at first,
then a little louder. By degrees the fire of conversation spread. At the
end of a minute I was the only listener. Then he shut the piano, and
said to me with a heart-rent smile: "It is always like this here--my wife
does not care for music." Can you imagine anything more terrible than
to marry a woman who does not care for your art? Take my word for it,
my friend, and don't marry. You are alone, you are free; keep as
precious things, your liberty and your loneliness.
THE POET.
That is all very well! You talk at your ease of solitude. Presently, when
I am gone, if some idea occurs to you, you will gently follow it by the
side of your dying embers, without feeling around you that atmosphere
of isolation, so vast, so empty, that in it inspiration evaporates and
disperses. And one may yet fear to be alone in the hours of work; but
there are moments of discouragement and weariness, when one doubts
oneself ones art even. That is the moment when it must be happiness to
find a faithful and loving heart, ever ready to sympathize with one's
depression, to which one may appeal without fearing to disconcert a
confidence and enthusiasm that are, in fact, unalterable. And then the
child. That sweet unconscious baby smile, is not that the best moral
rejuvenescence one can have? Ah! I have often thought over that. For
us artists, vain as all must be who live by success, by that superficial
esteem, capricious and fleeting, that we call the vogue; for us, above
all others, children are indispensable. They alone can console us for
growing old. All that we lose, the child gains. The success we have
missed, we think: "He will have it" and in proportion as our hair grows
thin, we have the joy of seeing it grow again, curly, golden, full of life,
on a little fair head at our side.

THE PAINTER.
Ah, poet! poet! have you thought also of all the mouthfuls by which
with the end of pen or brush we must nourish a brood?
THE POET.
Well! say what you like, the artist is made for family life, and that is so
true, that those among us who do not marry, take refuge in temporary
companionships, like travellers who, tired of being always home-less,
end by settling in a room in some hotel, and pass their lives under the
hackneyed notice of the signboard: "Apartments by the month or
night?"
THE PAINTER.
Such are all in the wrong. They accept the worries of wedlock and will
never know its joys.
THE POET.
"You acknowledge then that there are some joys?"
Here the painter, instead of replying, rose, searched out from among
drawings and sketches a much-thumbed manuscript, and returning to
his companion:
"We might argue like this," said he, "for ever so long without either
convincing the other. But since, notwithstanding my observations, you
seem determined to try marriage, here is a little work I beg you to read.
It is written--I would have you note--by a married man, much in love
with his wife, very happy in his home, an observer who, spending his
life among artists, amused himself by sketching one or two such
households as I spoke of just now. From the first to the last line of this
book, all is true, so true that the author would never publish it. Read it,
and come to me when you have read it. I think you will have changed
your mind."

The poet took the manuscript and carried it home with him; but he did
not keep the little book with all the needful care, for I have been able to
detach a few leaves from it and boldly offer them to the public.
[Illustration: p023-034]

MADAME HEURTEBISE.
She was certainly not intended for an artist's wife, above all for such an
artist as this outrageous fellow, impassioned,