From 1824 to the end of the Restoration, the department of the Fine Arts, connected with the ministry of the King's household, was confided to the Viscount Sosthenes de la Rochefoucauld, son of the Duke de Doudeauville. He was then at the head of the museums, the royal manufactures, the Conservatory and the five royal theatres,—the Opera, the Francois, the Odeon, the Opera-Comique, and the Italiens.
From the point of view of arts and letters the reign of Charles X. was illustrious. The King encouraged, protected, pensioned the greater number of the great writers and artists who honored France. What is sometimes called in literature the generation of 1830 would be more exactly described as the generation of the Restoration. This regime can claim the glory of Lamartine, as poet. A body-guard of Louis XVIII., he was the singer of royalty. He published, in 1820, the first volume of his Meditations Poetiques, in 1823 the second, and in 1829 the Harmonies. His literary success opened to him the doors of diplomacy. He was successively attache of the Legation at Florence, Secretary of Embassy at Naples and at London, Charge d'Affaires in Tuscany. When the Revolution of 1830 broke out, he had just been named Minister Plenipotentiary to Greece.
Victor Hugo published his Odes et Ballades from 1822 to 1828. "La Vendee," "Les Vierges de Verdun," "Quiberon," "Louis XVII," "Le Retablissement de la Statue de Henri IV.," "La Mort du due de Berry," "La Naissance du duc de Bordeaux," "Les Funerailles de Louis XVIII.," "Le Sacre de Charles X.," are true royalist songs. Alexandre Dumas, FILS, in receiving M. Leconte de Lisle at the French Academy, recalled "the light of that little lamp, seen burning every night in the mansard of the Rue Dragon, at the window of the boy poet, poor, solitary, indefatigable, enamoured of the ideal, hungry for glory, of that little lamp, the silent and friendly confidant of his first works and his first hopes so miraculously realized." Who knows? without the support of the government of the Restoration the light of that little lamp might less easily have developed into the resplendent star that the author of La Dame aux Camelias indicated in the firmament.
The author of Meditations Poetiques and the author of the Odes et Ballades were sincere in the expression of their political and religious enthusiasm. These two lyric apostles of the throne and the altar, these two bards of the coronation, obeyed the double inspiration of their imagination and their conscience. Party spirit should not be too severe for a regime that suggested such admirable verses to the two greatest French poets of the nineteenth century—to Lamartine and to Victor Hugo.
Let us recall also that in Victor Hugo it was not only the royalist poet that Charles X. protected, it was also the chief of the romantic school; for the government, despite all the efforts of the classicists, caused Hernani to be represented at the Francais, a subsidized theatre. When the Academy pressed its complaint to the very throne to prevent the acceptance of the play, the King replied wittily that he claimed no right in the matter beyond his place in the parterre. The first representation of Hernani took place the 25th of February, 1830, and the author, decorated, pensioned, encouraged by Charles X., did not lose the royal favor, when, on the 9th of March following, he wrote in the preface of his work: "Romanticism, so often ill-defined, is nothing, taking it all in all—and this is its true definition, if only its militant side be regarded—but liberalism in literature. The principle of literary liberty, already understood by the thinking and reading world, is not less completely adopted by that immense crowd, eager for the pure emotions of art, that throngs the theatres of Paris every night. That lofty and puissant voice of the people, which is like that of God, writes that poetry henceforth shall have the same matter as politics! Toleration and liberty!"
The first representation of a work that was a great step forward for the romantic school, Henri III et sa Cour, by Alexandre Dumas, had already taken place at the Francais, February 11, 1829. The 30th of March, 1830, the Odeon gave Christine de Suede, by the same author.
In 1829, Alfred de Vigny had represented at the Francais his translation in verse of Othello. It was from 1824 to 1826 that the poet published his principal poems. It was in 1826 that his romance of Cinq-Mars appeared. Victor Hugo published Les Orientates in 1829; Alfred de Musset, Les Contes d'Espagne et d'Italie in 1830. It may be said then that before the Revolution of 1830, romanticism had reached its complete expansion.
Note, also, that the government of Charles X. always respected the independence of writers and artists, and never asked for eulogies in exchange for the pensions and encouragement it accorded them with generous delicacy. It named Michelet Maitre de Conferences at the Ecole Normale in 1826. It pensioned Casimir Delavigne, so well known for his liberal opinions, and Augustin Thierry, a writer of the Opposition, when that great historian, having lost his eyesight, was without resources. It ordered of Horace Vernet the portraits of the King, the Duke of Berry, and the Duke of Angouleme, as well as a picture representing a "Review by Charles X. at the Champ-de-Mars," and named the painter of the battles of the Revolution and the Empire director of the School of Rome.
From the point of view of painting as well as of letters, the Eestoration was a grand epoch. Official encouragement was not wanting to the painters. Gros and Gerard received the title of Baron. There may be seen to-day in one of the new halls of the French School at the Louvre, the pretty picture by Heim, which represents Charles X. distributing the prizes for the Exposition of 1824, where Le Vaeu de Louis XIII. by Ingres had figured, and where the talent of Paul Delaroche had been disclosed. In the Salon Carre of the Louvre, the King, in the uniform of general-in-chief of the National Guards, blue coat with plaits of silver, with the cordon of the Saint Esprit, and in high boots, himself hands the cross of the Legion of Honor to the decorated artists, among whom is seen Heim, the author of the picture.
Ingres, chief of the Classic School, and Delacroix, chief of the Romantic School, shone at the same time. In 1827, the first submitted to general admiration l'Apotheose d'Homere and Le Martyre de Saint Symphorien. The same year Delacroix, who had already given in 1824 Le Massacre de Scio, in 1826 La Mort du Doge Mariano Faliero, exhibited LE Christ au Jardin des Oliviers, acquired for the Church of Saint Paul; Justinien,—for the Council of State; and La Mort de Sardanapale.
When the Musee Charles X. (the Egyptian Museum) was opened at the Louvre, the government ordered the frescoes and ceilings from Gros, Gerard, Ingres, Schnetz, Abel de Pujol. M. Jules Mareschal says:—
"The right-royal munificence of Charles X. was not marked by niggardliness in the appreciation of works of art any more than in the appreciation of the works of science and letters. But, as is known, it is not by interest alone that the heart of the artist is gained and his zeal stimulated. They are far more sensitive to the esteem shown them, to the respect with which their art is surrounded, and to the taste manifested in the judgment of their productions. Now, who more than Louis XVIII. and Charles X. possessed the secret of awakening lively sympathy in the world of artists and men of letters? Who better than their worthy counsellor seconded them in the impulses of generous courtesy so common with them? Thus from this noble and gracious manner of treating men devoted to art and letters, which marked the royal administration of the Fine Arts under the Restoration, sprang an emulation and a good will which on all sides gave an impetus to genius, and brought forth the new talents."
In theatrical matters, the Viscount Sosthenes de La Rochefoucauld exercised a salutary influence. He loved artists, and wishing to raise their situation, moral and social, he deplored the excommunication that had been laid on the players.
Speaking of the stage, he wrote in a report addressed to Charles X., June 20,1825: "I perceive that I have forgotten the most essential side,—the moral, I will even say the religious side. What glory it would be for a king to raise this considerable class of society from the abject situation in which it is compelled to live! Sacrificed to our pleasures, it has been condemned to eternal death, and a king believes his conscience quiet! For a long time I have cherished this thought; we must begin by elevating these people, as regards their art, by reforming, little by little, the swarming abuses that awaken horror, and end by treating with Rome in order to obtain some just concessions that would have important results."
In another report to the King, dated October 21, 1826, M. de La Rochefoucauld wrote, apropos of the obsequies of Talma:—
"A profound regret for me is the manner of the great tragedian's death. Sire, would it not be worthy of the reign, the breast, the conscience of Charles X., to draw this class of artists from the cruel position in which they are left by that excommunication that weighs upon them without distinction? Whether they conduct themselves well or ill, the Church repels them; this reprobation holds them perforce in the sphere of evil and disorder, since they have no interest in rising above it. Honor them, and they will honor themselves. It is time to undertake the reform of what I call a pernicious prejudice. The clergy itself is not far from agreeing on these ideas."
In his relations with authors, artists, directors of theatres, the Viscount was courtesy itself. We read in one of his reports (June 17, 1825):—
"Rossini is the first composer of Europe; I have succeeded in attracting him to the service of France; he had before been tempted in vain. Jealous of his success, people have cried out that he was an idler, that he would do nothing. I secured him by the methods and in the interest of the King; I can do with him as I will, as with all the artists, though they are most difficult people. They must be taken through the heart. Rossini has just composed a really ravishing piece; and, touched by the manner in which he is treated, he wishes to present it to the King in token of his gratitude, and wishes to receive nothing. He is right, but the King cannot accept gratis so fine a present; I propose that the King grant him the cross of the Legion of Honor and announce it himself to him to-morrow—which would be an act full of grace. All favors must come always from the King."
Great tenacity was needed in the government of Charles X. to get the Chefs-d'Oeuvre of Rossini represented at the Opera. A little school of petty and backward ideas rushed, under pretext of patriotism, but really from jealousy, systematically to drive from the stage everything not French. For this coterie Rossini and Meyerbeer were suspects, intruders, who must be repulsed at any cost. The government had the good sense to take no account of this ridiculous opposition, which refused to recognize that art should be cosmopolitan. Before seeing his name on the bills of our first lyric stage, Rossini required no less than nine years of patience. All Europe applauded him, but at Paris he had to face the fire of pamphleteers rendered furious by his fame. The government finally forced the Opera to mount Le Siege de Corinthe. Its success was so striking that the evening of the first representation (October 9, 1826), the public made almost a riot for half an hour, because Rossini, called loudly by an enthusiastic crowd, refused to appear upon the stage.
The maestro gave at the Opera Moise, March 26, 1826; Le Comte Ory, August 20, 1828; Guillaume Tell, August 20, 1829. (At this time the first representations of the most important works took place in midsummer.) The evening of the first night of Guillaume Tell, the orchestra went, after the opera, to give a serenade under the windows of the composer, who occupied the house on the Boulevard Montmartre, through which the Passage Jouffroy has since been cut. The 10th of February, 1868, on the occasion of the hundredth representation of the same work, there was a repetition of the serenade of 1829. The master then lived in the Rue Chaussee d'Antin, No. 2. Under his windows the orchestra and chorus of the opera commenced the concert about half an hour after midnight, by the light of torches, and Faure sang the solos.
The government which secured the representation of Guillaume Tell was not afraid of the words "independence" and "liberty." A year and a half before, the 20th of February, 1828, there had been given at the Opera the chef-d'oeuvre of Auber, La Muette de Portici, and the Duchess of Berry, a Neapolitan princess, had applauded the Naples Revolution put into music.
The government of Charles X. protected Meyerbeer as well as Rossini. Robert le Diable was only played under the reign of Louis Philippe, but the work had already been received under the Restoration.
During the reign of Charles X. the fine royal theatres reached the height of their splendor: the Francais and the Odeon were installed in their present quarters; the Opera in the hall of the Rue La Peletier, excellent as to acoustics and proportions; the Italiens in the Salle Favart (where they remained from 1825 to 1838); the Opera Comique in the Salle Feydeau, until the month of April, 1829, when it inaugurated the Salle Ventadour. Talma, Mademoiselle Duchesnoir, Mademoiselle Mars, triumphed at the Francais; Mademoiselle Georges, at the Odeon; Nourrit, Levasseur, Madame Damoreau, Taglioni, at the Opera; Sontag, Pasta, Malibran, and Rubini at the Italiens.
The Viscount de la Rochefoucauld wished in every way to raise the moral level of the theatre. He forbade subscribers, even the most influential, the entree behind the scenes of the Opera, because these persons had not always preserved there the desirable decorum. Thence arose rancor and spite, against which he had to contend during his entire administration. He wrote to the King, July 29, 1828:—
"A cabal is formed to deprive me of the direction of the theatres; and by whom and for what? It is a struggle, Sire, between good and evil. It is sought to maintain, at any cost, the abuses I have dared to reform. They throw a thousand unjust obstacles in my way. Gamblers are mixed up in it too; they wish to join this ignoble industry and the theatres. It is a monstrous infamy. The opera must be reached at all hazards, the coulisses must be entered; these are the abuses that must be revived. How can it be done? By removing the theatres from troublesome authority ... Sire, Your Majesty shall decide, and must defend me with a firm will in the interest, I venture to declare, of order; you must defend yourself also in the interest of morals and of art, and of a great influence of which it is sought to deprive you."
M. de La Rochefoucauld had the last word, and remained at the head of the direction of the Fine Arts until the close of the Restoration. To the credit of his administration there must still be added the creation of the school of religious music, directed by Choron, and the foundation of the concerts of the conservatory with Habeneck, and a little against the wishes of Cherubini. The chefs-d'oeuvre of German music were brought out as well as those of Italian music. The Viscount performed his task con amore, as they say on the other side of the Alps. He wrote to Charles X. January 12, 1830:—
"How many reflections must have come to the King on regarding the picture of the Coronation! I divined the thought that he did not complete, and my eyes filled with tears. Oh, how much I feel and imagine all the ennui given to the King by these barren and unfortunate politics! I detest them more even than the King detests them. Ungrateful offspring of the times, they fly away, rarely leaving even a memory. How much I prefer the arts!"
This was also the feeling of the Duchess of Berry, who, during all the Restoration, fled from surly politics to live in the region, radiant and sacred, of art and charity. The taste of this Italian lady for painting and music was a veritable passion. She was forever to be found in the museums, the expositions, the theatres. She caught the melodies by heart and was always interested in new works. An expert, a dilletante, was no better judge of pictures and operas; the great artists who shone in the reign of Charles X. received from the amiable Princess the most precious encouragements. Nor did she forget to encourage the efforts of beginners. "Who, then," she said, "would buy the works of these poor young people, if I did not?"
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