Book 7 — Editor's Easy Chair.

After our more severe Editorial work is done—the scissors laid in our drawer, and the Monthly Record made as full as our pages will bear, of history, we have a way of throwing ourselves back into an old red-backed Easy Chair, that has long been an ornament of our dingy office, and indulging in an easy, and careless overlook of the gossiping papers of the day, and in such chit-chat with chance visitors, as keeps us informed of the drift of the town-talk, while it relieves greatly the monotony of our office hours.

We have before now sailed over seas with some rollicking, red-faced captain, who, after a good day's run with his yards well braced to the wind, would, as evening began to fall, and the breezes to lull, rig out his studding-sail booms, and set new bits of canvas to catch every puff of the dying zephyrs. In like manner, we, having made our course good, out of mere whim, add to our sail, and mean to catch up in these few additional pages, those lighter whiffs from the great world of opinion, which come floating to us, as we sit here in our Easy Chair.

Nor are we altogether bent on choosing mere gossip; but, rather, we shall be on the watch for such topics or incidents as give a handle to the conversation of the town; and instead of treating them in any such philosophic fashion, as most writing men think it necessary to do, we shall try and set them down with all that gloss, and that happy lack of sequence, which makes every-day talk so much better than every-day writing.

There are hundreds of monthly occurrences which go into the journals as mere skeletons of facts; and yet, if a body had but the art of embalming by language, that fleshy covering which the every-day talk is sure to wrap about them, they would prove (these facts, we mean) the cheerfullest companions in the world.

And this is just the thing that we shall try to do. If the Cubans, down in Havanna, shoot some fifty men, we shall not be content with entering it upon our record: we shall not take up what we consider (as the Daily Journals consider they do) some impregnable position, and thunder away at some one else who has an equally impregnable position of precisely the opposite character; but we shall try and get hold of the actual situation of this new provision for the town maw, in that great feeding-place of the town, viz.—Public Talk. We shall say who are the most voracious feeders, and may possibly comment, in an amiable humor, upon the different modes of consumption.

The French have a most happy way of commuting the dull coinage of every-day facts into the most mailable matter in the world: and as we sit in our Easy Chair, and catch up, as we sometimes do, a leaf of a Parisian journal, we find ourselves unconsciously creeping into the heart of some street-story, which, in any English journal, would have been the merest item of Police!

Take, for instance, a single one—entered on all the commercial sheets after this fashion: "We understand that a suicide was committed under deplorable circumstances, not long since, in the Rue St. George. It appears that a French gentleman, owing to pecuniary embarrassments, had long been melancholy, and last evening killed himself with the fumes of charcoal. It is reported that he had been twice married, and (horribile dictu) that he exhumed his first wife, previous to committing the fatal deed. He leaves a very respectable property."

Now look at our Easy Chair survey of such an unfortunate matter:

"Monsieur B——, a widower of great respectability, was married to his second wife several years previous to the Revolution of 1848. The embarrassments which this event occasioned to several of the most considerable of his debtors, involved him in pecuniary difficulties of a serious character.

"Being of a sensitive nature, and unable to meet at that period his more immediate engagements, he became the victim of an intense mortification, which no efforts of his friends could relieve, and which gradually settled into entire mental alienation.

"He had still ample fortune, and lived in the enjoyment of his usual luxuries. His attentions to his new wife (who is represented as exceedingly beautiful) were, of course, less decided and punctilious than before, but there were observed no indications of any special hostility.

"Things wore on in this way for a year or more, when it was observed that Monsieur B—— absented himself at a certain time of the day for many hours, from home, without allowing his wife to suspect his whereabouts. His manœuvres to prevent pursuit, and avoid observation, were most adroit, and utterly forbade detection.

"Meantime the guardians of the cemetery of Père le Chaise had observed at a certain hour of the day a well-dressed individual make his appearance at the gates, and disappear upon the heights, within the inclosure of a little Gothic tomb, erected to the memory of Madame B——.

"The guardians having ascertained that the visitor was the husband of the deceased lady, with true Parisian politeness, avoided any special observation.

"It was ascertained afterward, however, that he employed these stolen hours in laboring upon the tomb—a pocket-knife, his only implement, and a single crazy hope—(which will appear in the sequel)—his only aim. Having, after four or five months of daily toil, finished his work, he waited only the absence of his wife to carry into execution his plan. For this he had not long to wait; she had promised a visit to the country; and upon the very day following her departure, Monsieur B—— hurried to his old rendezvous at Père le Chaise, and with the same knife with which he had worked his way into the stone sarcophagus in which the body of his first wife reposed, he severed the head from the trunk, transported it under cover of his cloak to his home; placed it before him upon the table; kindled a brazier of charcoal; wrote a last word to his living partner, and then, with his pipe in his mouth, and in face of the ghastly head from the tomb—he died upon his chair!"

There is in this story, insufferable as it may seem to delicate-minded readers, strong illustration of the French love of the horrible—of French passion—and of that French spirit of Dramatism, which would turn even the vulgarity of suicide into the heroism of a Tragedy.

Reading on, as we do, in our Easy Chair way, our eye falls upon another bit of French romance of a different style: it will probably never come to the eyes of half of our readers in its Paris shape, so we employ a lazy interval of our weightier duties to render it into old-fashioned English:

Every body knows that the rage for gaming in Paris, specially in private circles, has been for the last eight or ten years—excessive. And if any weak-minded American has "dined out" there, within that time, he has very likely been mulcted in a very pretty sum (after coffee was removed) at écarte.

But, this is not to our story, which, in translating, we shall take the liberty of vamping into the easiest possible shape—for ourselves.

Monsieur X—— was some descendant (grandson, for aught we know) of a certain Marshal of the Empire of France, and inherited from him (if report spake true) a handsome fortune of some five hundred thousand francs; or, in American coinage, one hundred thousand dollars. This is quite enough to live on pleasantly in Paris, or, for that matter, any where else.

Of course, Monsieur X—— was a mark for such mammas as had marriageable daughters; and as the French mothers always manage these affairs themselves, and are, beside, very thoroughly schooled in the ways of the world, Monsieur X—— stood a very poor chance of escape. In fact, he did not escape, but was married one fine morning to a very pretty mademoiselle, who had the credit of possessing rare virtues, and whom our hero (Monsieur X——), for a wonder, did really and truly love.

We mention this as even a greater rarity on the other side of the water, than on this; and every body of ordinary observation knows that it is rare enough with us.

They lived happily through the honey-moon, and much to the surprise of his friends, for a year or two afterward. But at length it was observed that he wore very long faces, and dined frequently by himself at the Café de Paris, and did not even smile at the broadest of Grassot's comic acting. As he was known to be a young man of very correct habits, the inference was (not always a just one, by the way) that the wife was in fault.

The truth was, that with a disposition naturally amiable and yielding, she had been seduced by those married friends who knew of her husband's resources, into an intense love of cards. As a natural consequence she became ever eager for play, morose in her habit, and petulant of manner.

The husband bore this all very quietly for a while, revolving in his own mind what could be done, and paying his wife's drafts upon him without a murmur. Days and weeks passed by, and the change wore grievously upon his spirits.

At length, he chose his course, and pursued it—after this manner.

He entered with apparent gayety into his wife's amusements, and introduced her, through the interposition of a friend, into one of the most famous gambling salons of Paris. As usual, she took her seat at the table where the stakes were largest. Her antagonist at the play was a stout old gentleman who wore a careless manner, but who after the first round or two played with remarkable success. When madame's losses had amounted to a considerable sum, he proposed "double or quits." Madame accepted and—lost.

The gentleman proposed the same game: madame accepted and lost!

The gentleman proposed the same trial a third and fourth time; and madame, supposing him to be an eccentric old gentleman, who was willing to furnish her with this opportunity of winning again the money, accepted each time his proposal, and uniformly—lost.

Still the play went on, until madame's losses had amounted to the extraordinary sum of four hundred thousand francs, when the old gentleman pleaded an engagement, and retired.

Madame X——, in an agony of trepidation gained her home, and throwing herself at her husband's feet, confessed and regretted the folly which had ruined them.

The husband was naturally astounded: "But," said he, controlling his emotion, "the losses must be met. There will remain some seventy thousand francs of my estate, and with that we can live comfortably in the country. For myself, I do not at all regret this: but, my dear (for his old affection lingered), I fear that you may sink under the privations you must encounter."

His goodness overcame her; she avowed not only her willingness but her great joy in becoming the companion of his exile.

It was in an old town of Brittany (we believe, for the paper is not at hand) that they lived quietly and cosily together, in a mossy old chateau. Their table was frugally served, and their servants were of the neighboring peasantry: in place of the old joyous rides in the Bois de Boulogne, they now took strolls together under the wood that shaded the chateau. Thus, for ten years they lived, growing into each other's affections, and rejoicing in the loss which had won them to a real enjoyment of life, and of each other's love.

"It was indeed a happy loss," said she.

"It was none at all," said the husband, and with a caress he handed her the certificates for some five hundred thousand francs, in the most available of French funds!

"Your antagonist," said he, "was a sure winner, but his services were purchased by your husband, and now that he has won you to his love, and to a sense of your own dignity, he makes over to you this recovered fortune."

And the French chronicler goes on to paint a pretty scene as a hint for those dramatists who choose to put the affair on the stage. And he further says that the story is well authenticated, as he might prove by giving the parties' names; but upon consideration, he favors us only with an X.

If the story is a lie, all we can say is, that Eugene Guinot must take the blame of it: and judging from his experience, we think the blame will sit lightly on him.

We have wandered so far from the town, that we had half forgotten that there was any town at all. But, after all, there lies but a step nowadays between Paris and New York—a step over sea, and a step over a very narrow bridge of morals. True, we have not yet imported the salon gambling, except in a quiet club-way, where surely vagrant bachelors, it would seem, have as good right to stultify themselves, as they have in most other situations in life. It is to be doubted, however, if gaming does not presently come into the round of amusements. Old methods do not last long in our growing society: and as evidence, we may note the abandonment, the present year, of the fancy balls, which, for four or five seasons back, have made the very Elysium of a summer's festivities.

What matter has been made of it under the new dispensation of undisguised ball costume, the papers have not much informed us: indeed it is richly observable, that when the fashions of the day withdraw from outré action, and shed those enormities of feature which excite the stare of the vulgar—just so soon the public press respects their modesty, and gives them the award of silence. As a consequence (for the sequitur may not appear, in the illogical order of our after-dinner arrangement) little has been said this year of the "dress balls" of Saratoga and Newport: and the catalogues of watering-place Deities have been transferred from the flash-papers, to the roll-books of the marriageable men. A few sharp days of early September (not far from the date of our writing) will have driven our city people away from those shores, where the eastern fogs come sailing in laden with agues, and dropped them down here and there, along those sheltered hill-sides of inland repute, which bask in a summer morning, and which, by and by, will smoke with the kindling glory of an Indian summer.

As yet few have found their way to the town itself: and those few find the streets full of bustle, of strangers, of dust, and of Cuba. It strikes a man oddly, who has been taking his siesta the summer through, under the shadow of country-grown trees, and in the hearing of birds, until he has grown into a sort of assimilation with country habit and country talk, to rebound upon a sudden, from the hard, frosted hill-sides into the very centre of this great furnace of business—and to find it all sweltering and panting with its labor, just as it did six months gone by, and just as it will do in six months to come! Your country idler, with the conceit of the city on him, somehow conceives the idea, that without him there will be less noise, and less commotion: and yet he may go and come, and take his thousands, and bring his thousands, and shout at his loudest, and the great city, quite careless of it all, still sends up from her pebbled veins, and her sweeping quays, the same unceasing roar.

We have forewarned our reader, or should have done it, that we shall shift our topic in these our after-dinner musings, as easy as the turning of a leaf. Our eyes have just now fallen upon a passage in Mr. Greeley's last letter from Europe, in which he speaks of the appearance of the English women, and commends, with a little more than his usual ardor of expression, their perfection of figure. He attributes this, and very justly, to the English lady's habit of out-of-door exercise. We had thought that this fact was known: that it was known years ago, and that our fair country-women would catch a hint from it, that would throw color into their cheeks and fullness into their forms. And yet, sadly enough, our ladies still coop themselves in their heated rooms, until their faces are like lilies, and their figures—like lily stems!

We have alluded to the matter now, not for the sake of pointing a satire surely, but for the sake of asking those one or two hundred thousand ladies, who every month light our pages with their looks, if they do indeed prize a little unnatural pearliness of hue, and delicacy of complexion, beyond that ruddy flush of health (the very tempter of a kiss!) and that full development of figure, which all the poets, from Homer down, have made one of the chiefest beauties of a woman?

If not, let them make of themselves horsewomen: or, bating that, let them make acquaintance with the sunrise: let them pick flowers with the dew upon them: let them study music of nature's own orchestra. Vulgarity is not essential to health: and a lithe, elastic figure does not grow in hot-houses.

For ourselves, we incline heartily to the belief, that if American women have a wish to add to the respect, the admiration, the love, and (if need be) the fear of the men, they will find an easier road toward that gain, in a little vigorous out-of-door exercise and a uniform attention to the great essentials of health, than in any new-fangled costumes, or loudly applauded "Rights."

We have grown unconsciously heated with the topic, and this added to the 90° by Fahrenheit, which is steaming at our elbow, must cut short the first installment of gossip from our red-backed easy-chair.

New York, September, 1851.