6

wait, and he produced 'L'Avare,' 'Les Facheux,' and 'Amphitryon,' before he ventured on the reproduction of Tartuffe.' Hebrought it out again during the King's absence in Flanders. The theatre overflowed with eager spectators, but in the middleof the performance a prohibition arrived from the heads of the temporary government. The lights were extinguished, the money was returned, and the performers retired; but Molière instantly despatched messengers to Louis to inform him of these proceedings, and the King replied to this message by an order to let the piece be played. Its popularity was finally none the less for these interruptions, but the hatred of the bigots grew apace, and extended from Molière to the whole profession of which he was a member. Upon the death of the satirist, so powerful in life, the Archbishop of Paris, De Harlay, refused him the decencies of sepulture, but the King remonstrated, and he was buried with 'maimed rites' by two priests without chanting; this omission being a marked affront. A large assemblage of friends met at the grave of the man whom they held in honour, and atoned by their enthusiasm for the meagreness of the ceremony.

it

The proceedings of the Archbishop, which were checked by the direct interposition of Royal authority, however unjus tifiable, were not illegal. They were founded upon an old decree of excommunication passed at the Council of Arles in the year 314 against all persons exercising the theatrical profession. This decree excluded players from the privileges of holy sacrament and of Christian burial: therefore a French priest might, if he chose to assert his power to the utmost, deny the rites of marriage to comedians; and in two or three instances appears that this was actually done. It must also be understood that when Louis XIV. set aside the enforcement of the law he did not attempt to abolish its existence. It was easy and pleasant to him to forbid the execution of the penalty in a particular instance, but it would have been onerous to call a fresh ecclesiastical council which alone could annul the act of excommunication, and which might after all only have renewed the condemnations of the early Church. This rigorous decree was not actually rescinded till the year 1849, when the Provincial Council held at Rheims suppressed by a special Act the censure passed by the Gallican Church upon the theatrical profession, this decision being formally ratified at Rome in the following year, 1850. It is an instructive fact in the history of humanity that the Archbishop who refused a Christian burial to Molière died, at the age of 70, in the arms

of

of a favourite mistress. Many popular songs and some famous couplets were directed against him, which were not more remarkable for restraint than the subject of them.

Although it was after Molière's death that the amalgamation of the three companies took place which was the actual foundation of the Comédie Française, we must regard Corneille and Molière as the great fathers of the French stage; from their productions the finest inspirations of Tragedy and Comedy were derived which have made the fame of the Théâtre Français great and lasting.

The most distinguished performers in the early days of French drama were Floridor, Baron, and Madame Champmeslé. Floridor, whose real name was Josias de Soulas, and who was a gentleman of good family, left the regiment of the Gardes Françaises to go upon the stage. He was handsome and graceful, with a singular charm of voice, and he was generally selected to be the orator to his company; that is, the actor whose function it was to speak an address before the performance of the piece, invoking the indulgence of the spectators; he was never heard without applause. He played both at the Marais and the Bourgogne with equal success in tragedy and comedy, and he was a personal favourite of Louis XIV. During an investigation which took place in his time touching the legality of certain titles assumed by gentlemen who had no sufficient warrant for holding them, Floridor's right to bear the title of Écuyer was questioned. The comedian, not having his title deeds in his possession, was obliged to ask for time to recover them. The space of a year was granted to him for this purpose: he proved his claim, was reinstated in his rights, and then continued his admirable performances—a convincing proof that the profession of the stage did not interfere with the civil rights of the comedians. He played leading characters in Corneille's and Racine's tragedies and in several comedies. He fell ill in the year 1672, and the Curé de St. Eustache seized the opportunity to persuade him to renounce the profession in which he had won his renown, and which he had honoured not less by his moral qualities than his intellectual gifts. He recovered from his illness, was faithful to his promise, and did not return to the stage. He died about three years afterwards.

Madame Champmeslé's name is familiar to all readers of French literature. She was discussed by Madame de Sévigné in prose, and extolled by Boileau in verse. Racine taught her elocution, and she excelled chiefly in his tragedies. She had considerable power and pathos, but her art was often

artificial,

artificial, and her style of sounding her author's verse was too regular in its cadence for the true utterance of passion. Penetrated by the genius of Racine, she enhanced his faults at the same time that she exhibited his beauties. She was a member of the first united company of the Comédie Française, which values the traditions of the past, and does not allow the merits of a great artist to be forgotten.

The name of François Baron is little known in England, yet few actors have deserved a wider reputation. He was the son of a meritorious tragic actor, but at an early age it was evident that he was to eclipse the parental fame; and when Molière saw him play in the juvenile troupe, known as 'La Troupe du Dauphin,' he was so much struck with his capacity that he at once requested him to become his pupil, intending to bring him out as the leading actor of his company. Baron profited by the lessons but deserted the master. He left Molière to join a provincial company, and finally made a successful appearance before the King and the Court at the Palais Royal in 1671. His first triumph was in Molière's 'Amour et Psyché.' His youth, his beauty, and his tender tones fitted him for the part of L'Amour, and made Psyché's sentiments quite intelligible to the feminine portion of his audience. He played during twenty years with equal power in Tragedy and Comedy, in Corneille and Molière, and Louis XIV. bestowed upon him every possible mark of esteem. He was the favourite of the day, but just as he reached the summit of his popularity he solicited the Royal permission to retire. Louis XIV. formally granted him his freedom at Fontainebleau, where the great actor appeared before him on the 22nd of October, 1691. He was at the time of his retreat the chief delight of the Comédie Française; he received the pension of 1000 livres due to him as a retiring member of the company, and the King's bounty added a second pension of 3000 livres-about 1607. according to the present value of French money. Baron was a proud man, and the obloquy attached to his profession was irritating to his sense of personal dignity. He persevered in his resolution during a period of thirty years, and then, as if it were his function to startle the public, he re-appeared upon the stage in Corneille's 'Cinna' on the 16th of March, 1720. This Rip Van Winkle of the drama came back to find most of his former comrades departed, but there still remained his Sovereign, and many of his friends at Court, to rejoice in the return of the tragedian who had first sounded the depth of unknown sympathies within them, and taught them the existence of untried passion. The theatre was crowded to excess, and the longing of many hearts was fulfilled.

Baron

Baron had not lost his power: he had doubled it. His figure was imposing; his voice was completely under his command. He had meditated on his art, and he came back to improve it. The artificial declamation, which was in vogue when he left the stage, had, during his absence, passed all reasonable limits: it had become absurd by exaggeration, and Baron resolved to put an end to its existence. He became the founder of a school of which the principles are at this time held to be the most excellent in dramatic art. He obliged academical rules to give way to Nature, and said, 'Les règles défendent d'élever les bras au-dessus de la tête, mais si la passion les y porte ils feront bien. La passion en sait plus que les règles.' A courageous innovator, he not only flung his arms fearlessly above his head when passion urged him, but he broke through the cadences of Racine when the pause of emotion did not fall in naturally with the cæsura of the line. Il rompait la mesure des vers de telle sorte que l'on ne sentait point l'insupportable monotonie du vers Alexandrin,' says Collé, in his description of him. This extraordinary tragedian left the stage for the second and last time on the 3rd of September, 1729. He was playing the part of Venceslas, and as he uttered the line—

'Si proche du cercueil où je me vois descendre'

he suddenly swooned, and was carried off the scene by his comrades. He did not long survive this accident, but he found time before his death to make a solemn renunciation of his profession, which he did, no doubt, in order to conciliate the Church and to obtain a respectable burial; accordingly he was interred with all proper funeral ceremonies. His portrait hangs in the Foyer des Artistes,' not far from that of Le Kain. The most remarkable of the artists who occupied the stage when Baron returned to it was Adrienne Lecouvreur, whose natural endowments were considerable, and whose intellect was of a high order. A true sensibility showed itself in all her representations, but it was checked by the pedantic conventionalities which belonged to that epoch of art. Baron, touched by her talent, redeemed it from this bondage. Adrienne, under his dominion, changed her style, and renounced the excessive restraint which interfered with the flow of poetry and passion. Among her most distinguished admirers was Voltaire; and in his tragedies, as in Racine's, her tender pathos and her dignity were equally felt. She was the chief ornament of the Comédie Française; and when she died, after three days' illness, at the age of forty, on the 20th of March, 1730, there was lamentation throughout Paris, for she was the favourite of society no less

than

than the delight of the stage. The sudden extinction of a bright light always raises wonder and conjecture; and it was whispered in aristocratic circles that Adrienne was poisoned by a certain Countess who disputed with her the exclusive devotion of the Comte de Saxe, and who made use of a little Abbé, the slave of her caprices, to destroy her rival. The Abbé was commissioned to convey to the actress a box of choice confitures,' containing some subtle poison. The tragedy of 'Adrienne Lecouvreur,' written by Messrs. Scribe and Legouvé, and made famous by Mlle. Rachel's impersonation of the principal character, is founded on this story, which had some vogue in its day, but which appears to have had no surer foundation than that of general rumour concerning itself with a surprising and painful event. The illness preceding death was so short that Mlle. Lecouvreur had no time to make those arrangements with the Church which were necessary to absolve her from the taint of her excommunicated profession; and thus it happened that Christian interment was denied to her, and that she was buried darkly at dead of night at the corner of the Rue de Bourgogne by two porters. A few months later, in London, died the great tragic actress, Mrs. Oldfield, and she was interred with stately ceremonies in Westminster Abbey.

This insult to the memory of a cherished artist was galling to the heart of the Parisians; it roused Voltaire, who commented strongly upon the proceeding both in prose and verse, and it, no doubt, contributed, with many other ill-advised acts, to that feeling of animosity against the clergy which broke through all restraint in the Revolution of 1789. The persecutions with which the priests pursued the players were very trying. Louis XIV., during the last half of his reign, rarely appeared at theatrical representations, and did little for the players. The droit des pauvres,' which began, as before mentioned, as a substitute for payment to the Confrères de la Passion' for the lease of their habitation, was continued after those conditions had passed away, and was augmented in various ways. The comedians were called upon to subscribe for the debts incurred in the building of St. Sulpice, and by an order issued on the 25th of August, 1695, they were compelled to make an annual donation of 250 livres to the Cardinal de Furstemberg and his successors. This Cardinal enjoyed an income of 700,000 livres; but a lady of expensive habits, who shared his worldly and spiritual advantages, the Countess de la Marck, reduced his revenues to such small proportions that he was glad to lay his hands on money wherever he could grasp it, and he was not ashamed to seize on the gains of the artists whom he denounced.