IV
Theoretically, the house was open to all corners; practically, it
was a kind of club. The guests protected themselves, and, in so
doing, they protected Siron. Formal manners being laid aside,
essential courtesy was the more rigidly exacted; the new arrival
had to feel the pulse of the society; and a breach of its undefined
observances was promptly punished. A man might be as plain, as
dull, as slovenly, as free of speech as he desired; but to a touch
of presumption or a word of hectoring these free Barbizonians were
as sensitive as a tea-party of maiden ladies. I have seen people
driven forth from Barbizon; it would be difficult to say in words
what they had done, but they deserved their fate. They had shown
themselves unworthy to enjoy these corporate freedoms; they had
pushed themselves; they had "made their head"; they wanted tact to
appreciate the "fine shades" of Barbizonian etiquette. And once
they were condemned, the process of extrusion was ruthless in its
cruelty; after one evening with the formidable Bodmer, the Baily of
our commonwealth, the erring stranger was beheld no more; he rose
exceeding early the next day, and the first coach conveyed him from
the scene of his discomfiture. These sentences of banishment were
never, in my knowledge, delivered against an artist; such would, I
believe, have been illegal; but the odd and pleasant fact is this,
that they were never needed. Painters, sculptors, writers,
singers, I have seen all of these in Barbizon; and some were sulky,
and some blatant and inane; but one and all entered at once into
the spirit of the association. This singular society is purely
French, a creature of French virtues, and possibly of French
defects. It cannot be imitated by the English. The roughness, the
impatience, the more obvious selfishness, and even the more ardent
friendships of the Anglo-Saxon, speedily dismember such a
commonwealth. But this random gathering of young French painters,
with neither apparatus nor parade of government, yet kept the life
of the place upon a certain footing, insensibly imposed their
etiquette upon the docile, and by caustic speech enforced their
edicts against the unwelcome. To think of it is to wonder the more
at the strange failure of their race upon the larger theatre. This
inbred civility - to use the word in its completest meaning - this
natural and facile adjustment of contending liberties, seems all
that is required to make a governable nation and a just and
prosperous country.
Our society, thus purged and guarded, was full of high spirits, of
laughter, and of the initiative of youth. The few elder men who
joined us were still young at heart, and took the key from their
companions. We returned from long stations in the fortifying air,
our blood renewed by the sunshine, our spirits refreshed by the
silence of the forest; the Babel of loud voices sounded good; we
fell to eat and play like the natural man; and in the high inn
chamber, panelled with indifferent pictures and lit by candles
guttering in the night air, the talk and laughter sounded far into
the night. It was a good place and a good life for any naturally-
minded youth; better yet for the student of painting, and perhaps
best of all for the student of letters. He, too, was saturated in
this atmosphere of style; he was shut out from the disturbing
currents of the world, he might forget that there existed other and
more pressing interests than that of art. But, in such a place, it
was hardly possible to write; he could not drug his conscience,
like the painter, by the production of listless studies; he saw
himself idle among many who were apparently, and some who were
really, employed; and what with the impulse of increasing health
and the continual provocation of romantic scenes, he became
tormented with the desire to work. He enjoyed a strenuous idleness
full of visions, hearty meals, long, sweltering walks, mirth among
companions; and still floating like music through his brain,
foresights of great works that Shakespeare might be proud to have
conceived, headless epics, glorious torsos of dramas, and words
that were alive with import. So in youth, like Moses from the
mountain, we have sights of that House Beautiful of art which we
shall never enter. They are dreams and unsubstantial; visions of
style that repose upon no base of human meaning; the last heart-
throbs of that excited amateur who has to die in all of us before
the artist can be born. But they come to us in such a rainbow of
glory that all subsequent achievement appears dull and earthly in
comparison. We were all artists; almost all in the age of
illusion, cultivating an imaginary genius, and walking to the
strains of some deceiving Ariel; small wonder, indeed, if we were
happy! But art, of whatever nature, is a kind mistress; and though
these dreams of youth fall by their own baselessness, others
succeed, graver and more substantial; the symptoms change, the
amiable malady endures; and still, at an equal distance, the House
Beautiful shines upon its hill-top.
