You have exercised your talents—you recite—you sing—from the drawing-room Standpunkt. My dear Fräulein, you must unlearn all that. You have not yet conceived what excellence is. You must unlearn your mistaken admirations. You must know what you have to strive for, and then you must subdue your mind and body to unbroken discipline. Your mind, I say. For you must not be thinking of celebrity. Put that candle out of your eyes and look only at excellence. You would, of course, earn nothing. You could get no engagement for a long while. You would need money for yourself and your family....
A mountebank's child who helps her father to earn shillings when she is six years old—a child that inherits a singing throat from a long line of choristers and learns to sing as it learns to talk—has a likelier beginning. Any great achievement in acting or in music grows with the growth. Whenever an artist has been able to say, "I came, I saw, I conquered," it has been at the end of patient practice. Genius at first is little more than a great capacity for receiving discipline. Singing and acting, like the fine dexterity of the juggler with his cups and balls, require a shaping of the organs toward a finer and finer certainty of effect. Your muscles—your whole frame—must go like a watch, true, true, true, to a hair. That is the work of springtime, before habits have been determined.
This demonstrates what I cannot emphasise too heartily—the impossibility of taking people out of their normal environment and making anything worth while of them. There is a place in the world for everybody and, if everybody would stay in that place, there would be less confusion and fewer melancholy misfits. Singing is not merely vocal. It is spiritual. One must be in music in some way; must hear it often, or, even, hear it talked about. Merely hearing it talked about gives one a chance to absorb some musical ideas while one's mental attitude is being moulded. Studying in classes supplies the musical atmosphere to a certain extent; and so does hearing other people sing, or reading biographies of musicians. All these are better than nothing—much better—and yet they can never take the place of really musical surroundings in childhood. Being brought up in a household where famous composers are known, loved, and discussed, where the best music is played on the piano and where certain critical standards are a part of the intellectual life of the inmates is a large musical education in itself. The young student will absorb thus more real musical feeling, and judgment, and knowledge, than in spending years at a conservatory.
I have often and often received letters asking for advice and begging me to hear the voices of girls who have been told they have talent. It is a heart-breaking business. About one in sixty has had something resembling a voice and then, ten chances to one, she has not been in a position to cultivate herself. It is difficult to tell a girl that a woman must have many things besides a voice to make a success on the stage. It seems so—well!—so conceited—to say to her:
"My poor child, you must have presence and personality; good teeth and a knowledge of how to dress; grace of manner, dramatic feeling, high intelligence, and an aptitude for foreign languages besides a great many other essentials that are too numerous to mention but that you will discover fast enough if you try to go ahead without them!"
An impulsive and warm-hearted friend was visiting me once when I received a letter from a young woman whom I will call "E. H.," asking permission to come and sing for me. I read the note in despair and threw it over to my friend.
"What are you going to do about it?" she asked, after she had glanced through it.
"Nothing. The girl has no talent."
"How do you know that?" protested my friend.
"By her letter. It is a crassly ignorant letter. I feel perfectly sure that she can't sing."
"You are very unkind!" my friend reproached me. "You ought at least to hear her. You may be discouraging a genuine genius——"
"Now see here," I interrupted, "'E. H.' is evidently ignorant and uneducated. She further admits that she is poor. These facts taken together make a terrible handicap. She'd have to be a miracle to make good in spite of them."
"I will pay her expenses to come here and see you," declared my dear friend, obstinate in well-doing, like many another mistaken philanthropist.
I told her that she might take that responsibility if she liked, but that I would have nothing to do with raising a girl's false hopes in any such way. "It's a little hard on her," I said, "to have to borrow money to take a journey simply to be told that she can't sing. However, have it your own way and bring her."
She came. I saw her approaching up the driveway and simply pointed her out to my misguided friend. Anyone would have known the minute he saw "E. H." that she could not sing. She slouched and dragged her feet and was hopelessly ordinary, every inch of her. It was not merely a matter of plainness, but something far worse. She was quite hopeless. It turned out, poor soul, that she was a chambermaid in a hotel. People had heard her singing at her work and had told her that she ought to have her voice cultivated. It was, as usual, a case of injudicious friends, and, by the way, the very fact of being carried away by such praise is in itself a mark of a certain lack of intelligence. This girl had no temperament, no ear, no equipment, no taste, no advantages in the way of having heard music. I had to say to her:
"You have a pretty voice but nothing else, and not a sign of a career. Dismiss it all, for you must have something more than a few sweet notes."
She cried, and I did, too. I hate to be obliged to tell girls such disagreeable truths.
Another girl came to me with her mother. She was full of herself and her mother equally wrapped up in her. She had taken part in small village affairs in the little Connecticut town where she lived. Her voice was not bad, but she produced her notes in a wrong manner. Her teacher had encouraged her and promised her success. But teachers do that, many of them! I do not know that they can altogether be blamed.
"You don't breathe right," I said to this Connecticut girl. "You don't produce your tone right. You've no experience and, of course, you believe your teacher. But you forget one thing. Your teacher has to live and you pay him for stimulating you, even if he does so without justification."
What I did not go on to say to her, although I longed to, was that she was not the build of which prime donne are made. A prima donna has to be compactly, sturdily made, with a strong backbone to support her hard work and a lifted chest to let the tones out freely. A niece of Bret Harte's, who appeared for a time in grand opera, drooped her chest as she exhausted her breath and, when I saw her do it, I said:
"She sings well; but she won't sing long!"
She didn't.
My Connecticut girl was big and sloppy, a long-drawn-out person, such as is never, never gifted with a big voice.
There is something else which is very necessary for every girl to consider in going on the operatic stage. Has she the means for experimenting, or does she have to earn her living in some way meanwhile? If the former is the case, it will do no harm for her to play about with her voice, burn her fingers if need be, and come home to her mother and father not much the worse for the experience. I sympathise somewhat with the teachers in not speaking altogether freely in cases like these. There is no reason why anyone should take from a girl even one remote chance if she can afford to take it. But poor girls should be told the truth. So I said to my young Connecticut friend:
"My dear, you are trying to support yourself and your mother, aren't you? Very well. Now, suppose you go on and find that you can't—what will you do then? What are you fitted for? What can you turn your hand to? What have you acquired? Look how few singers ever arrive and, if you are not one of the few, will you not merely have entirely unfitted yourself for the life struggle along other lines?"
Herewith I say the same to four-fifths of all the girl singers who, in villages, in shops, in schools, everywhere, are all yearning to be great. They came to me in shoals in Paris and Milan, begging for just enough money to get home with. I have shipped many a failure back to America, and my soul has been sick for their disappointment and disillusionment. But they will not be guided by advice or warning. They have got to learn actually and bitterly. Neither are they ever grateful for discouragement nor yet for encouragement. If you give them the former, they think you are a selfish pessimist; and if you give them the latter, they accept it as no more than their due. As I have previously mentioned, I have known only one grateful girl and she was of ordinary ability. Emma Abbott, for whom I certainly did a great deal, was only grateful because she knew it was expected of her by the world at large. I believe she really thought that all I did was to hasten her success a little and that she really had not needed my assistance. Possibly, she had not. But this other girl, to whom I gave a little, unimportant advice, wrote me afterwards a most appreciative letter, saying that my advice had been invaluable to her. It was the only word of genuine gratitude I ever received from a young singer; and I kept her letter as a curiosity.
I believe there are, or were, more would-be prime donne in Chicago than anywhere else on earth. I shall never forget appointing a Thursday afternoon in the Windy City to hear twelve aspirants to operatic fame—pretty, fresh, self-conscious, young girls for the most part. There was one of the number who was particularly pretty and particularly aggressive. She criticised the others lavishly, but hung back from singing herself. She talked a great deal about her voice, saying that she had sung for Theodore Thomas and that he had told her there was no hall big enough for it! Such colossal conceit prejudiced me in advance and I must confess I felt a little curiosity to hear this "phenomenal organ." It proved to be perfectly useless. She had neither power nor quality nor comprehension. She could, however, make a big noise, as I told her. On Sunday my friends began coming in to see me, full of an article that had appeared in one of the papers that morning. Everyone began with:
"Good morning, Louise. My dear! Have you seen,"—etc.
The article, that had quite openly been given the paper by the young lady whose voice had been so much admired by Theodore Thomas, described my unkindness to young singers, my jealous objection to praising aspirants, my discouragement of good voices!
As a matter of fact, I have always been the friend of young girls, especially of young singers. So far from wishing to hurt or discourage them, I have often gone out of my way to help them along. And I believe that every time I have been obliged to tell a young and eager girl that there was no professional triumph ahead of her, it has cut me almost, if not quite, as deeply as it has cut her. For I always feel that I am maiming, even killing some beautiful thing in discouraging her,—even when I know it to be necessary and beneficial.
Another thing that I wish young would-be artists would remember is that, if it is worth while to sing the music of a song, it is equally worth while to sing the words, and that you cannot sing the words really, unless you are singing their meaning. Do I make myself understood, I wonder? Once a girl with a sweetly pretty voice sang to me Nevin's Mighty Lak a Rose, the little negro song which Madame Nordica gave so charmingly. When the girl had finished, I said:
"My dear, have you read those words?"
She looked at me blankly. I know she thought I was crazy.
"Because," I proceeded, "if you read the poetry over before you sing that song again, you'll find that it will help you."
She had, I presume, "read" the words or she could not have actually pronounced them; but she had not made the slightest attempt to read the spirit of the little song. No picture had come to her of a rosy baby dropping asleep and of a loving mammy crooning over him. She had not read the feeling of the song, even if she had memorised the syllables. Girls hate to work. They, even more than boys, want a short cut to efficiency and success. Labour and effort are cruel words to them. They want the glamour and the fun all at once. What would they say to the noble and inspiring example of old E. S. Jaffray, a merchant of sixty, whom I once knew, who, at that age, decided to learn Italian in order to read Dante in the original?
The best way—as I have said before and as I insist on saying—for anyone to learn to sing is by imitation and assimilation. My friend Franceschetti, a Roman gentleman, poor but of noble family, has classes that I always attend when I am in the Eternal City, and wherein the instruction is most advantageously given. He criticises each student in the presence of the others and, if the others are listening at all intelligently, they must profit. But you must listen, and then listen, and then keep on listening, and finally begin to listen all over again. You must keep your ear ready, and your mind as well.
Just as Faure, when he heard the bad baritone, said to himself, "that's my note! Now how does he do it?" so you must hold yourself ready to learn from the most humble as well as from the most unlikely sources. Never forget that Faure learned from the really poor singer what no good one had been able to teach him. Remember, too, that Patti learned one of her own flexible effects from listening to Faure himself: and that these great artists were not too proud to acknowledge it. I never went to hear Patti, myself, without studying the fine, forward placing of her voice and coming home immediately and trying to imitate it.
Yet, after all one's efforts to help, one can only let the young singers find out for themselves. If we could profit by each other's experience, there would be no need for the doctrine of reincarnation. But I wish—oh, how I wish—that I could save some foolish girls from embarking on the ocean of art as half of them do with neither chart or compass, nor even a seaworthy boat.
A better metaphor comes to me in my recollection of a famous lighthouse that I once visited. The rocks about were strewn with dead birds—pitiful, little, eager creatures that had broken their wings and beaten out their lives all night against the great revolving light. So the lighthouse of success lures the young, ambitious singers. And so they break their wings against it.
THAT season of 1879 in Paris was certainly a wonderful one; and yet, before it was over, I caught that strange fever of unrest that sends birds migrating and puts the Romany tribes on the move. With me it came as a result of over-fatigue and ill-health; an instinctive craving for the medicine of change. The preceding London season had been exacting and, in Paris, I had not had a moment in which to really rest. Although the days had been filled most pleasantly and interestingly, they had been filled to over-flowing, and I was very, very tired. So, in the grip of the wanderlust, we packed our trunks and went to Aix-les-Bains. We had not the slightest idea what we would do next. My mother was not very well, either, and my coloured maid, Eliza, had to be in attendance upon her a good deal of the time, so that I was forced to consider the detail of proper chaperonage. We were in a French settlement and I was a prima donna, fair game for gossip and comment. Therefore, I invited a friend of mine, a charming young Englishwoman, down from Paris to visit me. She was very curious about America, I remember. She was always asking me about "the States" and was especially interested in my accounts of the anti-negro riots. The fact that they had been almost entirely instigated by the Irish Catholics in New York excited her so that she felt obliged to go and talk with a priest in Aix about it. It was she, also, who said something one day that I thought both amusing and significant.
"My dear," she exclaimed, "tell me what are 'buttered nuts'?"
"Never heard of them," I replied.
"Oh, yes, my dear Louise, you must have! They are in all American books!"
Of course she meant butternuts, as I laughingly explained. A moment later she observed meditatively, "you know, I never take up an American novel that I don't read some description of food!"
I think what she said was quite true. I have remarked it since. Although I do not consider that we are a greedy nation in practice when it comes to food, we do love reading and hearing about good things to eat.
Presently, as my mother felt better and had no real need of me, I decided to take a little trip, leaving her at Aix with Eliza. Not quite by myself, of course. I never reached such a degree of emancipation as that. But I asked my English friend to go with me, and one fine day she and I set out in search of whatever entertaining thing might come our way. I had been so held down to routine all my life, my comings and goings had been so ordered and so sensible, that I deeply desired to do a bit of real gypsy wandering without the handicap of a travelling schedule. No travelling is so delightful as this sort. Don Quixote it was, if I remember rightly, who let his horse wander whithersoever he pleased, "believing that in this consisted the very being of adventures."
We went first to Geneva and so over the Simplon Pass into Italy. We dreamed among the lakes, reading guide-books to help us decide on our next stopping-point. So, on and on, until after a while we reached Vienna. Three hours after my arrival there Alfred Fischoff, the Austrian impresario, routed me out.
"Where are you bound for?" he wanted to know.
"Nowhere. That is just the beauty of it!"
"Ah!" he commented understandingly. And then he asked, "How would you like to sing?"
Even though I was on a pleasure trip the idea allured me, for I always like to sing.
"Sing where?" I questioned.
"Here, in Vienna."
"I couldn't. I don't sing in German," I objected.
"You could sing als Gast" (as a guest), he said.
Finally it was so arranged and, I may add, I was the only prima donna except Nilsson who had ever been permitted to sing in Italian at the Imperial Opera House, while the other artists sang in German. A letter from my mother to my father at that time discloses a light upon her point of view.
"Louise telegraphed for Eliza and her costumes. I thought at first she was crazy, but it appears she was sane after all. A fine Vienna engagement...."
It was an undertaking to travel in Germany in those days. The German railway officials spoke nothing but German and, furthermore, they are never adaptable and quick like the Italians. In France or Italy they understood you whether you spoke their language or not; but a Teuton has to have everything translated into his own untranslatable tongue. When my mother had finally gathered together my costumes, she wrote out a long document that she had translated into German, concerning all that Eliza was to do, and where she was to go, and gave it to her so that she could produce it along the way and be passed on to the next official without explanation or complication. And after this fashion Eliza and my costumes reached me safely. She was a good traveller and a good maid. She was also very popular in that part of the world. Negroes had no particular stigma attached to them on the Continent. Many of them were no darker of hue than the Hindu and Mohammedan royalties who journeyed there occasionally. So, wherever we went, my good, dark-skinned Eliza was a real belle.
There was much to interest me in Vienna, not only as a foreign capital of note, but also as a curiosity. In a long life, and after many and diverse experiences, I never had been in a city so entirely bound up in its own interests and traditions. The luckless sinner battering vainly upon the gates of Heaven has a better fighting chance, all told, than has the ambitious outsider who aspires to social recognition by the Viennese aristocracy. If an American is ever heard to say that he or she has been received by Viennese society, those hearing the speech may laugh in their sleeve and wonder what society it was. The thing cannot be done. A handle to one's name, an estate, all the little earmarks of "nobility" are not only required but insisted on. I believe it to be a safe statement to make that no one without a title, and a title recognised by the Austrians as one of distinction, can be received into the inner circle. Even diplomatic representatives of republics are not exempt from this ruling. They may have the wealth of the Indies, and their wives may possess the beauty of Helen herself, and yet they are not admitted. For this reason Austria is a most difficult post for republican legations. Republican representatives do not stay there long. Usually, the report is that they are recalled for diplomatic reasons, or their health has failed, or some other pride-saving excuse to satisfy a democratic populace. Vienna was, and I suppose is, the dullest Court in the whole world. The German Court at one time had the distinction of being the dullest, but that has looked up a bit during the reign of the present Kaiser. But Austria! The society of Vienna has absolutely no interest in anything or anybody outside its own sacred Inner Circle.
On one occasion I was guilty of a great breach of etiquette. Meyerbeer's son-in-law, a Baron of good lineage, was calling on me, and a correspondent from The London Daily Telegraph, whom I had met socially and not professionally, happened to be present. Although I knew from my foreign experiences that possibly it was hardly the correct thing to do, I, not unnaturally, presented them to each other. To my surprise the Baron became stiff and the young Englishman somewhat ill at ease. I must say, however, the Englishman carried it off better than the Baron did. When the Austrian had departed, my newspaper acquaintance told me that I had committed a social faux pas in making them known to each other. Introductions are absolutely taboo between titled persons and "commoners," as they are sternly called. A baron could not meet a newspaper man!
As a case in point, an Englishman of very distinguished connections arrived in Vienna at the time of one of the Court balls. He applied at his Embassy for an invitation, but was told that such a thing would be quite impossible. Viennese etiquette was too rigid, etc. Therefore, he did not go to the ball. But it so chanced that, a little later, when he went to call on the British Ambassador, he mentioned, casually enough, that he had a courtesy title but never used it when travelling.
"Why didn't you say so?" exclaimed the Ambassador. "I could have got you an invitation quite easily, if you had only explained that!"
Even the opera was very official and imperial. The Court Theatre was a government house, and the manager of it an Intendant and a rather grand person. In my time he was Baron Hoffman; and he and the Baroness asked me often to their home and placed boxes at the opera at my disposal, this last courtesy being one that the regular artists at the opera are never permitted to receive. The Imperial Opera House of Vienna is perhaps the most complete operatic organisation in existence and especially, at that time, was the company rich in fine prime donne. Mme. Materna was considered to be the greatest dramatic singer then living. Mlle. Bianchi was a marvellous chanteuse légère, the equal of Gerster. Mme. Ehn was the most poetical of prime donne and not unlike Nilsson. Of Lucca's fame it is needless to speak again.
I sang seven rôles in Vienna: Lucia, the Ballo in Maschera, Mignon, Traviata, Trovatore, Marta, and one act of Hamlet,—the mad scene, of course. It was during Marta that I had paid to me one of the most satisfying compliments of my life. Dr. Hanslick was then the greatest musical critic of Europe, a distinguished and highly cultivated musical scholar, even if he did war against Wagner and the new school. To the astonishment of the whole theatre, between the acts, he wandered in by himself behind the scenes to call upon me and offer his congratulations. Only one other singer had ever been thus honoured by him before. He was graciousness itself and, in his paper, the Neue Frei Presse, he wrote these memorable words:
"Miss Kellogg is an artist of the first order—the only one to compare with Patti. It is the first time since Patti has gone that we have heard what one can call singing! I congratulate Vienna on having heard such a colossal artist!"
Later, I was asked to the Hoffmans' again to meet Herr Hanslick and his wife; and they were only two of the many distinguished and interesting people that I met at the Intendant's house. Sonnenthal was one of them, the great actor from the Hoftheatre. And Fanny Elssler was another. I wonder how many people to-day know even the name of Fanny Elssler, the dancer who captivated the young King of Rome and lived with him for so long? There is mention of her in L'Aiglon. When I met her she was seventy odd, and very quiet and dull. She was vastly respected in Austria and held an exceedingly dignified position.
I learned enough German to be able to sing in German for the Intendant and his friends, with I know not what sort of accent. They were very polite about it always, saying more than once to me, "what a gentle accent!" But my German was dealt with less kindly by my audience one night. The spoken dialogue in Mignon simply had to be made comprehensible and therefore I had mastered it, as I thought, quite acceptably enough. But somewhere in it I came what our English friends call a most awful "cropper." I do not know to this day what dreadful thing I could have said, but it afforded the house an ecstasy of amusement. The whole audience laughed loudly and heartily and long; and I confess I was considerably disconcerted. But, all things considered, the Viennese audiences were satisfactory to sing to. They have one little custom, or mannerism, that is decidedly encouraging. When they like anything very much, they do not break the action by applauding, but, instead, a little soft "Ah!" goes all over the house. It was an indescribably comforting sound and spurred a singer on to do her best to please them. I sang Felina in Mignon, and the Viennese, to my eternal gratitude, liked me in the part. I remembered Jarrett and the "wooden gestures" he had fixed upon me in the rôle, and it was most satisfactory to have people in the Austrian Capitol declare that I was "an exquisite creation after Watteau!" Of course the Germans and Austrians were so wedded to Materna's rather heroic style of singing that I suppose any less strenuous methods might well have struck them as unforceful, but—à propos of Materna and the inevitable comparison of my work with hers—the Fremden Blatt was kind enough to print:
"The grand voice, the powerful high tones, and the stupendously passionate accents were not heard. Yet she knows how to sing with a full, strong voice, with high tones, and with a graceful passionateness!"
That expression "graceful passionateness" has remained in my vocabulary ever since, for it is a triumph of clumsy phraseology, even for a German paper.
I want to quote Dr. Hanslick once more;—it is such a lovely and amazing thing to quote:
"From her lips," said this illustrious critic, speaking of your humble servant, "we have heard Verdi's hardest and harshest melodies come forth refined and softened."
Is this believable? Edward Hanslick did really apply the adjectives "hard" and "harsh" to Verdi's music! It has to be read to be believed, but what he said is on file.
Speaking of "gentle accent," I had, on one occasion, the full beauty of the Teutonic language borne in upon me in a peculiarly striking form. It was in Robert der Teufel, that I heard in Vienna. The instance that struck me was in the great scene during which he practises magic in the cave and makes the dead to rise so that they can dance a ballet later on. Alice is wandering around, and the devil is in a great state of mind lest she has seen or overheard something of his magic.
"Was hast du gesehen?" says he.
"Nichts!" she replies.
"Nichts?" he repeats.
"Nichts," insists she.
That "Nichts!" was repeated over and over until the whole theatre echoed and resounded with "nichts-ts-ts-ts!" like spitting cats. There never was anything less musical.
"Heavens, Alfred," said I to Fischoff, who was with me at the time, "can't they change it to 'Nein?'"
But he regarded me in a shocked manner at the very idea of so sacrilegiously altering the text!
German scores are full of loud ringing passages, built on guttural, hissing, spitting consonants. But, then, we must remember that librettists the world over are apparently men of an inferior quality of intellect who know little about music or singing. I cannot help feeling that by nature and cultivation the German writers of the texts for opera suffer from an additional handicap of traditional density. Even one of the greatest of all operas, Faust, suffers from being built upon a German theme. At least, I should perhaps say, it suffers in sparkle, vivacity, dramatic glitter. In the deeper, poetic meanings it remains impervious alike to time, place, and individual view-point. I never fully appreciated the rôle of Marguerite until I met the German people at close range. Then I learned by personal observation why she was so dull, and limited, and unimaginative. Such traits are, as I suddenly realised, not only individual; they are racial. Any middle-class girl of sixteen might of course have been deceived by Faust with the aid of Mephisto, but that Gretchen was German made the whole thing a hundred times simpler.
WHEN I received my engagement to sing at the Opera in Petersburg I was much pleased. The opera seasons in Russia had for years been notably fine. Since then they have, I understand, gone off, and fewer and fewer stars of the first magnitude go there to sing. In 1880, however, it was a criterion of artistic excellence and position to have sung in the Petersburg Opera. My mother and I, a manager to represent me, my coloured maid Eliza, and some seventeen or eighteen trunks set out from Vienna; and we looked forward with pleasurable anticipation to our winter in the mysterious White Kingdom, not knowing then that it was to be one of the dreariest in our lives.
Our troubles began just before we reached Warsaw, when we had to cross the frontier. We were, of course, stopped for the examination of passports and luggage and, although the former were all right, the latter was not, according to the views of the Russian officials. I had, personally, fifteen trunks, containing the costumes for my entire repertoire and to watch those Russians inspect these trunks was a veritable study in suspicion. It was late at night. Unpleasant travelling incidents always happen late at night it would seem, when everything is most inconvenient and one is most tired. The Russians appeared ten times more official than the officials of any other nation ever did, and the lateness of the hour added to this impression. Indeed they were highly picturesque, with their high boots and the long skirts of their coats. The lanterns threw queer shadows, and the wind that swept the platform had in it already the chill of the steppes. I have no idea what they believed me to be smuggling, bombs or anarchistic literature, but they were not satisfied until they had gone through every trunk to its uttermost depths. Even then, when they had found nothing more dangerous than wigs and cloaks and laces, they still seemed doubtful. The trunks might look all right; but surely there must be something wrong with a woman who travelled with fifteen personal trunks! And I do not know that I altogether blame them. At all events they were not going to let me cross the frontier without further investigation, and I was rapidly falling into despair when, suddenly, I had a brilliant thought. I gave an order to my maid, who proceeded to scatter about the entire contents of one trunk and finally found for me a large, thin, official-looking document, with seals and signatures attached to it. The Russians stood about, watchful and mystified. Then I presented my talisman triumphantly.
"The Czar!" they exclaimed in awed whispers; "the Czar's signature!"
Whereupon several of them began bowing, almost genuflecting, to show their respect for anyone who possessed a paper signed by the Czar. It was only my contract. The singers at the Russian Opera are not engaged by an impresario, but by the Czar, and that document which served us so well on this occasion was a personal contract with His Imperial Majesty himself.
So we succeeded in eventually crossing the frontier and getting into Russia, and, after that, the espionage became a regular thing. The spy system in Russia is beyond belief. One is watched and tracked and followed and records are kept of one, and a species of censorship is maintained of everything that reaches one. At first, one hardly realises this, for the officials have had so much practice that it is done with the most consummate skill. Every letter was opened before it reached me and then sealed up again so cleverly that it was impossible to detect it except with the keenest and most suspicious eye. Every newspaper that I received, even those mailed to me by friends in England and France, had been gone over carefully, and every paragraph referring to Russia—the army, the government, the diplomacy policy, the Nihilistic agitations—had been stamped out in solid black.
We stopped at the Hotel d'Europe, and one might think one would be free from surveillance there. Not a bit of it. We soon saw that if we wanted to talk with any freedom or privacy we should have to hang thick towels over the keyholes. And this is precisely what we did!
As soon as we reached Petersburg, I was called for a rehearsal—merely a piano affair. I went to it garmented in a long fur cloak, some flannel-lined boots that I had once bought in America for a Canadian trip, and a little bonnet perched, in the awful fashion of the day, on the very top of my head. It was early in October at this time and not any colder than our normal winter climate in the United States of America. There is but little vibration of temperature in Russia, but there are days before November when the snow melts that are very trying. This was one of them. The first thing that happened to me at that rehearsal to which I went in my flannel-lined shoes and my little bonnet, was that a stern doctor confronted me and called me to account for the manner in which I was dressed! A doctor at a rehearsal was new to me; but it seemed that the thoughtful Czar employed two for this purpose. So many singers pretended to be ill when they really were not that His Majesty kept medical men on the spot to prove or disprove any excuses. The doctor who descended upon me was named Thomaschewski. He was the doctor mentioned in Marie Bashkirtseff's Journal; and he remained my friend and physician all the time I was in the city. Said he, brusquely, on this first meeting:
"Never come out dressed like that again! Get some goloshes immediately, and a hat that comes over your forehead!"
I did not understand at the moment why he insisted so strongly on the hat. I soon learned, however, what so few Americans are aware of, that it is through the forehead that one generally catches cold. As for the goloshes, it was self-evident that I needed them, and, after that morning, I never set foot out of doors in Russia without the regular protection worn by everyone in that climate. A big fur cap, tied on with a white woollen scarf arranged as we now arrange motor veils, completed the necessary outfit.
Marcella Sembrich and Lillian Nordica were both in the opera company that year. Sembrich had a small, high, clear voice at that time; but she was always the musician and well up in the Italian vocal tricks. Scalchi was there, too, and Cotogni, the famous baritone. He was a masterful singer and an amusing man, with a quaint way of putting things. He is still living in Rome and has, I am sorry to say, fallen from his great estate upon hard times. The tenors were Masini and a Russian named Petrovitch, with whom I sang the Ballo in Maschera. They were all very frankly curious about "the American prima donna" and about everything concerning her. The Intendant of the Imperial Opera was a man with the title of Baron Küster, the son of one of the Czar's gardeners. No one could understand why he had been made a Baron, but, for some reason, he was in high favour.
My début was in Traviata, as Violetta. There was an enormous audience and the American Minister was in a stage box. Throughout the performance I never lost a sense of isolation and of chill. The strangeness, the watchfulness, the sense of apprehension with which the air seemed charged, were all on my nerves. It was said that the Opera-House had been undermined by the Nihilists and was ready to explode if the Czar entered. This idea was hardly conducive to ease of mind or cheerfulness of manner. I was glad that it was not sufficiently a gala occasion for the Czar to be present. Never before had I ever sung without having friends in front, friends who could come behind the scenes between the acts and tell me how I was doing and, if need be, cheer me up a bit. I knew nobody in the audience that first night, which gave me a most forlorn feeling, as if the place were filled with unfriendliness as well as with strangers. At last I thought of the American Minister, Mr. Foster (our legation in Russia had not yet attained the dignity of an embassy). I sent my agent to the Fosters' box, asking them to call upon me in my loge at the end of the opera. When he delivered the message, he was met by blank astonishment.
"Of course we should be delighted—and it is very kind of Miss Kellogg," said Mr. Foster, "but there is not a chance that we should be allowed to do so!"
And they were not.
The vigilance, even on the stage, was something appalling. Every scene shifter and stage carpenter had a big brass number fastened conspicuously on his arm, strapped on, in fact, over his flannel shirt so that he could be easily checked off and kept track of. Everything in Russia is numbered. There are no individuals there—only units. I used to feel as if I must have a number myself; as if I, too, must soon be absorbed into that grim Monster System, and my feeling of helplessness and oppression steadily increased.
I had over twenty curtain calls that evening—the largest number I ever had. But they did not entirely repay me for the heaviness of heart from which I suffered. Never before or since was I so unhappy during a performance. The house had been undoubtedly cold at first. As an American correspondent to one of the newspapers wrote home: "The house had small confidence in an operatic singer from America, for all history of that country is silent on the subject of prime donne, while there is no lack of account of such other persons as Indians, Aztecs, and emigrants from the lower orders of Europe!"
In Russia they still reserve the right of hissing a singer that they do not like. It is lucky that I did not know this then, for it would have made me even more nervous than I was. My curtain calls were a real triumph. Even the ladies of the audience arose and waved their handkerchiefs, calling out many times: "Kellogg, sola!" They wanted me to receive the honours alone; and the gentlemen joined in their calls, "Kellogg! Kellogg! Kellogg!" until they were hoarse.
The subscribers to the opera were divided into three classes in Petersburg; and, as a singer who was popular was demanded by all the subscribers for each of the three nights, it was a novel sensation to conquer an entirely new audience each night.
In the Opera-House, as in every other house in Petersburg, one had to go through innumerable doors, one after the other. This architectural peculiarity is what makes the buildings so warm. Russians build for the cold weather as Italians build for warm. The result is that one can be colder in an Italian house than anywhere else on earth, and more correspondingly comfortable in a Russian. Even the Petersburg public Post-Office had to be approached through eight separate doorways. There were a number of other unusual features about that theatre. One was the custom of permitting the isvoshiks (drivers) and mujiks (servants) to come inside to stay while the opera was going on. It struck me as most inconsistent with the general strictness and red tape; but it was entertaining to see them stowed away in layers on ledges along the walls, sleeping peacefully until the people who had engaged them were ready to go home. Another odd thing was the odour that permeated the house. It was not an unpleasant odour; it seemed to me a little like Russia leather. I could not imagine what it was at first. Afterwards I found that it did come from the sheep-skins worn by the isvoshiks. The skins are cured in some peculiar way which leaves them with this faint smell.
The thing I particularly appreciated that first night was the honour and good fortune of making my début with Masini, who, according to my opinion, was without exception the best tenor of his time. He would have pleased the most exacting of modern critics, for he was the true bel canto. It is told of him that, in the early years of his career, he sang so badly out of tune that no impresario would bother with him. So he retired, and worked, until he had not only overcome it but had also made himself into a very great artist. The night before I sang with him, I went to hear him. At first I thought his voice a trifle husky, but, before the evening was over, I did not know if it were husky or not, he sang so beautifully, his method was so perfect, his breath-control was so wonderful. It was a naturally enchanting voice besides. I have never heard a length of breath like his. No phrase ever troubled him; he had the necessary wind for anything. In L'Africaine there is a passage in the big tenor solo needing very careful breathing. Masini did simply what he liked with it, swelling it out roundly and generously when it seemed as if his breath must be exhausted. When the breath of other tenors gave out, Masini only just began to draw on his. I am placing all this emphasis on his method because I know breathing to be the whole secret of singing—and of living, too! Masini was a grave, kind man, not a great actor, but with a stage presence of complete repose and dignity. His manner to me was charmingly thoughtful and considerate during our work together. Yet he was a man who never spoke. I mean this literally: I cannot recall the sound of his speaking voice, although I rehearsed with him for a whole season. His greatest rôle was the Duke in Rigoletto and there was no one I ever heard who could compare with him in it.
Nordica was a young singer doing minor rôles that season and, both being Americans, we saw a good deal of each other and exchanged sympathies, for we equally disliked Russia. Our Yankee independence was being constantly outraged by the Russian spy system, and we were always at odds with it. One night, when we were not singing ourselves, we had a box together to hear our fellow-artists, and invited Sir Frederick Hamilton to share it with us. As we knew there was sure to be a crowd after the opera, Nordica suggested that we should leave our wraps in an empty dressing-room behind the scenes and go out by that way when the performance was over. This we accordingly did, going behind through the house by the back door of the boxes, and as a matter of course we took Sir Frederick with us. We had momentarily forgotten that in Russia one never does what one wants to, or what seems the natural thing to do. When we were discovered bringing an Englishman behind the scenes, there was nearly a revolution in that theatre!
I sang in Traviata four or five times in Petersburg and in Don Giovanni and in Semiramide. This last was the forty-fifth rôle of my répertoire. The Russian Opera season was less brilliant than usual that year because the Czarina had recently died and the Court was in mourning. The situation was one that afforded me some amusement. The Czar, Alexander, who was killed that same winter, had for a long time lived with the Princess Dolgoruki, as is well known, and, when the Czarina died, he married the Dolgoruki within a few weeks. To be sure, the marriage did not really count, for she could never be a Czarina because she was not royal, but she was determined to establish her social position as his wife and insisted on keeping him in the country with her at one of the out-of-the-way places. And all the time the Czar went right on with his official mourning for the Czarina! There was something about this that strongly appealed to my American sense of humour. When the Czar did finally leave the country palace and come back to Petersburg, he was in such fear of the Nihilists that he did not dare come in state, but got off the train at a way-station and drove in. Fancy the Czar of all the Russias having to sneak into his own city like that! And the worst of it was that all that vigilance was proved soon after to have been justified. Because of the situation of affairs, the Royal Box at the Opera was never occupied. Even the Czarevitch and his wife (Dagmar of Denmark, sister of Alexandra of England) could not appear. I am inclined to believe that, on the whole, Petersburg society was rather glad of the dull season. As there were no Court functions, the individual social leaders did not have to keep up their end either, and it must have been a relief, for times were hard, owing to the recent Nihilistic panic, and Russians do not know how to entertain unless they can do it magnificently. As a result of the dull social season, I did not go out much in society. But I was much interested in such glimpses as I had of it, for "smart" Russia is most gorgeously picturesque. Many Americans visit Petersburg in summer when everyone is away and so never see the true Russian life. Indeed, it is a very stunning spectacle. The sleighs, the splendid liveries, the beautiful horses, the harnesses, the superb furs—it is all like a pageant. I loved to see the troikas drawn by three horses, with great gold ornaments on the harnesses; and the drozhkis in which the isvoshiks drive standing up. The third horse of the troika is one of the typically Russian features. He is attached to the pair that does the work, and his part is to play the fool.
I remember a famous sleigh ride I had in a very smart drozhki, behind a horse belonging to one of the English Embassy secretaries. The horse was an extraordinarily fast one and the drozhki was exceptionally light and small. The seat was so narrow that the secretary and I had to be literally buttoned into it to keep us from falling out. The isvoshik's seat was so high that he was practically standing erect and nearly leaning back against it. Evidently the man's directions were to show off the horse's gait to the best advantage; and I know that the speed of that frail sleigh upon the icy snow crust became so terrific that I had to grip the sash of the isvoshik in front of me to stay in the sleigh at all.
And, oh, the flatness and mournfulness of those chill wastes of snow outside the city! It was of course bitterly cold, but one did not feel that so much on account of the fine dryness of the air. For me the light—or, rather, the lack of it,—was the most difficult thing to become accustomed to. But if I did not altogether realise the cold for myself, I certainly realised it for my poor horses. I had a splendid pair of blacks that winter and, when I was driven down to the theatre, they would be lathered with sweat. When I came out they would be covered with ice and as white as snow. There would be ice on the harness too, and the other horses we passed were in the same condition. I was much distressed at first, but it appeared that Russian horses were quite used to it and, so I was told, actually throve on it.
Petersburg is full of little squares and in every square were heaps of logs, laid one across another like a funeral pyre, which were frequently lighted as a place for the isvoshiks to warm themselves. The leaping flames and the men crowded about, in such contrast to the white snow, seemed so startling and theatrical in the heart of the city that nothing could have more sharply reminded us that we were in a strange and unknown land.
The fact that the days were so unbelievably, gloomily short (dawn and bright noonday and the afternoon were unknown) grew to be very depressing. Coasting on the great ice-hills is a favourite Russian amusement, and it is a fine winter sport. But that, too, is shadowed by the strange half-light, which, to anyone accustomed to the long, bright days of more temperate lands, is always conducive to melancholy. There was no sun to speak of. Such as there was moved around in almost one place and stopped shining at four in the afternoon. I never had the least idea of the time; hardly knowing, in fact, whether it was day or night.
PRINCE Oldenburg, the Czar's cousin, was the only member of the Royal Family who could be called a patron of music and had himself composed more or less. On his seventy-fifth birthday the Imperial Opera organised a concert in his honour, that took place at the Winter Palace; and we were really quite intriguée, having heard of the Winter Palace for years. I said to Nordica:
"If you'll find out how we get there, I'll send my carriage for you and we will go together."
She found out, and we arranged to have the hotel people instruct the coachman as to the particular entrance of the palace to which he was to drive us, for he was a Russian and did not understand any other language. Once started, he had to go according to instructions or else turn around and take me back to the hotel for new directions and a fresh start. More than once have I found myself in such a dilemma. However, on this occasion, he seemed to be fairly clear as to our destination and showed gleams of intelligence when reminded that he must make no mistake, since there were only certain doors by which we could enter. The others were open only to the Royal Family and the nobility.
Among the five prime donne who had been invited, or, rather, commanded, to appear at this function, there had been some discussion as to our costumes. All of them except myself sent for special gowns, one to Paris, one to Vienna, one to Berlin, one to Dresden—for this concert was to be before members of the Imperial Family and extra preparations had to be made.
"What are you going to wear?" Nordica asked me.
"Well," said I, "I'll never be in Russia again—God permitting—and I shall wear a gown that I have, a creation of Worth's, made some years ago, without period or date." It was really a gorgeous affair and quite good enough, of an odd, warm, rust colour that was always very becoming to me.
We arrived at the palace before anyone else and were driven to the door indicated. There we were not permitted to enter, but were directed to yet another entrance. Again we met with the same refusal and were sent on to another door. At last we drove in under a porte-cochère and an endless stream of lackeys came out and took charge of us. When they had escorted us inside, one took one golosh, and one took another, and then they took off our furs and wraps, and there was no escape for us except by mounting the beautiful red-carpeted marble staircase. At the top of it we were met by two very good-looking young men in uniform, who received us cordially and escorted us to the ballroom, leaving us only when the other artists arrived. The other artists looked cross, I thought. At any rate, they looked somewhat ill at ease and conscious of their elegant new clothes. It was the crackling, ample period, in which it was difficult to be graceful. About the middle of the evening Dr. Thomaschewski came up to me and said:
"The Grand Duchess Olga desires me to ask who made Mlle. Kellogg's gown. She finds it the handsomest she ever saw!"
So much for my old clothes! I was thankful to be able to say the gown was a creation of Worth's; and I did not add how many years before! The next day, after the affair of the concert was pleasantly over, Nordica came into my room like a whirlwind.
"There's the d—— to pay down in the theatre!" she exclaimed breathlessly. "All the other prime donne are threatening to resign! And, apparently, it is our fault!"
"What have we done?"
"It seems," she went on with an appreciative chuckle, "that we came up the Royal Staircase and were received as members of the Imperial Family, while they had to come in the back way as befitted poor dogs of artists!"
"Nordica," said I, "isn't that just plain American luck! Such a thing could never happen to anybody but an American!"
We learned in due course that our handsome young men, who had been so agreeable and courteous, were Grand Dukes! But the other prime donne recovered from their mortification and thought better of their project of resigning.
We began to be frightfully tired of Russian food. The Russian arrangement for cold storage was very primitive. They merely froze solid anything they wanted to keep and unfroze it when it was needed for use. The staple for every day, and all day, was gelinotte, some sort of game. We lived on it until we were ready to starve rather than ever taste it again. It was not so bad, really, in its way, if there had not been so much of it. Some of the Russian food was possible enough, however. The famous sour milk soup, for instance, made of curdled milk and cabbage and, I think, a little fish, was rather nice; and they had a pretty way of serving bouchers between the soup and fish courses. But my mother and I began to feel that we should die if we did not have some plain American food. In fact, we both developed a vulgar craving for corned-beef. And, wonder of wonders! by inquiring at a little shop where garden tools were sold, we found the thing we longed for. As it turned out, the shop was kept by an American and his wife; so we got our corned-beef and my mother made delicious hash of it over our alcohol lamp. She was famous for getting up all manner of dainty and delicious food with a minute saucepan and a tiny spirit flame.
The water everywhere was horrid and we were obliged to boil it always before we dared to take a swallow. And all these things told on my poor mother, whose health was becoming very wretched. She came to hate Russia and pined to get away. So I tried to break my contract and leave (considering my mother's health a sufficiently valid reason), but, although money was due me that I was willing to forfeit, I found I could not go until I had sung out the full term of my engagement. I was so wrathful at this that I went to see the American Minister about leaving in spite of everything; but even he was powerless to help us. Apparently the Russians were accustomed to having their country prove too much for foreign singers, for the Minister remarked meditatively:
"Finland used to be open, but so many artists escaped that way that it is now closed!"
It proved to be even harder to get out of Russia than it had been to get in. One mother and daughter whom I knew went to five hotels in twenty-four hours, trying to evade the officials, so as to leave without the usual red tape; but they were kept merciless track of everywhere and their passports sent for at every one of the five. Such proceedings must be rather expensive for the government. Some Russian friends of mine once came to Aix without notifying their governmental powers and were sent for to come back within twenty-four hours. Fancy being kept track of like that! I am devoutly thankful that I do not live under a paternal government. In time, however, we did succeed in obtaining permission to leave Russia; and profoundly glad were we of it. I had but one desire before we left that dark and frigid land forever, and that was to see the Czar just once. My friends of the English Embassy told me that my best chance would be on the route between the Winter Palace and the Military Riding Academy, where the Czar went every Sunday to stimulate horsemanship. So I started out the following Sunday, alone, in my brougham.
There were crowds of the faithful blocking the way everywhere—well interspersed with Nihilists, I have little doubt. Russian men are, on the whole, impressive in appearance; big and fierce and immensely virile. They are half-savage, anyway. The better class wear coats lined and trimmed with black or silver fur; while a crowd of soldiers and peasants make a most picturesque sight. On this occasion the cavalry and mounted police patrolled the route, and ranks of soldiers were drawn up on either side. Yet there was such a surging populace that, in spite of all the military surveillance, there was some confusion. I was driven up and down very slowly. Then I grew cold and got out of the carriage to walk for a short distance. I had gone but a little way and was turning back when I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was an official who informed me that I might drive but could not be permitted to walk! So I re-entered the brougham and was driven again, up and down, bowing sweetly each time to the officer who had halted me and dared to take me by the shoulder. And, finally, I caught only a glimpse of the Czar, through the hosts of guardians that surrounded him like a cloud. I could not believe that he cared for all that pomp and ceremony, for he was a weary-looking man and I felt sorry for him. I believe that he would have been as democratic as anyone could well be if he could only have had half a chance. The wife of the shop-keeper who sold garden tools told me that the Czar was perfectly accessible to them and very friendly. He liked new inventions and patents and ingenious farming implements and American machine inventions. A man I once knew had been trying for months to obtain an official introduction at Court in order to exploit a patent which he thought would interest His Majesty, and in vain. But, when he chanced to meet a friend of the Czar's in a picture gallery and told him about his idea, he had no further difficulty. His Minister, who had told him it was hopeless to try to get access to the Czar, was amazed to find him going about at the Court balls in the most intimate manner.
"How did you do it?" he demanded. "How did you manage to reach the Czar?"
"Just met him through a friend as I would any other fellow," was the reply.
We were in Petersburg at the Christmas and New Year's celebrations, which are held two weeks later than ours are. The customs were odd and interesting—notably the one of driving out in a sleigh to "meet the New Year coming in." This pretty custom was always observed by Mme. Helena Modjeska and her husband, Count Bozenta, even in America. I went to services in several of the churches, where I heard divine singing, unaccompanied by any instrument. The vibrations were very slow and throbbed like the tones of an organ. Nothing can be more splendid than bass voices. The decorations of the churches were strange and barbaric to eyes accustomed to the Italian and French cathedrals. The savagery as well as the orientalism of the Russians comes out in a curious way in their ecclesiastical architecture. The walls were often inlaid with lapis and malachite, like the decorations of some Eastern temple, and the ikons were painted gaudily upon metals. There were no pews of any sort; the populace dropped upon its knees and stayed there.
The little wayside shrines erected over every spot where anything tragic had ever happened to a royal person are an interesting feature of worship in Russia. As the rulers of Russia have usually passed rather calamitous lives, there are plenty of these shrines, and loyal subjects always kneel and make them reverence. I could see one of these shrines from my window in the Hotel d'Europe and marvelled at the devout fervour of the kneeling men in their picturesque cloaks, praying for this or some other Emperor, with the thermometer far below zero. It was always the men who prayed. I do not remember ever seeing a woman on her knees in the snow.
Our experiences in the shops of Petersburg were sometimes interesting. Of course in the larger ones French was spoken, and also German, but in the small places where "notions" were sold, or writing materials, only Russian was understood. To facilitate the shopping of foreigners, little pictures of every conceivable thing for sale were hung outside the shops. All one had to do was to point to the reproduction of a spool, or a safety pin, or an egg, or a trunk, and produce a pocketbook. One day my mother wanted some shoe buttons and we wagered that she could not buy them unaided. I felt sure there would be no painting of a shoe button on the shop wall. But she came back victoriously with the buttons, quite proud of herself because she had thought of pointing to her own boots instead of wasting time hunting among the pictures.
It was the collection of Colonel Villiers that first awakened in me an interest in old silver, and the beginning I made in Russia that winter ended in my possessing a collection of value and beauty. Villiers was a member of the Duke of Buckingham's family and was a Queen's Messenger, a position of responsibility and trust. And I had several other friends at the British Embassy. Lord and Lady Dufferin I knew; and one of the secretaries, Mr. Alan, now Sir Alan Johnston, who married Miss Antoinette Pinchot, sister of Gifford Pinchot, I had first met in Vienna. The night that Villiers arrived in Petersburg (before I had met him) some of the English attachés had been invited to dine with us; but the First Secretary arrived at the last moment to explain that the Queen's Messenger was expected with private letters and that they had to be received in person and handed in at Court promptly.
"It's the only way they have of sending really private letters, you see," he explained. "Alexandra probably wants to tell Dagmar about the children's last attacks of indigestion, so we have to stay at home to receive the letters!"
Well—the glad day did finally come when my mother and I turned our backs on Russia and its eternal twilight and repaired to Nice for a little amusement and recuperation after the Petersburg season. A number of our friends were there, and it was unusually gay. I was warmly welcomed and congratulated, for Petersburg had put the final cachet upon my success. Although I might win other honours, I could win none that the world appraised more highly than those that had come to me that year. In a letter to my father, from Nice, my mother says: