Читать книгу The Life of Hector Berlioz as Written by Himself in His Letters and Memoirs - Hector Berlioz - Страница 7

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Will it be credited that when I was only twelve years old, and even before I fell under the spell of music, I became the victim of that cruel passion so well described by the Mantuan?

My mother’s father, who bore a name immortalised by Scott—Marmion—lived at Meylan, about seven miles from Grenoble. This district, with its scattered hamlets, the valley of the winding Isère, the Dauphiny mountains that here join a spur of the Alps, is one of the most romantic spots I know. Here my mother, my sisters, and I usually passed three weeks towards the end of summer.

Now and then my uncle, Felix Marmion, who followed the fiery track of the great Emperor, would pay a flying visit during our stay, wreathed with cannon smoke and ornamented with a fine sabre cut across the face. He was then only adjutant-major in the Lancers; but young, gallant, ready to lay down his life for one look from his leader, he believed the throne of Napoleon as stable as Mont Blanc. His taste for music made him a great addition to our gay little circle, for he both sang and played the violin well.

High over Meylan, niched in a crevice of the mountain, stands a small white house, half-hidden amidst its vineyards and gardens, behind which rise the woods, the barren hills, a ruined tower, and St Eynard—a frowning mass of rock.

This sweet secluded spot, evidently predestined to romance, was the home of Madame Gautier, who lived there with two nieces, of whom the younger was called Estelle. Her name at once caught my attention from its being that of the heroine of Florian’s pastoral Estelle and Némorin, which I had filched from my father’s library, and read a dozen times in secret.

Estelle was just eighteen—tall, graceful, with large, grave, questioning eyes that yet could smile, hair worthy to ornament the helmet of Achilles, and feet—I will not say Andalusian, but pure Parisian, and on those little feet she wore ... pink slippers!

Never before had I seen pink slippers. Do not smile; I have forgotten the colour of her hair (I fancy it was black), yet, never do I recall Estelle but, in company with the flash of her large eyes, comes the twinkle of her dainty pink shoes. I had been struck by lightning. To say I loved her comprises everything. I hoped for, expected, knew nothing but that I was wretched, dumb, despairing. By night I suffered agonies, by day I wandered alone through the fields of Indian corn, or sought, like a wounded bird, the deepest recesses of my grandfather’s orchard.

Jealousy—dread comrade of love—seized me at the least word spoken by a man to my divinity; even now I shudder at the clank of a spur, remembering the noise of my uncle’s while dancing with her.

Every one in the neighbourhood laughed at the piteously precocious child, torn by his obsession. Perhaps Estelle laughed too, for she soon guessed all.

One evening, I remember, there was a party at Madame Gautier’s, and we played prisoner’s base. The men were bidden choose their partners, and I was purposely told to choose first. But I dared not, my heart-beats choked me; I lowered my eyes unable to speak. They were beginning to tease me when Estelle, smiling down from her beauteous height, caught my hand, saying:

“Come! I will begin; I choose Monsieur Hector.”

But ah! she laughed!

Does time heal all wounds; do other loves efface the first? Alas, no! With me time is powerless. Nothing wipes out the memory of my first love.

I was thirteen when we parted. I was thirty when, returning from Italy, I passed near St Eynard again. My eyes filled with tears at the sight of the little white house—the ruined tower. I loved her still!

On reaching home I heard that she was married; but even that could not cure me. A few days later my mother said:

“Hector, will you take this letter to the coach-office. It is for a lady who will be in the Vienne diligence. While they change horses ask the guard for Madame F., give her this letter, and look carefully at her. You may recognise her, although you have not met for seventeen years.”

Without suspicion I went on my errand and asked for Madame F. “I am she, Monsieur,” said a voice that thrilled my heart. “It is Estelle,” said my heart. Estelle! still lovely, still the nymph, the hamadryad of Meylan’s green slopes. Still lovely with her proud carriage, her glorious hair, her dazzling smile. But ah! where were the little pink shoes? She took the letter. Did she know me? I could not tell, but I returned home quite upset by the meeting. My mother smiled at me.

“So Némorin has not forgotten his Estelle,” she said. His Estelle! Mother! mother! was that trick quite fair?

With love came music; when I say music I mean composition, for of course I had long since been able to sing at sight and to play two instruments, thanks, needless to say, to my father’s teaching.

Rummaging one day in a drawer, I unearthed a flageolet, on which I at once tried to pick out “Malbrook.” Driven nearly mad by my squeaks, my father begged me to leave him in peace until he had time to teach me the proper fingering of the melodious instrument, and the right notes of the martial song I had pitched on. At the end of two days I was able to regale the family with my noble tune.

Now, how strikingly this shows my marvellous aptitude for wind instruments. What a fruitful subject for a born biographer!

My father next taught me to read music, explaining the signs thoroughly, and soon after he gave me a flute. At this I worked so hard that in seven or eight months I could play quite fairly.

Wishing to encourage my talent, he persuaded several well-to-do families of La Côte to join together and engage a music-master from Lyons. He was successful in getting a second violin, named Imbert, to leave the Théâtre des Célestins and settle in our outlandish little town to try and musicalise the inhabitants, on condition that we guaranteed a certain number of pupils and a fixed salary for conducting the band of the National Guard.

I improved fast, for I had two lessons a day; having also a pretty soprano voice I soon developed into a pleasant singer, a bold reader, and was able to play Drouet’s most intricate flute concertos. My master had a son a few years older than myself, a clever horn-player, with whom I became great friends. One day, as I was leaving for Meylan, he came to see me.

“Were you going without saying good-bye?” he asked. “You may never see me again.”

His gravity struck me at the moment, but the joy of seeing Meylan and my glorious Stella montis quite put him out of my head. But on my return home my friend was gone; he had hanged himself the very day I left, and no one has ever been able to discover why. It was a sad home-coming for me!

Among some old books I found d’Alembert’s edition of Rameau’s Harmony, and how many weary hours did I not spend over those laboured theories, trying vainly to evolve some sense out of the disconnected ideas. Small wonder that I did not succeed, seeing that one needs to be a past master of counterpoint and acoustics before one can possibly grasp the author’s meaning. It is a treatise on harmony for the use of those only who know all about it already.

However, I thought I could compose, and began by trying arrangements of trios and quartettes that were simply chaos, without form, cohesion, or common sense. Then, quite undaunted, I listened carefully to the quartettes by Pleyel, that our music-lovers performed on Sundays, and studied Catel’s Harmony, which I managed to buy. Suddenly I rent asunder the veil of the inmost temple, and the mystery of form and of the sequence of chords stood revealed. I hurriedly wrote a pot-pourri in six parts on Italian airs, and, as the harmony seemed tolerable, I was emboldened to compose a quintette for flute, two violins, viola, and ’cello, which was played by three amateurs, my master, and myself.

This was indeed a triumph though, unfortunately, my father did not seem as pleased as my other friends. Two months later another quintette was ready, of which he wished to hear the flute part before we performed it in public. Like most provincial amateurs, he thought he could judge the whole by a first-violin part, and at one passage he cried:

“Come now! That is something like music.”

But alas! this elaborate effusion was too much for our performers—particularly the viola and ’cello—they meandered off at their own sweet will. Result—confusion. As this happened when I was twelve and a half, the writers who say I did not know my notes at twenty are just a little out. Later on I burnt[1] the two quintettes, but it is strange that, long afterwards in Paris, I used the very motif that my father liked for my first orchestral piece. It is the air in A flat for the first violin in the allegro of my overture to the Francs-Juges.