The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865

V >> Various >> The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19

_"The Adventures of Mr. Obadiah Oldbuck: wherein are duly set forth the
Crosses, Chagrins, Calamities, Checks, Chills, Changes, and
Circumgyrations by which his Courtship was attended. Showing also the
Issue of his Suit, and his Espousal to his Ladye-Love."_

Thousands laughed themselves to tears, when looking at these grotesque,
yet lifelike pictures; but scarcely one knew the name of their author,
M. Rodolphe Toepffer, of Geneva, Switzerland.

Long before Mr. Oldbuck made his appearance in America, he had been the
means of uniting in fast friendship the great poetic giant of Germany,
Goethe, and the modest Genevese caricaturist. The least of M. Toepffer's
merit, however, was his ability to handle the pencil. As a humoristic,
satiric, pathetic, and aesthetic writer, he is unique in the French
language. His wonderful genius was so pliable, that, while he excelled
in the power of catching the warmest glow of Nature in those exquisite
descriptions with which his writings are filled, and while, with
picture-words, he could reproduce all the tender beauty of a sunset in
the Alps, or the soft, singing gurgle of the mountain-brook, no one
better than he could also portray every subtile shade and feature of the
human mind. He excelled in analyzing character. His mental perception
was sympathetic and ready. His mind-eye was so keen and so piercing,
that nothing could escape its searching glance. The most insignificant
attitude of the heart was not only seen, but at once noted down and
studied by him; and in its delicately skilful dissection, Toepffer
comprehended the whole of the individual. Hence his universality. In
manner of thought, and in style, his writings have traits which remind
one of Sterne, Addison, Charles Lamb, Montaigne, Xavier de Maistre, (the
author of the famous "Voyage autour de ma Chambre,") and our own
Hawthorne.

It is just twenty-three years ago, that Xavier de Maistre, being
besieged by publishers for another of his charming stories, answered,
"Before all, take Toepffer, not me." Previously to this, a Swiss
gentleman, while visiting Weimar, introduced to Goethe the comic series
already referred to, which Toepffer had merely thrown off in his hours of
leisure. Goethe at once sent over the Alps for "Mr. Jabot," "Mr.
Pencil," "Mr. Crepin," and "Dr. Festus"; and, in the "Kunst und
Alterthum," the great poet expressed to his admiring circle of friends
his full appreciation, of the unequalled ability and charming humor of
Toepffer. He went still farther; for, in his favorite literary journal,
he drew the attention of all Germany to the merit of the Genevese
author.

In 1839, M. de Sainte-Beuve introduced, with the highest eulogium, M.
Toepffer to the wide and fastidious world of French letters. Thus did the
greatest genius of Germany, the most celebrated modern romancer of
Northern Italy, and one of the first writers of France stand godfathers
to M. Toepffer. Their judgment did not misguide them; for, though Toepffer
was not a _litterateur_ by profession, his few volumes stand out in
French literature like those gigantic Alpine summits whose snow-white
purity is never dimmed by cloud-shadows.

But I anticipate. Personal recollections become more interesting in
proportion to the distance of time which intervenes between us and the
death of the loved and admired. Violets are not gathered on a fresh-made
grave; and the soil of Memory must have been moistened with tears,
before we can expect it to yield its most cherished flowers.

As some of our author's works, "Les Nouvelles Genevoises," and "Les
Voyages en Zig-Zag," have attracted considerable attention in the United
States, a sketch of his life and a mention of his various writings will
be acceptable to American readers.

I was but a child when the name of Toepffer already had for me a
significance and a meaning which no other possessed. I had a feeling of
deepest regard and veneration for him, as I would meet him in the narrow
streets of Geneva, or in some of the shaded walks, which clasp, like
loving arms of Beauty, that bright little city of Central Europe. His
tall, commanding figure gave him an air of dignity and patrician
distinction; which latter was his by right. When he looked at you from
under the shadow of his broad-brimmed hat, you felt in that gaze there
was power,--a something which dropped from his eye into your very heart,
and made its home there.

But allow me to make a _detour_, and call attention to that city where
Toepffer was born, and where society had such an influence upon his
creative mind.

No spot in all Europe has more intrinsic importance than Switzerland.
Perched, as it is, amid inaccessible summits of intellectual and of
geographical elevation, it remains the magnetic centre, towards which,
from every part of the world, the sympathies of people most naturally
converge. And Geneva--the proud, miniature Republic--is to-day what she
has been for three long centuries, the Mecca of Switzerland, a luminous
altar of freedom of thought and of intellectual independence, from which
bold opinions have sprung and radiated, and around which every son of
Liberty has rallied. The Republic of Geneva stands alone in her
celebrity. So small a country that one morning's drive embraces the
whole of its territory, it can yet boast of a nationality so deeply
rooted, and of an individuality so strongly marked, that no foreign
invasion and no foreign contact have ever been able to impair them.

It is impossible, even for the most superficial reader of history, to
overlook that great array of names which made the last years of the
eighteenth century so illustrious in Europe. Among them it is equally
impossible not to recognize those which Geneva so proudly furnished.
Theology, Natural Science, Philology, Morals, Intellectual Philosophy,
and Belles-Lettres,--all these branches are admirably represented, and
bend down with their luxuriant weight of fruit. The native land of such
men as Bonnet, De Saussure, De Candolle, Calandrini, Hubert, Rousseau,
Sismondi, Necker, has nothing to covet from other countries. Still
Geneva became the foster-mother of many great men. Calvin she took from
his own Picardy. Theodore Agrippa d'Aubigne, the grandfather of Madame
de Maintenon, and ancestor of Merle d'Aubigne, the truest friend of
Henry IV., Geneva honored as if her own son. Voltaire so loved Geneva
that there he had a residence as well as at Ferney, and sang with
enthusiasm of blue Lake Leman, "Mon lac est le premier." Madame de Stael
was born of Swiss parents in Paris, but her childhood and many of her
mature years were spent in charming Coppet, where the waters of the lake
lave the shores within the boundary of the Canton of Geneva. Sismondi
was a native of Geneva, and under the influence of Madame de Stael, and
inspired by his visits to Italy, resolved to devote himself to the past
glories of the land of his ancestors. It was in the city of Geneva that
he first delivered those lectures on "The Literature of Southern
Europe," which, in book-form, are so well known to every civilized
nation. Benjamin Constant, another Genevese, was a kindred spirit, who
shared with Madame de Stael a delightful and profitable intimacy.
Dumont; (so highly eulogized by Lord Macaulay,) the friend of Mirabeau
and of Jeremy Bentham, was also of Geneva. De Candolle and his son gave
to science their arduous labors. De la Rive in Chemistry, Pictet in
Electrology, and Merle d'Aubigne in History, Gaussen and Malan in
Theology, and many others, not unknown to fame, might be mentioned as
continuing the list of distinguished names that testify to the
intellectual supremacy of Geneva.

Here, in our own day, what sons of Fame have gone to linger near a
society so congenial! Byron tells us that his life was purer at Geneva
than that which he led elsewhere. Here, amidst the scenes consecrated by
Milton nearly two centuries before, Shelley delighted to dream away his
summer hours. He loved to go forth on the pellucid surface of "clear,
placid Leman," there to drink in the soft beauties of the shores, or to
gaze upon the distant sublimities of Mont Blanc. Here Sir Humphry Davy
came, after his Southern tour, and "laid him down to die." Wordsworth
found here the graces of his Westmoreland home wedded to a grandeur
which realized the loftiest conception of his mind. At Geneva, to-day,
is found that noble son of France and devoted friend of America, the
Count Agenor de Gasparin.

Here, too, have members of the royal and noble houses of Europe come to
be wooed by those waters whose "crystal face" Byron calls

"The mirror where the stars and mountains view
The stillness of their aspect."

The late Charles Albert, the hero King of Sardinia, was educated at
Geneva. More than once did the future benefactor and monarch of Northern
Italy stray along the road to Lausanne, or float in his little shallop
on the side of Bellevue, whence he could look upon that prettiest of
summer residences, Pregny, and at night could listen to the trills of
the nightingales, which sing with a tenderness peculiar to the Valley of
Geneva. At Pregny lived Josephine, whose Imperial spouse had driven away
from Sardinia the members of the House of Savoy. But Time is a wonderful
magician, and to-day near beautiful Pregny the nephew of Europe's great
conqueror and conquered and the grand-daughter of Charles Albert have
their own villa. The favorite residence of the late Grand Duchess
Constantine of Russia was La Boissiere, in the Canton of Geneva, and on
the road to Chamouny, not far from the house of Sismondi. The late
Duchess de Broglie, the daughter of Madame de Stael, lived during the
winter in the street St. Antoine; near where M. Toepffer had his house,
and in the summer at Coppet. Not far from her, at Genthod, resided that
gentle daughter of America, the Baroness Rumpf, still remembered in New
York as the daughter of John Jacob Astor. The Duchess de Broglie and the
Baroness Rumpf are rare instances of the truest Christian womanhood in
exalted stations.--But a whole magazine article would not suffice to
give a list of the great, the noble, and the gifted who have sojourned
for a time in the city of Geneva.

Yet, if Geneva has borrowed some of the great of other countries, she
has amply repaid the debt. She sent her Casaubon to the court of James
I. of England, to be the defender of the faith. Later, she lent to
England her De Lolme, who added to his distinguished political acumen
such affluent philological knowledge, that he wrote one of the best
works ever written on the British Constitution in the English and the
French languages. She lent to Russia Le Fort, the famous general and
admiral, the counsellor of Peter the Great, the originator of the
Russian navy, and the founder of that army out of which grew the forces
that defeated Charles XII. at Pultowa. During the tempestuous days which
signalized the downfall of a monarchy, and while France was rent asunder
by the mad upheavings of an infuriated populace, Necker was called to
the head of the finances. After five years of indefatigable probity, and
when his services had enlisted the profound gratitude of the doomed
king, he was compelled to quit Paris. Recalled again, and again
dismissed, his final departure was the signal for a general outbreak,
which resulted in the taking of the Bastille and the overthrow of the
House of Capet. Albert Gallatin she gave to the United States. How
curious it is to trace the life of this son of Geneva! Graduating with
honors at his native university, he came to America in 1780, was
commander of a small fort at Machias while Maine was still
Massachusetts, was teacher in Harvard University, filled high places
under the government of Pennsylvania; elected Senator to Congress from
that State, (but vacating his seat because his residence had not been
sufficiently long to qualify him,) Secretary of the Treasury under
Jefferson, Envoy Extraordinary to sign the Treaty of Ghent, and for
seven years Minister Plenipotentiary to France. He was offered the
Secretaryship of State by Madison, a place in the Cabinet by Monroe, and
was selected by the dominant party as a candidate for the second office
in the gift of the American people. All of these last three proffered
honors he refused, and passed the remainder of his long life in the
genial pursuits of literature.

If Geneva has been the fireside of learning and of belles-lettres, it
has not been less the home of the fine arts. Petitot, the celebrated
painter on enamel, has handsomely paid his share to the
_chefs-d'oeuvres_ of the seventeenth century. While enjoying the
capricious favors of Charles I. at Whitehall, where he had his lodgings,
he worked on some of those perfect portraits which to-day have their
place in the Louvre, and which for ages must remain the triumphs of
minutely finished, expressive Art. Nor is the little Republic poor in
contemporaneous artistic talent. Pradier was born and grew up in
presence of Mont Blanc, whose sublime grandeur may well inspire the
dreams of the sculptor and ennoble him. Calame, Diday, and Hubert in
landscape painting, and Hornung in historical painting, (widely known by
his "Death of John Calvin,") are all sons of Geneva. Thalberg, the
musician, is a native of Geneva.

The habitual companionship of master minds must necessarily exert an
immediate and irresistible influence upon the rapid growth of thoughts
and ideas in the young. And it is not to be wondered at that those who
from their earliest infancy have had the readiest access to such a
companionship, and who have most fully imbibed that influence, retain
through the after-years of life a strength and a boldness of originality
essentially opposed to the hesitating timidity of less favored
individuals. In a society like that of Geneva, where family traditions
are jealously cherished as a part of the national history, and where
every family has its importance and its well-defined place, the memory
of distinguished men cannot perish, but is handed down from father to
son, as a portion of the state patrimony. Every little boy, as he plays
in the street, feels that he has reason to be proud that he is a
Genevese. It was with such sentiments and under such auspices that
Toepffer glided through the years of childhood. He drank deep at the
fountain of inspiration unawares, and manhood found him ready to follow
those who beckoned to him from the pages of history.

Rodolphe Toepffer was born at Geneva on the seventeenth day of February,
1799. As his name indicates, he was of German descent; but his family
had resided so many years in French Switzerland that he could no longer
be claimed by the land of Schiller and Goethe, though it was said that
one of his most distinctive literary characteristics was like that of
Mozart in music,--that he blended the deep, warm feeling of Germany with
the light and elegant graces of Southern Europe.

Americans who have visited the public Gallery of Art, known in Geneva as
the Musee Rath, will perhaps recall a small, but very spirited,
winter-scene, painted in oil, and which bears the name of Toepffer. This
picture is by the father of Rodolphe. M. Toepffer _le pere_ was the first
of that long list of Swiss painters who became devoted students of
Nature. The names of Calame, Diday, (Calame's master,) and Hubert are
now known throughout the world; and that of Calame stands among the
first in the rank of eminent living landscape painters. They are worthy
successors of the father of Rodolphe Toepffer, who was peculiarly happy
in rendering the mountain-scenes of Savoy, and in portraying those
picturesque and attractive episodes of peasant-life entitled "The
Village Wedding," "The Fair in Winter," etc., etc.

There are but few incidents to record of Toepffer _fils_. It is in his
writings mostly that he is to be found. Elsewhere he is only passing by;
but _there_ he dwells and shines in full radiance. His life was so
quietly modest, so tranquil and far removed from the tumultuous
preoccupations which belong to a fashionable society, it was so simple
and pure, that the biographer is at a loss to find any striking event
that may give it an outward coloring. When only a child, as he so
charmingly tells us in his inimitable pages of the "Presbytere," he
devoured books, all sorts of books,--indeed, all the books he could get
hold of in his uncle's well-stocked library. And many an hour of his
sunny boyhood did he pass at the window in the house where he was born,
gazing dreamily at the mullions, arches, and fretted work of the old
Cathedral, or at the distant flight of the swallows, while in his mind
he dwelt upon some brilliant _saillie_ of Montaigne or Rabelais. His
marked fondness for sketching showed itself in numerous and picturesque
outlines, all of which bore the unmistakable stamp of talent, and
foretold in the exuberance of the boy-fancy what the man would be.
Happily for him, happily for us who are allowed to gather up the crumbs
of art and authorship which fell from his ample store, Toepffer enjoyed
the very best and most propitious advantages which in any country can
bless childhood. He was born in the lap of a society daintily
intellectual and fastidiously cultivated. His very first impressions
were those of refinement. His very first steps were directed towards
culture. There was no arid waste around him, and he had not to cut his
way through the newly broken furrows of a young civilization. He was
taken by the hand of Genius at the very outset of his career, and was
never allowed to falter; for in the successive creations of his pencil
and of his pen there is the same fulness of imagination, the same
delicacy of observation, the same exquisite perfection of analysis. He
seems to have understood so well the power of his mind, that he never
ventured beyond his depth, but sustained himself through all his years
of authorship with the same grace and elegance.

And nowhere could he have better artistic encouragement and emulation
than in his native city. We do not remember who said that "in Geneva
every child is born an artist," but the statement would bear
investigation. Talent as well as taste for drawing and painting is
almost universal, and belongs as well to the poor as to the rich. It
may not be well known that De Candolle, the celebrated and untiring
Genevese botanist, made use, in a course of lectures, of a valuable
collection of tropical American plants, intrusted to his care by a
Spanish botanist. Unfortunately, the herbarium was needed by its owner
sooner than expected, and Professor De Candolle was requested to send it
back. This he stated to his audience, with many a regret for so
irreparable a loss. But some of the ladies present at once offered to
copy the whole collection in one week, This was done. The drawings,
"filling thirteen folio volumes, and amounting in number to eight
hundred and sixty, were accurately executed by one hundred and fourteen
women-artists in the time specified." In most cases the principal parts
of the plants alone were colored; the rest was only pencilled with great
accuracy. Where is the other city of the same size in which such a
number of amateur lady-artists could be found? One of these very
drawings, having been accidentally dropped in the street, was picked up
by a little girl ten years old, and was returned to De Candolle, copied
by the child; and it is no blemish to the collection.

The son of an artist, Toepffer found his own career ready made, and
stepped into it with all the instincts of his Art-loving nature. His few
early paintings are full of promise. But the young artist was not
destined to distinguish himself in his chosen career. A disease of the
eyes compelled him to give up his favorite pursuit. His brush, still
warm from the passionate ardor with which it had been grasped, was
broken and thrown away. Toepffer lamented all his life long the privation
that was thus forced upon him. Art, as a profession, was closed against
his eager ambition; yet he loved Art, and lived for it. Happily for him,
he was still in the complete possession of all his hopes and illusions.
Happily for him, he was young; and, without being discouraged by his
great disappointment, he turned the bent of his mind study-ward. Toepffer
became a close student of human nature. He took to analyzing it
instinctively, as the bird takes to the air. He was more than a dreamer,
though the charming dreams which we have from him make us half regret,
perhaps, that he did something else besides dreaming. He says, in his
story, "La Bibliotheque de mon Oncle,"--"The man who does not enjoy
dreaming his time away is but an automaton, who travels from life to
death like a locomotive rushing from Manchester to Liverpool. A whole
summer spent in this listless manner does not seem _de trop_ in a
refined education. It is even probable that one such summer would not
prove enough to produce a great man. Socrates dreamed his time away for
years. Rousseau did the same till he was forty years old; La
Fontaine--his whole life. And what a charming mode of working is that
science of losing time!"

But, either dreaming or working, Toepffer knew well what he was capable
of; and without impatience, without restlessness, he awaited the future,
consoling himself with the sentiment he expresses so well in the
following sentence:--"What can be said of those beardless poets who dare
to sing at that age, when, if they were true poets, they would not have
too much in their whole being with which to _feel_, and to inhale
silently, those perfumes which later only they may know how to diffuse
in their verse? There are precocious mathematicians; but precocious
poets--_never_."

Toepffer was right. Life is the true poet. Its teachings drop in tears,
and the heart receives them kneeling, and is in no hurry to babble to
the world all their silent beauty.

If Toepffer studied, it was not alone. He had devoted himself to the
serious task of education. His pupils, mostly the sons of wealthy
Englishmen and Russians, together with a few lads from France, Italy,
and America, served only to widen his family circle. His relation to
them was charming. As an authority, he used the most winning persuasion.
He respected the mental individuality even of a child, and would use
his admirable tact in kindly encouraging every indication of talent,
which, from want of a sufficient self-reliance or of a timely care, was
hiding itself. Year after year, in vacation-time, Toepffer left the
city with his thirty or forty young companions, and with them he
travelled on foot through the mountains and around the lakes of
Switzerland,--sometimes pushing in the track of Agassiz over glacier
billows, sometimes wandering far down upon the fertile plains of
Lombardy and Venetia. These were always most delightful excursions, when
the ordinary halt became a common enjoyment, not only from the
fun-loving spirit of the master, but also for the promise of future
illustrations. After the return home, during the long winter evenings,
Toepffer took either his pen or his pencil, and, with his pupils,
re-gathered from their memoranda and drawings their summer impressions
and adventures. Then he made his paper laugh with the spirited and
piquant sketches which all know who have peeped into the "Voyages en
Zig-Zag." Thus his fireside amusements have become those of the world.
The "Voyages en Zig-Zag," before his death, were already classic in
France. The richest luxury of type, paper, and illustration has not been
spared, and edition after edition is scattered in Europe from the Neva
to the Tagus. In the "Voyages" we find the most correct delineation, in
words and sketches, of the peculiarities and glories of Alp-land. The
exquisite French of this work has never yet found a translator.

His early style had something so fresh and so quaint that it can be
accounted for only by going to the books which Toepffer studied. His _dii
majores_ were Montaigne and Amyot, and Paul Louis Courier, a learned
Hellenistic scholar, as well as vivacious writer of the French
Revolution and of the first Empire. For Montaigne Toepffer cherished the
highest admiration. In his "Reflections and Short Disquisitions upon
Art," (_Reflexions et Menus Propos_,) he thus tersely sums up the
excellency of the French philosopher:--"Thinker full of probity and
grace; philosopher so much the greater by that which he said he did not
know than by that which he thought he knew." In our own language,
Shakspeare was his favorite author. M. de Sainte-Beuve says, "Toepffer
was sworn to Shakspeare," and adds that the works of Hogarth first
taught the Genevese writer to appreciate Shakspeare, Richardson, and
Fielding.

Besides possessing the ability to convey instruction to others, Toepffer
was a fine classical scholar. With two other literary gentlemen, he
published some excellent editions of the Greek classics, which he
enriched with notes. All these qualifications marked him as the man for
a still higher position. Accordingly, in 1832, when only thirty-three,
he was appointed Professor of Belles-Lettres in the College of Geneva.
At the same time, while discharging faithfully his duties in the
College, he conducted, aided by tutors, his little _pension_, now so
well known by the "Voyages en Zig-Zag."

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19