National Republican. (Washington City (D.C.)) 1872-1888, 1874-04-08
AIMEE DESCLEE.

| tFrom the Pail Mail Gazette.
The irony Of life has never been more cruel than
II has shown itself in the brief story Of q great
artist, discovered only to be lost. For years q
struggling actress, discredIted and unrecognized,
Aimee Desclee came into full light at last. con-
scious probably hat her long privation and her
hard battle had kill ed her, knowing how surely
the seeds OF death were soun with the seeds of
fame. And 1t was all the harder upon her, all the
harder upon art, because this was no common case
Of talent, which it takes years and long practice
to ripen, but genius so spontaneous and so new
that It needed no better training than success, no
greater chastener than its own instructive mod
esty. / have seen many fine and some great &C.
tresses but none the least like this. / mean no
comparisons, and cannot m axe them for Desclee
could be compared only to herse IT. SO distinct and
peculiar was her style. She seemed to have taken
up acting at its beginning and tudied it q new
art.
She spoke like no other player; for she spoke
not as one who knows beforehand what has to be
said, in speech more or less measured and pre-
pared, as all others have spoken, as far as have
seen or know, but now rapidly and decidedly, now
hesitating for q word here and there, now with
some slight repetition. So eople speak in real
life. She listened like no other player; for she
listened and sometimes with an air Of deep atten-
ton, sometimes as with an evident effort, like q
person distracted by the conversation supposed
" W CdEIlou Ou neIs eye = lltllo Whu-
dering, the ear but half commanded. Often the
thoughts were clearly far away. Sopeople listen
in real life. When first saw her act it was in
"Frou-Frou," when she had played It for many
consecutive nights. Ny FIRST impression, caused
by this, her peculiar method Of speaking, and
listening, was that she was not sure Of the words
Of her part, and was careless Of It. Only by de-
grces, as the play went on did We learn that this
was the very contamination Of the art Of hiding
audiences. As she said herself she never took
them by storm at first, as some great tragic ar
lists have done. 1t was easy to depreciate and
difficult to understand her; while at the best
many who believed in her could give no reason
for the faith that was in them.
To the nervous she was a revelation. Nerves
are the bitter growth of the day, born Of railways
on one side, and the propagation Of weaklIngs,
through improved medical science, on the other.
And the name Of the sufferers is legion. There
is genius with nerves and genius without them.
The last means happiness and success; the first
may mean failure, and must mean misery. Des-
elee was nervous from head to foot. In the won
derful little scene In "Frou Frou where she tried
in vain to make her husband understand that the
child-wife has grown into woman, every nerve
crisped and every sense rebelled at the good
natured stolidity Of the sensible man whom she
had married. Alas, for the little misunderstand-
ings Of life II George Eliot writes their eplcs,
Aimee Desclee was their best interpreter. Her
eyes were wonderful. She acted whole histories
with them alone There was one little scene in
the "Visite de Noces, in which she stood quietly
recalling some happy memories Of the past to the
man who had made them, when o whole world Of
Joy and sorrow seemed concentrated in her eyes.
She never made "points"-as it is the fashion to
call them-for the many; for the few she never
missed one. never can avoid associating her in
fancy with the parts she might have played.
She was to me an ideal Marguerite; and those
who happen to have seen her in the'"Gueule de
Loup" may remember-probably they will not
how for one instant she assumedthe words and atti
tude of Gretchen "Je suis demoiselle, nj belle"
or the parts she did play, Frou-Frou was perhaps
the most perfect, but the Prineesse Georges the
most striking. The former, gem as it was, suf
fered from the coarse and commonplace nature Of
its setting. Never, apart from Desclee, was there
duller play. From the "Princesse Georges"
London wssydebarTed by the wisdom of the au-
thorities, who smiled at the same moment upon
the pleasant moral Of the New Magadalen." 1
saw itin Paris, am glad to think. But we shall
see her there no more, and shall soon hear how
much she is excelled, even in her own line, by
Madame Chose or Mile. Upe Telle. Her passage
among US was too short, It may be- to build up one
Of those enduring regulations whose roots spread
downward. But, to those lovers Of her art who
loved It most in her, she stands apart among the
nnest Of her interpreters-to some the finest, be-
cause the most subtle of all. Her sad story Is as
strange riddle as any in this world. But It car
ries at least this lesson-that we should never
despair of an art in which, even in day OF small
people and small things, genius like hers can
come straight to the front at last and force even
from stupidity certain need Of honor.