Camilla: A Tale of a Violin: Being the Artist Life of Camilla Urso — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
Camilla: A Tale of a Violin: Being the Artist Life of Camilla Urso
John Stuart Mill · en
Not all of her days were happy. Massart was dreadfully cross at times.
He would detect the slightest flaw in the work. Once he marched a stupid
boy out of the room by the ear and told him never to come back again. If
she should be treated like that it would really break her heart. She
would try her best to attend to all that was said and to do everything
just right. Massart might storm and rage about the room, but it should
not be from any neglect on her part. Altogether it was not a very lovely
life. Try as hard as she could it did not always please, and some days
it was really pretty tough for such a very small girl.
Another trouble came. Mother would bend over that dreadful embroidery
all day long, and things did not seem so prosperous as in Nantes. Father
was busy looking about for new rooms and almost before Camilla was aware
of it they were ready for a change of residence.
They could not afford the rent of the rooms on the Rue St. Nicholas
d’Antin, and they found cheaper quarters in a flat just under the roof
in an old house on the Rue Lamartine, and up six flights of long, dark
stairs.
It was a sad change from their comfortable home in sunny Nantes. There
was nothing to be seen out of the windows save steep, red roofs, the
sky, and sundry wild cats that roamed over the tiles. The streets
thereabouts were narrow and crooked, with mean little sidewalks hardly
wide enough for one.
It was not the Paris of to-day. The wide and handsome Rue de La Fayette
that now passes near the Rue Lamartine and the beautiful Square
Montholon with its trees and gardens was not in existence then. Camilla
first knew Paris as a city of short, crowded streets lined with tall
houses and cheap shops and crowded with work people and small
householders.
They had only been settled in the new home a few weeks when a greater
trouble came to them. The wolf began to growl in the echoing entry way
of the tall house. They began to think he would climb the stairs or come
in over the tiles and scare even the starved cats away.
The store of money they had brought from dear, old Nantes had melted
away long ago. There was “little to earn and many to keep.” M. Urso
tried and tried, but could get no permanent position at any of the
theatres. There were scores of flute players in the city. As for
organists, there were a dozen for every organ. Once in a while he had a
chance to play for a single Sunday, as a substitute. Occasionally there
was a party or other gathering where a few francs could be earned by
playing.