Identifier: memoriesofmylife00bern (find matches)
Title: Memories of my life : being my personal, professional, and social recollections as woman and artist
Year: 1907 (1900s)
Authors: Bernhardt, Sarah, 1844-1923
Subjects:
Publisher: New York : D. Appleton
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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nservatoirewith my governess. We started early, as I preferred walkingto taking the omnibus, and I kept the franc which my mothergave me every morning, part of which was for the omnibus andpart for cakes. We were to walk home always, but every otherday we took a cab with the two francs I had saved for thispurpose. My mother never knew about this little scheme, butit was not without remorse that my kind Brabender consentedto be my accomplice. As I said before, I did not miss a lesson, and I even wentto the deportment class, at which poor old )\I. Elie, duly curled,powdered, and adorned with lace frills, presided. This was themost amusing lesson imaginable. Very few of us attended thisclass, and M. Elie avenged himself on us for the abstention ofthe others. At every lesson each one of us was called forward.He addressed us by the familiar term of thou, and consideredus as his property. There were only five or six of us, but weeach had to mount the stage. He always stood up with his 80 ^i
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< o < < 1-1 ow QO I DECLINE MATRIMONY AND WED ART little black stick in his hand. No one knew why he should havethis stick. * Now, j^oung ladies, he would say, the body thrownback, the head up, on tiptoes—thats it—perfect. One, two,three, march. And we marched along on tiptoes with heads up and eyelidsdrawn over our eyes as we tried to look down in order to seewhere we* were walking. We marched along like this with allthe stateliness and solemnity of camels! He then taught us tomake our exit with indifference, dignity, or fury, and it wasamusing to see us going toward the doors either with a laggingstep or in an animated or hurried way, according to the moodin which we were supposed to be. Then we heard: Enough!Go! Not a word! for M, Elie would not allow us to murmura single word. Evervi;hing, he used to say, is in the look,the gesture, the attitude! Then there was what he called rassiette, which meant the way to sit down in a dignifiedmanner, to let oneself fall into a s

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