He spoke in this way for an hour, bitter, excessive,
nervous, extravagant, and sometimes eloquent. All at once he
stopped,--and pressing my hand with a mixture of bitterness and
cynicism, he said,--"Old boy, I have now given you a dollar's worth of
literature; lend me ten dimes." I hastily drew from my pocket three or
four gold coins, and, blushing, slipped them into his hand; it trembled
a little; he thanked me with a glance, and, muttering something like
"Good bye," disappeared around the next corner.
The next time I met Monsieur Jules Sandeau he said to me,--"I want you
to go with me to Madame Emile de Girardin's to-morrow evening. She is to
read a tragedy she has written in five acts and in verse. You will meet
a good many of our celebrated literary men there. You must remember that
the watchword at that house is, Admiration, more admiration, still more
admiration. You must excite enthusiasm to ecstasy, compliments to
lyrical poetry, and carry flattery to apotheosis. But before we go there
I beg you to allow me to return your aristocratic breakfast by a poor
literary man's dinner, which we will eat, not in Bignon's sumptuous
private room, but outside the walls of Paris, at 'Uncle' Moulinon's,
which is the rendezvous of the supernumeraries of art and literature.
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