Chapter IV (1)

The use of friends--_Le Musée des Familles_--An article by M. Gaillardet--My reply to it--Challenge from M. Gaillardet--I accept it with effusion--My adversary demands a first respite of a week--I summon him before the Commission of Dramatic Authors--He declines that arbitration--I send him my seconds--He asks a delay of two months--Janin's letter to the newspapers

Although great events were gathering like a dreadful storm on the horizon, and were about to take place in the midst of the miserable controversy about which we are writing, I think it is better, as we have begun it, to follow it to the end, rather than to return to it later.

M. Gaillardet persisted in his lawsuit and won it. I have mentioned that I had completely refused to second Harel in his defence. The ill-advised stars which had stolen a march upon M. Gaillardet's name were obliged to fall behind it; but, as Harel had wished, all Paris knew that I was the real author of _La Tour de Nesle._

Did this do the drama much good? I have my doubts about it; I have already expressed my opinion upon the pleasure the public takes in making the reputation of an unknown young man at the expense of established reputations. Two years went by, during which _La Tour de Nesle_ ran its two to three hundred performances. I thought no more about the old quarrel; I had only published _Gaule et France_ during those two years--a very incomplete work, from the point of view of science, but singularly noteworthy from the point of view of the prediction with which it ends--and had _Angèle_ performed, when, one morning, a friend of mine (friends are very useful sometimes, as we are about to see), came into my room when I was still in bed, and, after a few preliminary words, asked me if I had read _Le Musée des Familles._ I looked at him with an obviously astonished air.

"_Le Musée des Familles_?" I asked. "On what grounds should I have read that paper?"

"Because it contains an article by M. Gaillardet."

"So much the better for _Le Musée des Familles."_

"An article on _La Tour de Nesle_."

"Ah! an article on the drama?"

"No, on the tower."

"Well, how does that affect me?"

"Because in M. Gaillardet's article on the tower he speaks of the play."

"Well, what does he say? Come to the point."

"He says it is his best drama."

"He ought to be ashamed of himself. It is one of my best, he means."

"You ought to read it."

"What is the good?"

"Because it may perhaps have to be replied to."

"M. Gaillardet's article?"

"Yes."

"Do you think so?..."

"Good heavens! Read it."

I called Louis. The servant I then had was called Louis; he was a droll fellow whom I found drunk from time to time, when I returned home at night, and who gave as an excuse that as he had to fight a duel the next morning he must drown his thoughts. I hurried him away to Henry Berthoud, the publisher of _Le Musée des Familles,_ with a message asking him to send me the number which contained M. Gaillardet's article. Louis returned with the required number, and this is what I read

"LA TOUR DE NESLE

"One evening the setting sun lit up the sky with a purple
red colour, and bordered the horizon that lay between Sèvres
and Saint Cloud with a ribbon of fire; I was on the Pont
des Arts, with M. de Jouy's _L'Ermite_ in my hand. Guided
by the Academician, I had come there as an observer to the
centre of a bird's-eye view; for this particular place is
a focus where a thousand rays meet and converge. Opposite
to me, the city, the cradle of Paris, with its houses piled
up in the shape of a triangle, and as close to one another
as a battle corps; at the head of the city, the Pont Neuf,
with its ancient arches and its nine adjoining streets. To
the left, the Louvre, which is no longer the old Louvre,
with its heavy tower and belfry; the Tuileries, that royal
_pied-à-terre,_ whose name is ennobled with the dignity
of time and of the revolutions which have passed over its
head; a monument of which can be said, as Milton said of
Satan: 'Lightning has struck it and marked its face!' To the
right, the Mint, the sole building in Paris which, together
with the Timbre-Royal and the Morgue, possess a physiognomy
of their own, and, so to speak, show the nature of their
existence. Below, the Institut and the Bibliothèque Mazarine.

"I had reached thus far in my _circumspection,_ when my
_cicerone_ (I still refer to M. de Jouy) informed me, in a
footnote, that at this place formerly stood the tower of
Nesle, from the top of which, according to the chroniclers,
several queens or princes were forced to fling themselves
into the Seine, to get rid the more surely and swiftly
of the misfortune they had drawn down upon themselves. I
was much struck by this anecdote. When still young and at
college, I had read Brantôme and what it contained about the
tower of Nesle; but the recollection of it had been effaced
from my memory: it now returned to me vividly and suddenly.
Assuming a twofold power from the hour and the place where I
stood, it returned with redoubled force and impressiveness;
it completely took possession of me.... For the first time,
I detected the drama, and my first and best drama was
conceived!

"There is something both attractive and terrible in this
story of debauchery and of princely slaughters, consummated
in the night, at midnight, between the thick walls of
a tower, with no witnesses but the burning lamps, the
attendant assassins, and God watching all! Something which
takes possession of the soul, in the hutchery of these young
men (they were all young and beautiful!) who had come there
weaponless and without mistrust,... a truly royal quarry,
which hyænas and tigers might envy! But I am letting myself
run away in these poetical reflections, and I forget that I
am, and only desire to be, a story-teller.

"Let us first speak of the building, then, afterwards, I
will speak of its mysteries. At the time of King Philip,
the Beautiful, and his sons, the boundaries of Paris were
limited, on the left bank of the Seine going down, by an
enclosure made by Philippe-Auguste, who gave his name to it.
That enclosure, the walls of which correspond pretty nearly
to the later towers of the Louvre, had, for their outer
defence, a moat which communicated with the Seine, and took
the water to the Gate of Bussy. Beyond the enclosure, were
the great and little pré-aux-Clercs, so called because they
were used on fête days as a promenade by the students of
the university. They covered the space now occupied by the
rues des Petits-Augustins, Marais-Saint-Germain, Colombier,
Jacob, Verneuil, de l'Université and of Saints-Pères, etc.
On this space, and adjoining the enclosure, was the hôtel de
Nesle, which had a façade of eleven great arcades, with a
close which was planted with trees, the end of which, on the
quayside, was close to the Church of the Augustines. This
mansion occupied the situation of the College Mazarin, the
hôtel de la Monnaie and other contiguous sites: its spacious
court, its buildings and its gardens were almost bounded by
the rues Mazarine and Nevers and the quai Conti, formerly
called quai de Nesle.

"Amaury de Nesle, the owner of the mansion, sold it, in
1308, to Philippe le Bel for the sum of 5000 livres;
Philippe le Long gave it to Jeanne de Bourgogne, his wife,
and she, in her will, ordered it to be sold, and the money
applied to the foundation of a college which was called the
Collège de Bourgogne. In 1381, Charles VI. sold it to his
uncle, the due de Berry. Finding the gardens too small,
the latter, in 1385, added seven acres of land to them,
situated outside the town moats, and, in order to establish
communication, he had a bridge built over the moat. This
outer portion was called the _petit séjour de Nesle._ From
the hands of the Duc de Berry, the mansion passed into those
of several other princes and, finally, was sold outright by
Henri II. and Charles IX. in 1552 and 1570. Upon its ground
various constructions rose up, such as the hôtel de Nevers,
the hôtel de Guénégaud, which has since taken the name of
Conti; later again still, what remained of this mansion was
pulled down to make room for the Collège Mazarin, now the
Palais de l'Institut. At the western end of the mansion,
in the angle made by the course of the Seine and the moat
of the enclosure de Philippe-Auguste, were the gate and
tower of Nesle, the only ones which were represented on the
engraving placed at the head of this account. The gate was
a kind of fortress comprised of a building flanked by two
round towers, between which was the entrance from the town.
This was reached by a stone bridge supported on four arches,
and re-establishing the communication intercepted by the
moat, which was very wide at this spot.

"It appears that, for a long time, this gate had been closed
to the public; for I read letters patent of 13 April 1550,
addressed to the provost and aldermen, authorising them to
'cause the gate of Nesle to be opened, for the convenience
of the neighbourhood, and for foot passengers and horses
only, not for the use of waggons or pack horses subject to
the payment of toll.' I further read in these letters that
'the faubourg had been ruined by the wars, and reduced to
arable land; and, having begun to be rebuilt under François
I., who had allowed it to be done, it was one of the finest
suburbs of any of the towns of France. Whereupon, request
being made by the town, the opening of the said gate is
allowed.'[1]

"It was by this gate of Nesle that Henri IV. entered Paris,
after having besieged that side of the city, in 1589. It
was still in existence under the reign of Louis XIV. Now as
to the tower; it was situated some few feet to the north
of the gate, on the point of land which was formed by the
moat where it reunited itself to the Seine: the river
bathing it at its foot. It was round in shape, was about
a hundred and twenty feet in height, and overlooked the
roof of the gallery of the Louvre. It was yoked to a second
tower containing the spiral staircase, and was not so large
in diameter, but still higher. At first sight, one would
have said they were like two sisters, one of whom had the
heritage of the strength and the maturity of age, and the
other the lightness and graces of youth. More pointed and
slender, this tower was the look-out one; more _solid_ and
_staid,_ the former trusted to its strength and waited.
Both were joined to the neighbouring gate by a wall, their
ally, these three forming a complete whole, which faced
south-west, and was continued by ramparts which, together
with several other works, completed the defence.

"On the other bank, opposite these, rose the Louvre, and, in
the angle between the Louvre and the Wall of Paris, was a
tower similar to them, which they called the _tour du Coin._
In times of danger, an iron chain, one end of which was
fixed to the _tour de Nesle,_ stretched across the Seine,
and, held up at various distances by boats, was fastened to
the _tour du Coin,_ and barred from that side of the river
the entrance from the city of Paris.

"Originally, the door and gate of Nesle bore the name of
Philippe Hamelin, their builder or their first owner, I
do not know which. Later, they derived their name from the
mansion, which had become important. The windows of the
tower and one terrace of the mansion looked over the river.

"Brantôme (I now return to him), in the second paragraph,
art. Ier of his _Femmes Galantes,_ relates that a Queen of
France, whom he does not name, ordinarily lived there, 'who
was on the watch there for passers-by, calling out to them
and making them come to her; and throwing them from the top
of the tower, _which still stands,_ to the water below to
drown them.... I do not wish to say, he adds, that this was
true; but the common people, the greater portion of Paris,
at least, declare this; and no man so simple but who, if
you showed him the tower alone, and questioned him concerning
it, would say it was so.'

"Jean Second, a Dutch poet, who died in 1536, supported
Brantôme's assertion in a piece of Latin verse which he
composed about the tower of Nesle.[2]

"Mayeme mentions it in his _History of Spain_, vol. I, p.
560. Villon, who wrote his poems in the fifteenth century,
at a still nearer date to the event, adds his testimony
to it. Giving several new details, he informs us that the
wretched victims were shut into sacks before being flung
into the river. In the second strophe of his _Ballade des_
_Dames du temps jadis,_ he asks--

"... Où la royne
Qui commanda que Buridan
Fût jeté, en ung sac, en Seine?"

"This Buridan, of whom Villon speaks, escaped from the trap,
we know not how. He retired to Vienna, in Austria, where
he founded a university, and his name became famous in the
schools of Paris in the fifteenth century.

"In 1471, a Master of Arts of the University of Leipzig
wrote a small work entitled _Commentaire historique sur
les jeunes écoliers parisiens que Buridan,_ etc. It will
be seen that the story of the tower of Nesle had become of
European fame. The queen, of whom Brantôme, Jean Second,
Mayeme and Villon, all speak, was taken to be, successively,
Jeanne de Navarre, wife of Philippe le Bel; next, Marguerite
de Bourgogne, first wife of Louis X., as well as his two
sisters, Jeanne and Blanche, all three daughters-in-law of
Philippe le Bel.

But Robert Gaguin, a historian of the fifteenth century,
comes forward in defence of Jeanne de Navarre. After
speaking of the conduct of the three princesses, wives of
the three sons of Philippe le Bel and of their punishment,
he adds: 'These disorders and their frightful consequences
gave birth to a tradition injurious to the memory of Jeanne
de Navarre, wife of Philippe le Bel. According to that
tradition, she caused students whom she attracted to her
to be thrown into the river from the window of her room.
Only one single student, Jean Buridan, had the good luck to
escape the penalty he had incurred; this is why he published
this epigram (before his self-exilement): _Ne craignez
pas de tuer une royne; cela est quelquefois bon_ (Reginam
interficere nolite timere; bonum est).'

"Thus, Gaguin does not contest the fact; on the contrary,
he confirms it and develops it, only complaining--and not
without reason--that it was attributed to Jeanne de Navarre,
who did not live at the same time as Buridan. As regards
Margaret of Burgundy and her sisters Jeanne and Blanche,
they have not the safeguard or the protection of a date,
nor of the verdict of history. All the world knows, on the
other hand, that the three sisters were in other ways guilty
of the most scandalous conduct; two of them had their two
brothers, Philippe and Gaultier d'Aulnay as their lovers;
the tower of Nesle then belonged to the Princess Jeanne,
and was their meeting-place. But, one day, says Geoffrey of
Paris--

"'Tout chant et baudor et leesce
Tornés furent à grand destrèce,
Du cas qui lors en France avint:
Dont escorcher il eu convint,
Deux chevaliers joli et gaie,
Gaultier et Philippe d'Aulnay.'

"In fact, these two young men were suddenly arrested as
well as the queen and her sisters, the princesses. Philippe
confessed that he was the lover of Margaret, wife of Louis
x., and Gaultier that of Blanche, Comtesse de la Marche.
This confession made, says Geoffrey--

"'L'eure ne fut pas moult retraite
Que donnée fut la sentence;
Si furent jugiés sans doutance
Les deux chevaliers de leur _paire._
D'une sentence si amère
Por leur traison et péchié,
Que ils furent escorchié,
. . . . .
Et puis entrainé et pendu!'

"Margaret and Blanche were taken to the Andelys, where
they were flung, says Geoffrey, into a kind of underground
dungeon.

"'Longuement en prison là furent,
Et de confort moult petit urent.
L'une ne l'autre ni ot aise;
Mais toutes voies plus à mal aise
Fut la royne de Navarre,
En haut estoit; et à la terre
La comtesse fut plus aval,
Dont elle souffroit moins de mal,
Car elle estoit plus chaudement.
Ce fut justice voirement,
Car la royne cause estoit,
Du péché que elle avoit fait.'

"From this prison they were transferred to the
Château-Gaillard, a Normandy fortress. There, by order of
Louis x., Margaret was strangled with a towel, according to
some, and with her own hair, according to others. Blanche
was spared and divorced, and took the veil at the Abbey of
Maubisson, where she ended her life. But Jeanne was even
more fortunate; she had been arrested, like her sisters--

"'Et, quand la comtesse ce vit,
Hautement s'écria et dit:
Por Dieu, oiez moi, sire Roi;
Qui est qui parle contre moi?
Je dis que je suis preude fame,
Sans nul crisme, sans nul diffame;
Et sé nul ne veut contre dire,
Gentil Roy, je vous réquier. Sire,
Que vous m'oiez en deffendant
Sé nul ou nulle demandant
Me fait chose de mauvestie,
Mon cuer sens si pur, si traitie,
Que bonnement me détiendrai,
Ou tel champion baillerai,
Qui bien saura mon droit deffendre,
S'il ovus pies à mon gage prendre.'

She succeeded, indeed, in justifying herself more or less,
and her husband Philippe le Long took her back again.

"FRÉDÉRICK GAILLARDET"

There was nothing in all this particularly offensive to me; but I had been so greatly annoyed over the whole business, that I had promised myself, on the very first opportunity that presented itself, to be disagreeable to M. Gaillardet, and I did not intend to let this opportunity slip by. The occasion appeared and I seized it. I wrote, _ab irato,_ the following letter, and I did wrong. I cannot do more than confess it, I hope.

"TO M. S.--HENRY BERTHOUD

"MONSIEUR LE DIRECTEUR,--In turning over one of your back
numbers, I chanced upon an article in which M. Gaillardet
relates how he wrote his drama of _La Tour de Nesle._
I should never have believed that such details were of
sufficiently lively an interest to the public; but, as M.
Gaillardet thinks otherwise, I will submit to his opinion,
and I will relate, in my turn, how I wrote mine.

"I must first of all admit that its birth or, rather, its
incarnation, its earliest idea, dawned on my mind in a
less sudden and inspired and, consequently, less poetical,
a manner than in his case. It did not strike me on the
Pont des Arts, towards the evening of a beautiful summer
day, at that hour when the ray of the western sun purples
the horizon of the great city; it did not come to me,
indeed, while I was gazing at the Mazarin Palace, vulgarly
known as the Institut. That is why my _Tour de Nesle_ is
so unacademic. No; but you will, perhaps, recollect the
disastrous time when the cholera leapt from St. Petersburg
to London, and from London to Paris, and fell upon the
Hôtel-Dieu, spreading its wings over the doomed city like
a black pall. The rich man in his selfishness, first of
all, hoped that the plague-laden breath of this demon would
restrict itself to a mortality among the poor; that the
aristocratic scourge would only decimate the dwellers in
lodgings or garrets, and that it would think twice before
it knocked with its trailing shroud at the doors of the
mansions of the opulent Chaussée or the noble Faubourg. He
thought it had gone mad I He shut the padded shutters of his
windows so that no sound should reach him; he ordered his
valets to fight fresh candles, to bring in more bottles of
wine, to sing more songs. Then, at the close of the orgy, he
heard the shout at his door:--It was the Asiatic angel come,
like the Commander after Don Juan's feast, to seize him by
the hair, saying: 'Repent thee and die!'

"Oh I then there was universal desolation, indeed I and it
was curious to see how the rumour of the first cry of death
from a rich household went resounding through the faubourg
Saint-Honoré to the Luxembourg, and from the Luxembourg
to la Nouvelle-Athènes; how, suddenly, all who lived
encircled within that elegant triangle were stirred by a
growing terror, and thought of nothing but flight, and shut
themselves in their carriages emblazoned with the arms of
Crécy, of Marengo or of the Bourse. More than one of these
carriages, before it reached the end of the street, came
into collision with a waggon covered with black on its way
to the cemetery, and more than one fugitive met Death, the
incorruptible Customs' officer, who forbade him to go beyond
the frontier, recognising him as his, and having marked him
for the tomb beforehand.

"Then, to the noise of these barouches, berlins and
post-chaises, which increased in every direction, and tore
along the roads, there succeeded a dull and continuous
sound. A long file of hearses of all descriptions, from a
simple black curtain converted into one (for these funeral
equipages were soon insufficient for the number of guests
invited), followed incessantly, at a walking pace, in a
triple line, and before them yawned the jaws of a cemetery.
Then, by another route, the carriages returned, empty and
impatient to be refilled. All things disappear before the
incessant fear of death: the Bourse was mute; the walks
became solitary; the places of entertainment deserted; the
theatre Porte-Saint-Martin, that king of money-makers, took
9000 francs only during the whole month of April.

"One of the bomb-shells which had burst over Paris struck
me. I was still laid on my bed, feverish, but convalescent
when M. Harel came and sat by my bedside. The disease from
which his theatre was suffering was following the reverse
course from mine. M. Harel is one of those gladiators who,
if not the strongest, are, at least, the most agile I know:
a man of calculated cool-headedness, clever by nature,
eloquent from necessity. For five years, I believe, fortune
and he wrestled with one another and struggled in the lists
that go by the name of the pit of a theatre; certainly, more
than once, he bit the dust, but, more than once, he also
floored his adversary and, each time the thing happened,
the goddess did not rise except with empty pockets.
Nevertheless, this time, he himself confessed she had her
dagger at his throat!

"With a man like M. Harel, circumstances may change from ill
to good, and from good to ill ten times in one day; but,
in either case, it is always a pleasure to see him because
he is always amusing to listen to: Give him Mascarille and
Figaro for _valets de chambre_ and, if he does not get the
better of them, I wish I may be a Georges Dandin. It was,
then, with the usual pleasure which his presence gave me, no
matter, as I have previously said, what the position I might
be in with respect to him, that I saw M. Harel come in. This
time, moreover, I thought we were on friendly terms, and
his visit was a real bit of good luck to a convalescent. He
recounted to me, in the wittiest manner imaginable, all the
tribulations the theatre was undergoing, enough to drive an
ordinary man mad, and ended by saying that if my brains
were as empty at that moment as his theatre he was a ruined
man.

"An author's head is rarely quite dried up; he has always,
in one of the drawers of that marvellous piece of furniture
which we call the brain, two or three ideas which are
awaiting the period of incubation necessary for each of
them before they can come forth alive. Unfortunately, or,
perhaps, fortunately, none of these ideas was, at the
moment, ready to be born from me, and they each needed
several more months of gestation unless they were to come
forth into the world still-born. M. Harel gave me a week.

"There are two ways of working at literary work as a whole
and dramatic work in particular: one is conscientious, the
other pecuniary; the first artistic, the second bourgeois.
In the first method, one works thinking only of oneself;
in the second, thinking only of the public, and the great
evil of our profession is that it is very often the
pecuniary work which prevails over the conscientious, and
the bourgeois upholding itself over the artistic scheme.
Which means that, when one works for oneself, one sacrifices
all public requirements to personal, whilst, if one works
for others, one sacrifices all personal demands to public;
and this does not prevent, whatever their fate, an author
having works to which he is indifferent and those for which
he has a predilection. Now, it is useless to say that works
of predilection are not created in a week. I stuck to it,
then, not to give up any of the ideas I had in my head at
that moment; and, M. Harel seeing this, he incontinently
mentioned one of those which he had in his MSS. boxes at his
theatre.

"'_Pardieu!_' he said to me, 'there is in one of the three
or four hundred dramas received at the Porte-Saint-Martin a
subject which would suit your style of work admirably, and
in which Mademoiselle Georges would have a fine part.'

"'What is it?'

"'A Margaret of Burgundy.'

"'I cannot take it: I refused to deal with it the other day
when some one suggested it to me.'[3]

"'But why?'

"'Because a friend of mine, who, I think, has much more
cleverness than you, which is saying a good deal, is doing a
drama on it.'

"'Who is he?'

"'Roger de Beauvoir?'

"'You are mistaken! It is a novel entitled, _L'Écolier de
Cluny.'_

'Oh! then another difficulty is removed! I am all the more
pleased to plunge into the stream of the fourteenth century
at the time when cholera has come to pay me a call, for I
know my Louis le Hutin to my finger-tips.'

"'So it is understood I send you the MS. to-morrow.'

"'But the author! Will it suit his ideas?'

"'The play belongs to me; mine by fair and square contract:
I have the right to have it rewritten at my own pleasure,
by whomsoever I think fit. And, believe me, I feel sure
the author will prefer that you should touch it up rather
than any one else.... Besides, let me tell you everything
frankly.'

"'I warn you that, after that declaration, I shall be on my
guard!'

"'Exactly so ... You know Janin is rather friendly towards
me?'

"'Yes.'

"'Very well, I begged him to rewrite this play, as it
is unactable as it is, and I only took it after he had
consented to overhaul it ...'

"'Then you do not need me?'

"'On the contrary, for it was Janin himself who told me
to come to you. He has toiled and moiled at it; he has
put marvellous style into it; "I have Janin's MS. in my
possession; it is, indeed, perhaps the work on which he best
displayed the wealth and flamboyant versatility of his pen.
This is so true, that when my drama was done I made use of
his work as the gold dust with which to besprinkle my own,"
but, finally, he was the first to realise that there was no
play in what he had done. This morning, he came into my room
with an armful of papers, which he flung at me, telling me
that you were the only one who could put it into shape, that
I should kill him with worry, that he had the cholera and
that he was going to apply a score of leeches.'

"'Very well, send me all these old papers to-morrow?'

"'Will you set at it immediately?'

"'I will try; but on one condition.'

"'What is it?'

"'That I shall not appear at the rehearsals, and that my
name shall not figure on the bills; because I am doing this
for you and not for myself. So give me your word of honour?'

"'My word of honour!'"

"I have already mentioned that, at the time M. Harel came to
hunt me up, I was suffering from fever, a state of mind, as
every one knows, extremely favourable to the concoction of
works of the imagination. Therefore, the very same day, my
character of Margaret of Burgundy was decided upon, my rôle
of Buridan drawn out and part of the plot contrived. Next
day M. Harel arrived with his manuscript.

"'Here the thing is,' he said.

"'What a pity! it comes too late.'

"'How is that?'

"'Your drama is finished.'

"'Bah!'

"'Send me your secretary to-night; he shall have the first
scene.'

"'Ah! my dear friend! You are ...'

"' One moment! Let us concern ourselves with business
matters now.'

"'But you know that, between us ...'

"'Ah! it is not of my own I wish to speak; it is of those
of your young man.... You have made the young man sign a
contract, you told me?'

"'Yes.'

"'On what conditions?'

"'Why, according to the usual Porte-Saint-Martin terms: 2
louis per performance, I for himself, I for Janin, and 12
francs' worth of tickets.[4]

"'As Janin renounced his part in the collaboration, does he
give up his rights?'

"'There is no doubt on that head; he was the first to say so
to me.' 'Then, your young man enjoys the benefit of Janin's
withdrawal, and has the treaty entirely to himself?'

"'Nothing of the kind!'

"'Why?'

"'Because, with your rights, which are in addition to the
ordinary arrangements, that would cost me a ruinous sum per
night. Besides, he only claims one louis; he expects to have
a collaborator: he will get his louis and his collaborator;
only, the latter, instead of being named Janin, will be
called Dumas, and, instead of being named, will not hear of
it.'

"'Yes; but I would like this young man to be satisfied with
me, all the same.'

"'There is a way; let him deduct his second louis from your
rights.'

"'Yes, but then, you, on your side, will take the sum of 20
francs' worth of tickets; that will make even money for him.'

"'I am anxious it should.'

"'Do you agree to that?'

"'Perfectly.'

"'Let us draw it up.'

"I took up pen and paper and the treaty was drawn up and
signed.

"'Is there anything besides to take over in what you have
brought there?' I continued, pointing to the manuscript
lying on my bed.

"'Why, yes, in the first act ... Understand clearly that
this MS. is Janin's; I have not brought you the other, which
is illegible.' 'I will see that after I have written mine.'

"'Then I shall have something to-night?'

"'Yes, the first scene.'

"'That is well; Verteuil shall be with you at ten
o'clock.'[5]

"I spent the day scratching the nib of a pen on paper.
Verteuil came that night at the appointed hour; I was dead
tired, but the scene was done; it was the tavern scene.

"'At what time must I return?' said Verteuil to me.

"' To-morrow, at four.'

"'And shall I have the second scene?'

"'You shall have it.'

"'Wonderful!...'

"'Only, leave me in peace.'

"'I will take myself off at once.'

"'Verteuil took his leave. I then remembered what M. Harel
had said to me of the beauties of style, which, according to
him, existed in the beginning of the work. The first thing I
caught sight of, on looking at the names of the characters,
was that the principal hero was called _Anatole,_ a name
which seemed to me singularly modern for a fourteenth
century drama; but I went on with my reading undiscouraged.
There was a suggestion of plot, of which I took advantage,
and, as I have said, admirable things in the way of style.
However, I only took the tirade of the _grandes_ _dames._
Thus, it is at Janin, and not at me, that the marquises of
the faubourg Saint-Germain ought to throw stones. As far as
the second, third, fourth and fifth acts were concerned,
they diverged so greatly from ordinary theatrical rules,
that it was impossible to extract anything from them;
nevertheless, the magic of the style made me read them
right to the end; but, when I had read the manuscript, I
laid it down and did not open it again.

"Next day, Verteuil was prompt and I was punctual, and he
carried off his second scene. When the first three acts were
done, they were read to the actors without waiting for the
last two. According to our compact, my name was not uttered,
I never appeared at the reading, and M. Harel took the place
of the presumed author, who was still absent from Paris.

"In a week's time, M. Harel had his drama completely
finished. I then wrote to the young man to tell him that
his first performance was going to take place. He never
favoured me with an answer; but took carriage, came to Paris
and found his rehearsal tickets at his rooms. He rushed to
the Porte-Saint-Martin, came in as they began the second
act, listened to it quite quietly, also to the third; but,
at last, losing patience after the prison scene, he came up
on to the stage and asked if they were soon going to begin
the rehearsal of his play, or if they had made him come
solely and simply to listen to somebody else's drama. The
actors began to laugh. The resemblance in the names suddenly
occurred to his mind, and he saw clearly that he had said a
foolish thing.

"'What,' said Bocage to him, 'do you not recognise your
child, or has it been changed at nurse?'

"The young man did not know what to reply.

"'Are you dissatisfied with the prison scene?' continued
Bocage.

"'Not at all,' said the young man, who began to regain his
self-possession; 'on the contrary, it seems to me very
effective.'

"'Very well, but you shall see your second act,' resumed
Bocage; 'that will please you indeed!'

"The young man saw his second act, and declared it to be
exactly to his taste. Only, he seemed much to regret that
the name of Anatole had been exchanged for that of Gaultier
d'Aulnay.

"The young man followed the rehearsals of _his drama_ most
carefully, making objections at random to which nobody
listened, and corrections which they took good care not to
follow.

"The day of the representation arrived. Carefully though I
had kept the secret on my side, the indiscreet interest of
the manager, the jokes of the actors, even the complaints
let slip as to the _author,_ had denounced me to the public
as the real culprit; a certain way of handling, in the
construction of the play, and qualities of style impressed
with an individual stamp of its own, at each moment rose
up to accuse me more and more; in short, there was not
one single person in the theatre but who expected to hear
my name pronounced by the lips of Bocage, when he came to
announce, according to custom, that the play they had had
the honour of performing was by Monsieur * * * He named the
young man.

"I had just fulfilled the last engagement that I had set
myself, and, certainly, it was the most difficult. To hear a
whole theatre stamping, applauding with hundreds of hands,
demanding with the frenzy of triumph your name as the
author, which is equivalent to your person, your life and
your renown, and to give up instead of your own an unknown
name to the halo of publicity; and all this when one might
have done otherwise, since no sort of promise binds you,
since no engagement whatever has been entered into, this
is, believe me, the philosophy of delicacy pushed to the
extremest limit.[6]

"When the performance was over, I caught sight of our young
man as I was going downstairs with the audience. He modestly
received the compliments of all his friends and was riding
the high horse in the centre of a group of them. Janin was
going down at the same time as I. We exchanged one of those
looks which nobody could understand; then we went away arm
in arm, laughing all along the boulevard, at the young man,
at the public and, most of all, at ourselves. Next day, M.
Harel, who made out that the absence of my name on the bills
was prejudicial to him, invented one of those methods which
were peculiar to himself, of telling the public, tacitly,
what it was impossible to tell it outright, and he drew up
his bill in these terms--

"LA TOUR DE NESLE
"_Drame en cinq actes, en prose_
"DE MM. *** ET GAILLARDET

"He had, as we see, reversed the rules of algebra, which lay
down that one should proceed from the known to the unknown,
and not from the unknown to the known. It was impossible to
give proof, I think, of a more knowing ignorance and of a
more ingenious blunder. Which seeing, the young man wrote
the following letter to the editor of the _Corsaire...._.

We are acquainted with that letter as well as with Harel's answer: I have quoted them previously.

"That answer did not hinder the young man, who was a
barrister, from bringing an action against M. Harel, but it
was a singular action, as you shall see. He never dreamt
of taking the asterisks from the bill altogether; it was
a question, therefore, solely, of changing the position
of them. A request was, consequently, presented by the
young man to the Tribunal de Commerce, to have the things
re-established in algebraical position; this request asked
for a decree which should authorise the young man to put
himself first. Until then all went well, and the young man
had not completely forgotten the small service I had just
done him, and the way in which I had done it; witness the
following letter which he had written me when starting his
lawsuit--

'MY DEAR MASTER,--I wish to renew my thanks for your good
and loyal conduct in my affairs yesterday; but, since Harel
is intractable, I will not yield him an inch of ground, and
I am going to fight him. If, indeed, as he says, the honour
of his management is imperilled, so is my word compromised;
and _I am too far pledged with the public and with my
friends to remain quiet._

"'Do not let this business worry you, my dear master, and
particularly do not let it prevent you from going away
when you wish; only, in that case, I would ask you of your
goodness to make one trivial declaration,[7] so that Harel
may be brought to trial, and made to overcome his obstinacy
by the certain prospect of a conviction against him. A
thousand pardons for all the upset these miserable, wretched
quarrels are causing you. A thousand cordial thanks.

"'4 _June_ 1832'

"Owing to my declaration, the sentence was pronounced
and the unlucky asterisks were condemned to be put last.
Meanwhile, a singular idea had presented itself to the
young man: namely, to sell the MS. without my knowledge.
Consequently, he went in search of Duvernoy and told him
that he was the author of _La Tour de Nesle,_ and that he
had come to do business with him.

"Duvernoy, who knew how things had been going, came
in search of me, and warned me of the action of my
_collaborator._ We settled there and then the conditions of
the sale. It was fixed at 1400 francs, 700 of which were
to be handed to the young man. Doubtless, this sum did not
appear to the young man proportionate to the merit of _his
drama_; for he threatened Duvernoy and me with a second
lawsuit if we fixed the basis of terms on these conditions.
At the end of a fortnight he signed a contract of sale for
a sum total of 500 francs. The young man would have done
better, you see, to go on letting me look after his business
affairs. It is needless to say that only one single name
appeared on the pamphlet, as was the case on the bills. You
will, perhaps, think that in consideration of this last deed
of division my young man held me discharged?

"At the time I was occupied with the publication of my
complete works I received a letter from him. What do you
think he told me in that letter? He told me that he had just
learnt with the greatest surprise that I had the presumption
to put _his drama_ amongst mine. As one sees, the matter
had degenerated into buffoonery. I replied to the young man
that, if he continued to bother me with his nonsense, I
should print his manuscript in the preface of my own. This
intimation was a genuine thunderbolt to the poor devil. He
did not know that M. Harel had made me a present, as a kind
of premium, of the autograph MS. after the signing of my
agreement for _Angèle._

"Next day I received, by a sheriff's officer, an invitation
to place my manuscript in its author's hands, because, he
said, he had just negotiated its _sale._ The thing will
at first appear odd, but it will be understood, when one
reflects that, with the exception of one scene, the drama
was entirely unrevised; the publisher, then, could not have
been in his right senses, but the author was well within his
rights.

"M. Philippe Dupin, to whom I sent both the MSS., and who
still has them in his possession, replied to our adversary
that we were ready to surrender the said autograph, but
that we would only do so in exchange for a copy collated
under the inspection of three dramatic authors and
certified conformable to them. The young man reflected
for a fortnight, then withdrew his demand. This was the
third lawsuit he had begun against me, in order to gain
for himself 12,000 francs. Since that time I have heard
no further mention of the young man, and I do not at the
present day know if he be dead or alive. That is how my
_Tour de Nesle_ was composed. As for M. Gaillardet's, I am
not aware if it is, as he says, his best drama; I still only
know it from reading it, and I shall wait until he has it
played before deciding if it be better than _George_ and
_Struensee._--Faithfully, etc.,

"ALEX. DUMAS"

The days rolled by, and I knew that my future adversary went shooting every morning, and I was kept informed of the progress which he made. Finally, appeared the famous answer. Let me be permitted to reproduce it in full, with the insults it contains. It is probable that M. Gaillardet to-day regrets his insults towards me, as I regret my violence towards him.[8]

"TO M. S.--HENRY BERTHOUD

"MONSIEUR LE DIRECTEUR,--I published an article in the
twenty-first number of _Le Musée des Families_ which you did
me the honour to ask from me on the ancient tower of Nesle.
In that article, I related cursorily, and under the form of
a chat without any sort of pretension, how the idea had come
to me to write a drama, the first conception of which no one
has contested with me; a drama printed and published over
two years ago, and performed to-day for the two hundredth
time under my name, by the consent of M. Dumas himself. I
did not say a word of M. Dumas; I did not make any allusion
to the judicial and literary discussion which arose formerly
between him and me. Anyone can be convinced of this by
reading my article. I should have a scruple, indeed, against
reviving a quarrel long since extinguished, and to which an
amicable transaction put an end; a transaction proposed by
M. Dumas himself, as I shall tell in due course, by which
the public controversy that I had then desired and provoked
was settled in its earliest stages. However that may be,
to-day M. Dumas returns to the affair; he rekindles the
cold and scattered ashes, piling them up with his hands and
stirring them to life with his breath, and relights the
fire, at the risk of burning his own fingers at it. Since he
has thrown down the glove, I pick it up. He has incited me,
I reply to him. So much the worse for him if he be wounded
in this game, if his reputation chances to be compromised
thereby: it does not rest with me to avoid the fight.... I
am the offended, the insulted one I and, if ever retaliation
be permissible, it is to him who has not sought the
attack.... To such an one, vengeance is sacred and reprisals
holy, he employs the right of natural and legitimate defence!

"I come, then, to the _complete and true story of La Tour
de Nesle._ I will base my recital on proofs _written and
signed_ by the actual personages in this story, and, when
proofs shall fail me, I will put before the readers' eyes
the suppositions and probabilities of the case, and say to
him: 'Consider and judge!' But, in a lawsuit like this,
where _honour_ is everything, where the written proof of
many of the general facts cannot be set forth (for that, the
future would need to have been foreseen and divined as to
what would happen), where each of the litigants in certain
circumstances must be _believed,_ because he has always
told the truth in others, where he who has once lied, on
the contrary, is no more worthy of credence; in an affair,
in fact, where good faith ought to prevail over lying,
when both have nothing to show beyond _their word,_--I
must, and I will, before all else, convince my adversary of
_inaccuracy_ (I will be polite in expression), and, that
_inaccuracy_ proved, I will bind it on his forehead like the
inscription of a brand at the head of a standard, so that
the stigma may survive and hover incessantly over the guilty
one, before the eyes of the judges in this suit.

"M. Dumas declares (I begin with the first sentence of
his article relative to _La Tour de Nesle),_ that, having
received a visit from M. Harel, the latter said to him,
'The play belongs to me; mine by fair and square contract;
I have the right to have it rewritten at my own pleasure,
by whomsoever I think fit....' And, further: 'You have
made the young man sign a contract, you told me?' 'Yes.'
'On what conditions?' 'Why, according to the usual terms
of the Porte-Saint-Martin: 2 louis per performance, 1 for
himself, 1 for Janin and 12 francs' worth of tickets.' Then,
in a note, M. Dumas adds: 'This treaty is still in the
possession of M. Harel.' Very well, the more words the more
_inaccuracies._ Here is the only treaty which ever existed
between me and M. Harel; it is the one they made me sign, by
what manœuvre I will tell later, when they made me accept
the collaboration of M. Janin."

Then followed the text of that treaty, which the reader knows.

"'The drama was played,' says M. Dumas; 'they gave the
name of the _young man._ (M. Dumas has throughout used
_that expression_ to designate me.) To hear a whole theatre
clapping, demanding your name and, instead of one's own,
an unknown name given up to the halo of publicity; and all
this _when one might have done otherwise, since no sort of
promise binds you, since no engagement whatever has been
entered into,_ this is the philosophy of delicacy pushed to
the extremest limit.'

"Well, here is the letter I received from M. Dumas before
the performance, and the _conditions_ on which alone I
consented to allow the play to be acted."

That letter, the first that I wrote to M. Gaillardet, will not have been forgotten.

"Now, reader, decide. In the case of M. Dumas, which holds
its head highest, the _philosophy_ of delicacy, or, indeed,
that of _assurance_? 'Duvemoy came in search of me,'
continues M. Dumas, 'and we _settled_ there and then the
conditions of the sale. It was _fixed_ at 1400 francs, 700
of which were to be handed to the _young man._ Doubtless
this sum did not appear to the _young man_ proportionate to
the merit of his drama.... In a fortnight's time, he signed
a contract of sale for a sum total of 500 francs. The _young
man_ would have done better, you see, to go on letting me
look after his business affairs.'

"Here is a declaration signed by M. Duvemoy.

"'By the same impartial spirit which made me give a
declaration to M. Alexandre Dumas in which I acknowledged
that M. Gaillardet had offered me the MS. of _La Tour de
Nesle_ (we shall see this later), I assert that _there was
never any question_ of 1400 francs for the price of the said
MS., but of a sum which, I believe, was to be 1000 francs.
DUVERNOY

"'PARIS, 8 _Septembre_ 1834'

"I have much more to say and all the _philosophies_ to
quote! but they will find room in my narrative; for, now,
yes,--now, I feel myself quite strong enough to undertake
them!

"It was on 27 March that I read my drama _La Tour de Nesle_
to M. Harel in the presence of M. Janin and of Mademoiselle
Georges. The drama was received. 'Dumas could not have done
better!' exclaimed the manager, enthusiastically. 'There
is, however, something to touch up in the style, which is
not at all dramatic; but do not worry yourself about that;
begin another drama, and Janin will do us both the favour
of revising some pages.' I did not quite comprehend how M.
Janin, who had never written a play, could have a dramatic
style, to use the manager's expression. 'But, if he has not
written one,' I said to myself, 'he has heard a great many,
which, perhaps, comes to the same thing.'

"I therefore professed that I should be extremely flattered
and most grateful if M. Janin would indeed _smooth down_ a
few sentences. M. Janin consented with ready willingness,
and I left M. Janin and Mademoiselle Georges joyfully. I was
in the seventh heaven.... My rapture did not last long.

"Two days later, 29 March, I went to see what my _Janinised_
drama had become. What was my surprise to see a whole act
_rewritten_! 'It is a big piece of work,' I said aside to
the manager. 'M. Janin did much more than I had desired;
but I do not think my style so bad that he need ...' 'No,
no, certainly,' replied M. Harel; 'but Janin has thrown
himself thoroughly into it, he will at least want his
share.' 'What! his share?' 'Yes, his half.' 'But it is a
collaboration then?--there is some _misunderstanding_; I
will go and tell M. Janin.' 'Ah! what are you going to do?
You will offend Janin, Janin the most influential of the
critics! You will make an enemy for life.' 'Bah!' 'I tell
you it is so. You do not know what the theatre is! But ...
besides they have set to work on it! It is not intact. You
are bound on both sides! etc., etc.,' to such an extent that
M. Harel, seeing me quite stunned, took a sheet of paper,
scrawled upon it the agreement that I have transcribed
above, and made me sign it.... And that is how I got my
first collaborator.

"Then, I attributed that occurrence to a misunderstanding;
now, I attribute it to a _very good understanding_: ideas
change with time!