Unsentimental, speaks of _ma tristesse_ as he reviews that delightful
past. He cannot remember it, to be sure, but he has read about it. He
thinks ill of the present as he compares the present with 'those dead
years.' Writers then belonged to a sort of heroic brotherhood. They
went out like soldiers to conquer their literary liberties. They were
kings of the Paris streets. 'But we,' says Zola in a pensive strain,
'we live like wolves each in his hole.' I do not know how true a
description this is of modern French literary society, but it is not
difficult to make one's self think that those other days were the days
of magnificent friendships between young men of genius. It certainly
was a more brilliant time than ours. It was flamboyant, to use one of
Gautier's favorite words.

Youth was responsible for much of the enthusiasm which obtained among
the champions of artistic liberty. These young men who did honor to
the name of Hugo were actually young. They rejoiced in their youth.
They flaunted it, so to speak, in the faces of those who were without
it. Gautier says that young men of that day differed in one respect
from young men of this day; modern young men are generally in the
neighborhood of fifty years of age.

Gautier has described his friends and comrades most felicitously. All
were boys, and all were clever. They were poor and they were happy.
They swore by Scott and Shakespeare, and they planned great futures
for themselves.

Take for an example Jules Vabre, who owed his reputation to a certain
Essay on the Inconvenience of Conveniences. You will search the
libraries in vain for this treatise. The author did not finish it. He
did not even commence it,--only talked about it. Jules Vabre had a
passion for Shakespeare, and wanted to translate him. He thought of
Shakespeare by day and dreamed of Shakespeare by night. He stopped
people in the street to ask them if they had read Shakespeare.

He had a curious theory concerning language. Jules Vabre would not
have said, As a man thinks so is he, but, As a man drinks so is he.
According to Gautier's statement, Vabre maintained the paradox that
the Latin languages needed to be 'watered' (_arroser_) with wine, and
the Anglo-Saxon languages with beer. Vabre found that he made
extraordinary progress in English upon stout and extra stout. He went
over to England to get the very atmosphere of Shakespeare. There he
continued for some time regularly 'watering' his language