st plan,
but it was partly finished. In the collection, we find the scattered
treasures of an eminently French muse: old songs picked up in the
provinces, in which wit and naive sentimentality dispute for precedence.
All this still exists, but who can sing as he did the song beginning: "I
was but fifteen," or "Lisette, my love, shall I forever languish?" and
so many others!

To explain the inexpressible charm which distinguished Delsarte from all
other singers, a songstress once said: "His singing contrives to give us
the _soul of the note_. The others are _artists_, but _he_ is _the
artist_."

Chapter XVI.

Delsarte's Evening Lectures.

In Francois Delsarte's school there were morning classes and evening
classes. The former were more especially devoted to the theory, to
lessons. Those of which I shall speak might be compared to lectures, to
dramatic and musical meetings. A choice public was always present. Among
them were:

The composers Reber and Gounod;

Doctor Dailly, Madame de Meyendorf--a great Russian lady, the friend of
art;

The Princess de Chimay and the Princess Czartoriska, who glided modestly
in and took the humblest place;

Madame Blanchecotte, whose charming verses were crowned by the Academy;

Countess d'Haussonville, a familiar name;

M. Joly de Bammeville, one of the exhibitors at the Exhibition of
Retrospective Arts, in 1878;

Doriot, the sculptor; Madame de Lamartine, Madame Laure de Leomenil, a
well-known painter; Madame de Blocqueville, daughter of Marshal Davout,
and author of his biography; a throng of artists, men of letters and
scientists; certain original figures of the period.

On one occasion we were joined by a man of some celebrity--the
chiromancist Desbarolles. Delsarte had the courtesy to base his theory
lesson upon the latter's system; he pointed out its points of relation
with the sum total of the constitution of the human being. It was a
lesson full of spirit and piquant allusions; one of those charming
impromptus in which Delsarte never failed.

From time to time certain persons in clerical robes appeared in the
audience; the austerity of their habit contrasting somewhat strangely
with the attire of the elegant women, men of fashion and young actors in
their apprenticeship around them; but matters always settled themselves.
One evening one of these priests was in a neighboring room, the doors of
which were open into the drawing-room. If the songs seemed to