re is no novelist in French literature--or, indeed, in any
other--who, during his lifetime, occupied such a curiously "mixed"
position as Alphonse Daudet.[415] No contemporary of his obtained wider
general popularity, without a touch of irregular bait or of appeal to
popular silliness in it, than he did with _Le Petit Chose_, with the
charming bundle of pieces called _Lettres de Mon Moulin_, and later with
the world-delighting burlesque of _Tartarin de Tarascon_. _Jack_ and
_Fromont Jeune et Risler Aine_ contained more serious advances, which
were, however, acknowledged as effective by a very large number of
readers. But he became more and more personally associated with the
Naturalist group of Zola and Edmond de Goncourt; and though he never was
actually "grimy," he had, from a quite early period, when he was
secretary or clerk to the Duc de Morny, adopted, and more and more
strenuously persisted in, a kind of "personal" novel-writing, which
might be regarded as tainted with the general Naturalist principle that
nothing is _tacendum_--that private individuality may be made public use
of, to almost any extent. Of course a certain licence in this respect
has always been allowed to novelists. In the eighteenth century English
writers of fiction had very little scruple in using and abusing that
licence, and French, though with the fear of the arbitrary justice or
injustice of their time and country before them, had almost less. As the
nineteenth went on, the practice by no means disappeared on either side
of the Channel. With us Mr. Disraeli indulged in it largely, and even
Thackeray, though he condemned it in others, and was furious when it was
exercised on himself, in journalism if not in fiction, pretty
notoriously fell into it now and then. As to Dickens, one need not go
beyond the too notorious instance of Skimpole. Quite a considerable
proportion of Balzac's company are known to have been Balzacified from
the life; of George Sand's practice it is unnecessary to say more.

[Sidenote: His books from this point of view and others.]

But none of these is so saturated with personality as Daudet; and while
some of his "gentle" readers seem not to care much about this, even if
they do not share the partiality of the vulgar herd for it, it disgusts
others not a little. Morny was not an estimable public or private
character, though if he had been a "people's man" not much fault would
probably have been found with him. I dares