wards cut away by the editors of the _Oeuvres
Completes_ for reasons given under the head of _Les Faux Saulniers_
(vol. iv. of that edition), is a specially Sternian piece, mixing up the
chase for a rare book, and some other matters, with the adventures of a
seventeenth-century ancestress of this book's author, who eloped with a
servant, zigzagged as much as possible. It is quite good reading, but a
little _mechanical_. Perhaps it is not too officious to remark that
_Filles du Feu_ is to be interpreted here in the sense of our "_Faces_
in the fire."

[244] Gerard was a slightly older man than Theo, but they were, as they
could not but be, close friends.

[245] Even those who care little for mere beauty of style--or who cannot
stand the loss of it in translation--may find here a vivid picture, by a
hand of the most qualified, of the mental condition which produced the
masterpieces of 1825-1850. And the contrast with the "discouraged
generation" which immediately followed is as striking.

[246] Especially, it may be, if one has heard Galuppi's own music played
by a friend who is himself now dead.

[247] Some would make it a quintet with Leconte de Lisle, but I think
"the King should consider of it" as to this. He is grand _sometimes_:
but so are Pere Le Moyne and others. It is hit or miss with them; the
Four can make sure of it.

[248] It does, of course, deserve, and in this place specially should
receive, the credit of being the first French historical novel of the
modern kind which possessed great literary merit.

[249] Alexander, though he actually wrote histories of a kind, was far
below Alfred in political judgment.

[250] _Vide infra_ on Dumas himself.

[251] About Plato and Homer, who are very welcome, and "Le Mensonge
Social," which is, perhaps, a little less so.

[252] But see note 2 on next page.

[253] One wonders if the Black Doctor was so sure of this on his own
death-bed?

[254] The first line of Gilbert's swan-song--the only song of his that
is remembered. It sets Stello himself on the track which the "Black
Doctor" has concealed up to the point. As the original rhythm could not
be kept without altering the substance, I have substituted another--not
so unconnected as it may seem.--By the way, Vigny has taken as much
liberty with French dates in this story as with English facts in the
Chatterton one. Gilbert died in 1780, and Louis XV. had passed from the
arms of his last mistress, Scarlatina