e she smiles, how strong is love, how frail
is life.

* * * * *

RENE LE SAGE

Gil Blas

Except that he was born at Sarzeau, in Brittany, on May 8,
1668, and that he was the son of the novelist Claude le Sage,
little is known of the youth of Alain Rene le Sage. Until he
was eighteen he was educated with the Jesuits at Vannes, when,
it is conjectured he went to Paris to continue his studies for
the Bar. An early marriage drove him to seek a livelihood by
means of literature, and shortly afterwards he found a
valuable and sympathetic friend and patron in the Abbe de
Lyonne, who not only bestowed upon him a pension of about
L125, but also gave him the use of his library. The first
results of this favour were adaptations of two plays from
Rojas and Lope de Vega, which appeared some time during the
first two or three years of the eighteenth century. Le Sage's
reputation as a playwright and as a novelist rests, oddly
enough, in each case on one work. As the author of "Tuscaret,"
produced in 1709, he contributed to the stage one of the best
comedies in the French language; as author of "The Adventures
of Gil Blas of Santillana" he stands for all time in the front
rank of the world's novelists. Here he brought the art of
story-writing to the highest level of artistic truth. The
first and second parts of the work appeared in 1715, the third
in 1724, and the fourth in 1735. Le Sage died at Boulogne on
November 17, 1747.

_I.--I Start on my Travels_

My uncle, Canon Perez, was a worthy priest. To live well was, in his
opinion, the chief duty of man. He lived very well. He kept the best
table in the town of Oviedo. I was very glad of this, as I lived with
him, my parents being too poor to keep me.

My uncle gave me an excellent education. He even learned to read so as
to be able to teach me himself. There were few ecclesiastics of his rank
in Spain in the early part of the seventeenth century who could read a
breviary as well as he could when I left him, at the age of seventeen,
to continue my duties at the University of Salamanca.

"Here are forty ducats, Gil Blas," he said to me when we parted. "And
you can take my old mule and sell it when you reach Salamanca. Then you
will be able to live comfortable until you obtain a good position."

It is, I suppose, abou