ad commenced his career
as a writer in the _Minerve Francaise_. In this miscellany, his letters
on Paris acquired as much vogue as his comedies. About 1818, Etienne
acquired a single share in the _Constitutionnel_, and after a year's
service became impregnated with the air of the Rue Montmartre--with the
spirit of the _genius loci_. When one has been some time writing for a
daily newspaper, this result is sure to follow. One gets habituated to
set phrases--to pet ideas--to the traditions of the locality--to the
prejudices of the readers, political or religious, as the case may be.
Independently of this, the daily toil of newspaper writing is such, and
so exhausting, that a man obliged to undergo it for any length of time
is glad occasionally to find refuge in words without ideas, which have
occasionally much significancy with the million, or in topics on which
the public love to dwell fondly. Under the reign of Louis XVIII. and
Charles X. it lost no opportunity, by indirection and innuendo, of
hinting at the "Petit Caporal," and this circumstance during the life of
the emperor, and long after his death, caused the journal to be
adored--that is really the word--by the old army, by the _vieux de
vieille_, and by the _durs a cuirs_. In these good old bygone times the
writers in the _Constitutionel_ wore a blue frock closely buttoned up to
the chin, to the end that they might pass for officers of the old army
on half-pay. In 1830 the fortunes of the _Constitutionnel_ had reached
the culminant point. It then counted 23,000 subscribers, at 80 francs a
year. At that period a single share in the property was a fortune. But
the avatar of the Citizen King spoiled in a couple of years the sale of
the citizen journal. The truth is, that the heat of the Revolution of
July had engendered and incubated a multitude of journals, great and
little, bounding with young blood and health--journals whose editors and
writers did not desire better sport than to attack the _Constitutionnel_
at right and at left, and to tumble the dear, fat, rubicund, old
gentleman, head over heels. Among these was the _Charivari_, which
incontinently laughed at the whole system of the establishment, from the
crapulous, corpulent, and Voltairien Etienne, down to the lowest
printer's devil. The metaphors, the puffs, _canards_, the _reclames_,
&c. of the _Constitutionnel_ were treated mercilessly and as
nothing--not even Religion itself can stand the test of ridicule