ascend very high yet,
and the thread that sails it is not very strong. Amedee's kite is his
growing reputation. He must work to sustain it; and always with the
secret hope of making little Maria his wife. Amedee works. He is not so
poor now, since he earns at the ministry two hundred francs a month, and
from time to time publishes a prose story in journals where his copy is
paid for. He has also left his garret in the Faubourg St.-Jacques and
lives on the Ile St. Louis, in one room only, but large and bright, from
whose window he can see, as he leans out, the coming and going of boats
on the river and the sun as it sets behind Notre-Dame.

Amedee has been working mostly upon his drama, for the Comedie-Francaise
this summer, and it is nearly done; it is a modern drama in verse,
entitled L'Atelier. The action is very simple, like that of a tragedy,
but he believes it is sympathetic and touching, and it ends in a
popular way. Amedee thinks he has used for his dialogue familiar but
nevertheless poetic lines, in which he has not feared to put in certain
graphic words and energetic speeches from the mouths of working-people.

The grateful poet has destined the principal role for Jocquelet, who has
made a successful debut in the 'Fourberies de Scapin', and who, since
then, has won success after success. Jocquelet, like all comic actors,
aspires to play also in drama. He can do so in reality, but under
particular conditions; for in spite of his grotesque nose, he has strong
and spirited qualities, and recites verses very well. He is to represent
an old mechanic, in his friend's work, a sort of faubourg Nestor, and
this type will accommodate itself very well to the not very aristocratic
face of Jocquelet, who more and more proves his cleverness at
"making-up." However, at first the actor was not satisfied with his
part. He fondles the not well defined dream of all actors, he wishes,
like all the others, the "leading part." They do not exactly know what
they mean by it, but in their dreams is vaguely visible a wonderful
Almanzor, who makes his first entrance in an open barouche drawn by
four horses harnessed a la Daumont, and descends from it dressed in
tight-fitting gray clothes, tasselled boots, and decorations. This
personage is as attractive as Don Juan, brave as Murat, a poet like
Shakespeare, and as charitable as St. Vincent de Paul. He should have,
before the end of the first act, crushed with love by one single glance,
t