n."[25] The court cast Mdlle. Plessy in six thousand francs
_provision_, deferring judgment on the principal claim. Two years later
Mdlle. Plessy returned and re-entered the fold. Thanks to Samson, she
did not pay a single farthing of damages, and the Comedie bore the costs
of the whole of the lawsuit.[26]

[Footnote 25: Damages claimed by one of the parties, pending
the final verdict.--EDITOR.]

[Footnote 26: Curiously enough, it was Emile Augier's
"Aventuriere" that caused Mdlle. Plessy's secession, just as it
did thirty-five years later, in the case of Mdlle. Sarah
Bernhardt.--EDITOR.]

Both Samson and Regnier were very proud of their profession, but their
pride showed itself in different ways. Regnier would have willingly made
any one an actor--that is, a good actor; he was always teaching a great
many amateurs, staging and superintending their performances. Samson, on
the other hand, had no sympathy whatsoever with that kind of thing, and
could rarely be induced to give it aid, but he was very anxious that
every public speaker should study elocution. "Eloquence and elocution
are two different things," he said; "and the eloquent man who does not
study elocution, is like an Apollo with a bad tailor, and who dresses
without a looking-glass. I go further still, and say that every one
ought to learn how to speak, not necessarily with the view of amusing
his friends and acquaintances, but with the view of not annoying them. I
am a busy man, but should be glad to devote three hours a week to teach
the rising generation, and especially the humbler ones, how to speak."

In connection with that wish of Samson, that every man whose duties
compelled him, or who voluntarily undertook to speak in public, should
be a trained elocutionist, I remember a curious story of which I was
made the recipient quite by accident. It was in the year '60, one
morning in the summer, that I happened to meet Samson in the Rue
Vivienne. We exchanged a few words, shook hands, and each went his own
way. In the afternoon I was sitting at Tortoni's, when a gentleman of
about thirty-five came up to me. "Monsieur," he said, "will you allow
me to ask you a question?" "Certainly, monsieur, if it be one I can
answer," I replied. "I believe," he said, "that I saw you in the Rue
Vivienne this morning talking to some one whose name I do not know, but
to whom I am under great obligations. I was in a great