ments. He was an old
bachelor without friends, and he held the misanthropical opinion
that disinterested friendship did not exist upon earth. He felt no
affection except for his sister's family, and the only way that he
showed that was by finding fault with everything that they did. He was
one of those people whose uneasy solicitude causes them to blame those
they love when they are ill, and obstinately prove to them that they
suffer by their own fault.

At the Clerambaults no one minded him very much. Madame Clerambault
was so easy-going that she rather liked being pushed about in this
way, and as for the children, they knew that these scoldings were
sweetened by little presents; so they pocketed the presents and let
the rest go by.

The conduct of Leo Camus towards his brother-in-law had varied with
time. When his sister had married Clerambault, Camus had not hesitated
to find fault with the match; an unknown poet did not seem to him
"serious" enough. Poetry--unknown poetry--is a pretext for not
working; when one is "known," of course that is quite another thing;
Camus held Hugo in high esteem, and could even recite verses from the
"Chatiments," or from Auguste Barbier. They were "known," you see, and
that made all the difference.... Just at this time Clerambault himself
became "known," Camus read about him one day in his favourite paper,
and after that he consented to read Clerambault's poems. He did not
understand them, but he bore them no ill will on that account. He
liked to call himself old-fashioned, it made him feel superior, and
there are many in the world like him, who pride themselves on their
lack of comprehension. For we must all plume ourselves as we can; some
of us on what we have, others on what we have not.

Camus was willing to admit that Clerambault could write. He knew
something of the art himself,--and his respect for his brother-in-law
increased in proportion to the "puffs" he read in the papers, and he
liked to chat with him. He had always appreciated his affectionate
kind-heartedness, though he never said so, and what pleased also in
this great poet, for great he was now, was his manifest incapacity,
and practical ignorance of business matters; on this ground Camus
was his superior, and did not hesitate to show it. Clerambault had a
simple-hearted confidence in his fellow-man, and nothing could have
been better suited to Camus' aggressive pessimism, which it kept in
working order. The greate