The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1883-04-06
IS0lteuiiautstli.
PECULIAR TRAITS or EMINENT FRENCH LITE
RARY MEN.
from BIackwood's Magazine.l


From BIackwOod's Magazine.I
Many Of the most distinguished French
| novelists and dramatlsts show much OF
| what we English would call Bohemianism
| in their habits. And II 1t be said tlat IL
| arises in great measure out OF the customs
| OF the country, we must remember tllat
| ,hcir customs are but the outcome OF the
| national temperament. They SIT loose 10
the domestic hearth and haunt cafes ana
| lighthouses, in jovial company, which
| conduces. again, TO mbusiness-like hours
| in the morning: when, thanks to the Ia.
vor OF the public they have come to anord
| Il, they have their country houses in con-
| genial colonies, where. living as race
apart, they are in the way Of entertaining
parties OF eccentric visitors, 10 the scandal
OF the citizen neighbors they look down
upon. The bearers OF some OF the greatest
names i'm modern French romance might
have been merged in the most miserable
| type OF Bohemianism had il not been Tor
! the transcendent talents which, by giving
| them lucrative popularity, saved them
| from the consequences OF their imprudence.
Dumas the elder, for example, showed him
self model men Of business in one re-
spect; and it was his bold originality that
devised the idea OF manufacturing fiction
| in piece-work by employes'he inspired.
From first to last he made an immense deal
OF money. But he was as free with his
coins as his famous quartette OF musket-
GERS with their pistols, and he laviShed the
results Of his hard-driyen bargains in the
day without giving a thought to the needs
OF the morrow. Had his application been
smaller and his talents less picturesque. and
his lot east i'm the Quarter Latin, he might
have been in perpetual straits like Henry
Murger, though he would have shown
more than Murger's ingenuity in eXtrica-
ting himself from them. Or, il we turn
| back TO the still mightier Balzac. we stand
amazed at the work he accomplished I'M
der the weight OF the difficulties he i'm
posed on himself. BY far the better part Of
his ample income went TO swell the profits
OF the usurers. lie wrote his .'Balthasar
Claes" and Eugene Grandet' with his
staircase blockaded. He was always keep
ing creditors and bailifls at bay; half the
| ingenuity that might have gone TO the COM
position OF masterpieces must have run TO
waste in making arrangements to meet en-
gagements, or more often in dcvising the
means OF eyading them. The double wear
and tear OF the brain must have been ire
mendous; and he treated the chronic mala-
dy that came of impecuniOusncSs with
douches OF the strongest coffee, swallowed
at the most unreasonable hours. Turning
day into night, he was forever burning the
| candle at both ends and the forms OF his
! greatest eXtrayaganccS were characteristics.
| His subtle vet strangely diScorded fancy be-
came dependent on surrounding itself with
the costly means OF realizing the luXuries
in which his Imagination loved to reyel.
He crowded his rooms with rich tapestries,
with carvings, and laccs, and rare china;
he never grudged the money for such an
object OF art as might have been among the
heirlOoms in Balthasar ClaeN's stately
Flemish mansion; and the taste had grown
upon him as his fancy began TO flag. twas
but another aspect OF the careleSSnesS
which makes the Bohemian. who needs
warmth by way OF inspiring a hating SON
net 10 his mistresSc's eyebrow, break up his
bedstead TO feed the fire.