These illustrious names, however, are not sufficient to prevent the eye which runs down the list of original members from being startled by the obscurity of at least half the names. It must be remembered that in 1635 it was no envied distinction or disputed honour to form part of this new and untried corporation. The labours of the academicians were disinterested, for the Académie was not yet endowed, and there was little or no reward offered, besides the favour of the Cardinal, for the zealous labours of scholarship. Moreover, it was necessary to silence opposition and disarm ridicule. The general feeling of the public, as reflected in the action of parliament, was hostile. Louis XIII himself, although he had passed the Letters Patent, was far from favourable to his Minister's literary project, as we learn from a letter of Chapelain. But Richelieu was passionately bent on its success, and we see from Tallemant that whenever the Académie made a step in advance, the Cardinal was at no pains to conceal his lively satisfaction. But there were more seats than eminent men of letters to fill them, and consequently almost anyone who would consent or could be inveigled was elected. Scarron says the only thing that some of the original Immortals were fit for was to snuff candles or to sweep the floor. There was a class of academicians who were styled "the children of the pity of Boisrobert," because the "plaisant abbé," in filling up the _fauteuils_, was merciful to needy men of letters without talent, and fetched them in so that they might eat a piece of bread. They were buoyed up with the hope that Richelieu would bring in an age of gold for scribblers. But another element must not be forgotten. There was a great temptation to turn poachers into gamekeepers, and a certain number of the original members of the Académie Française were wits whose bitterness Richelieu himself, or Chapelain, or Boisrobert, dreaded. Maynard was one of these, but perhaps the most curious example was a man called Bautru. He was no writer, for one scurrilous piece in the _Cabinet Satirique_ represents his complete works. But he was a savage practical joker, whose tongue was universally dreaded. His wit seems to have been ready. He was a "libertine" in the sense of that day, and openly irreligious. One day, he was caught taking his hat off to a crucifix as he passed in the street. "Ah! then," said his friends, "you are on better terms with God than we supposed?" "On bowing terms; we don't speak," Bautru replied. In 1642, he called our Charles I "a calf led from market to market; and presently they will take him to the shambles," he prophetically added. His was an evil tongue with a sharp edge to it, which it was safest to have inside the Académie, and there were others of the same sort among the false celebrities, _les passe-volans_ or dummies, whose presence in the original list is at first so disconcerting.