Glasses clinked merrily, and poets and composers flitted about the room to chat with their contemporaries. A sketch artist, deftly drawing the portrait of a baritone's jolly little mistress, was surrounded by a bantering group, that passed keen, intelligent, and good-natured criticism on the work as it rapidly grew under his hands. The whitehaired pianist sat puffing at his cigarette and looking over some music with a rather pretty young woman who had written popular songs of La Villette. The opening of the doors and the straggling entrance of three men sent an instant hush throughout the room. "Verlaine!" whispered the musician to me. It was indeed the great poet of the slums,--the epitome and idol of Bohemian Paris, the famous man whose verses had rung throughout the length and breadth of the city, the one man who, knowing the heart and soul of the stragglers who found light and warmth in such places as the Soleil d'Or, had the brains and grace to set the strange picture adequately before the wondering world. The musical director, as well as a number of others in the place, stepped forward, and with touching deference and tenderness greeted the remarkable man and his two companions. It was easy to pick out Verlaine without relying upon the special distinction with which he was greeted. He had the oddest slanting eyes, a small, stubby nose, and wiry whiskers, and his massive forehead heavily overhung his queerly shaped eyes. He was all muffled up to the chin; wore a badly soiled hat and a shabby dark coat. Under one arm he carried a small black portfolio. [Illustration: 8202] Several of the women ran to him and kissed him on both cheeks, which salutations he heartily returned, with interest. One of his companions was Monsieur Bi-Bi-dans-la-Purée--so he was called, though seemingly he might have been in anything as well as soup. He was an exceedingly interesting figure. His sunken, drawn, smooth- shaven face gave terrible evidence of the excessive use of absinthe. A large hooked nose overshadowed a wide, loose mouth that hung down at the corners, and served to set forth in startling relief the sickly leaden color of his face. When he spoke, a few straggling teeth gleamed unpleasantly. He wore no overcoat, and his jacket hung open, disclosing a half-opened shirt that exposed his bare breast. His frayed trousers dragged the ground at his heels. But his eyes were the most terrible part of him; they shone with the wild, restless light of a madman, and their gaze was generally flitting and distrait, acknowledging no acquaintances. Afterwards, when Verlaine was dead, I often saw Monsieur Bi-Bi-dansla-Purée on the street, looking most desolate, a roll of white manuscript in his hand, his coat and shirt wide open, exposing his naked breast to the biting cold wind. He seemed to be living altogether in another world, and gazed about him with the same unseeing vacant stare that so startled me that night in the Soleil d'Or.