In spite of the cold, her toothless mouth was half open, as she was panting, and her eyes had an expression of distressing anxiety, as she looked at the wide road she had to cross, with carriages and omnibuses passing each other. Victor Hugo approached her, and after a short conversation, he drew a piece of money from his pocket, handed it to her, then taking off his hat he confided it to her and, with a quick movement and a laughing face, lifted the bundle to his shoulder and crossed the road, followed by the bewildered woman. I rushed downstairs to embrace him for it, but by the time I had reached the passage, jostled against De Chilly, who wanted to stop me, and descended the staircase, Victor Hugo had disappeared. I could see only the old woman’s back, but it seemed to me that she hobbled along now more briskly. The next day I told the poet that I had witnessed his delicate, good deed. “Oh,” said Paul Maurice, his eyes wet with emotion, “every day that dawns is a day of kindness for him!” I embraced Victor Hugo and we went to the rehearsal. Oh, those rehearsals of “Ruy Blas”! I shall never forget them, for there was such good grace and charm about everything. When Victor Hugo arrived everything brightened up. His two satellites, Auguste Vacquerie and Paul Maurice, scarcely ever left him, and when the master was absent they kept up the divine fire. Geffroy, severe, sad, and distinguished, often gave me advice. Then, during the intervals of rest, I posed for him in various attitudes, for he was a painter. In the _foyer_ of the Comédie Française there are two pictures representing the members of both sexes for two generations. The pictures are not of very original composition, neither are they of beautiful coloring, but they are faithful likenesses, it appears, and rather happily grouped. Lafontaine, who was playing _Ruy Blas_, often had long discussions with the master, in which Victor Hugo never yielded. And I must confess that he was always right. Lafontaine had conviction and self-assurance, but his elocution was very bad for poetry. He had lost his teeth, and they were replaced by a set of false ones. This gave a certain slowness to his delivery, and there was a little odd, clacking sound between his real palate and his artificial rubber palate, which often distracted the ear listening attentively to catch the beauty of the poetry. As to that poor Tallien, who was playing _Don Guritan_, he made a hash of it every minute. He had understood his rôle quite wrongly. Victor Hugo explained it to him clearly and intelligently. Tallien was a well-intentioned comedian, a hard worker, always conscientious, but as stupid as a goose. What he did not understand at first, he never understood. It was finished for life. But, as he was straightforward and loyal, he put himself into the hands of the author, and gave himself up then in complete self-abnegation. “That is not as I understood it,” he would say, “but I will do as you tell me.”