Consider the novels of 1844-1850. The _Mousquetaire_ cycle, the Valois cycle, _Monte Cristo_! Did Scott, or even Dickens, at their best and most prolific, ever equal this rate of production? Perhaps we must give the prize to Scott for the work of 1814-1820, including _Waverley, The Antiquary, Old Mortality, The Heart of Midlothian, Rob Roy_, and so on. That record cannot be broken, and Scott worked in his odd hours, or in his holidays, while he worked _alone._ But in all the great novels of Dumas, Maquet, the _ci-devant_ Augustus Mackeat, collaborated. Yet who can deny that the work is the work of the Dumas of the _Mémoires_ and of _Mes Bêtes?_ It is the same hand, the same informing spirit, the same brilliant gaiety, the same honest ethics, the same dazzling fertility of resource. Maquet did something--there is no doubt on that head, the men constantly worked together. But what did Maquet do? He may have made--he did make--"researches." Heaven knows that they were not very deep. Perhaps he discovered that Newcastle is on the Tweed, and that the Scottish army which--shall we say did not adhere to Charles I.?--largely consisted of Highlanders. Perhaps he suggested that Charles I. might want to hear a Mass on the eve of his execution. Perhaps he depicted jolly Charles II. as _un beau ténébreux_, in the _Vicomte de Bragelonne._ I think that there I find the hand of Maquet. Whatever he did, Maquet did something. I suggest that he made these remarkable researches, that he listened while Dumas talked, that he "made objections" (as the _père_ invited the _fils_ to do), that sometimes he "blocked out" a chapter, which Dumas took, and made into a new thing, or left standing, like that deplorable Charles II. at Blois. On the whole, I conceive that (as regards the great novels) Maquet satisfied Dumas's need of companionship, that he was to the man of genius what Harry Killigrew was to the actual Charles II. Before the law, in 1856 and in 1858, M. Maquet claimed his right to be declared fellow-author of eighteen novels, all the best of them. It was recognised by the law that he had lent a hand, but he took no more than that by his legal adventures. M. Glinel publishes two of his letters to his counsel: "It is not justice which has won the day, but Dumas," exclaims Augustus. He also complains that he is threatened with a new law-suit _"avec l'éternel coquin qu'on appelle Dumas."_ Time kills many animosities. According to M. About, M. Maquet lived to speak kindly of Dumas, as did his legion of other collaborators. "The proudest congratulate themselves on having been trained in so good a school; and M. Auguste Maquet, the chief of them, speaks with real reverence and affection of his great friend." Monsieur Henri Blaze de Bury describes Dumas's method thus:--