His own extraordinary gifts of industry, knowledge, brilliance, ingenuity, sympathy, were playthings to him. He scattered wit as he scattered wealth, lavishly, with both hands, being so reckless that, on occasion, he would sign work into which he had put nothing of his own. To such a pitch did Dumas carry his lack of seriousness that the last quarter or more of his life makes rather sorry reading. "The chase of the crown piece" may be amusing in youth, but when middle age takes the field in pursuit of the evasive coin, the spectacle ceases to exhilarate. Dumas was really of a most generous nature, but he disregarded the Aristotelian mean--he was recklessly lavish. Consequently he was, of course, preyed upon by parasites of both sexes, odious hangers-on of literature, the drama, and the plastic arts. He, who could not turn away a stray self-invited dog, managed to endure persons rather worse than most of that strange class of human beings--the professional friends of men of genius. "What a set, what a world!" says Mr. Matthew Arnold, contemplating the Godwin circle that surrounded Shelley. "What a set!" expresses Lockhart's sentiments about certain friends of Sir Walter Scott. We cannot imagine why great men tolerate these people, but too often they do; a famous English poet was horrified by "those about" George Sand. The society which professionally swarmed round Dumas was worse--the _cher maître_ was robbed on every hand. He "made himself a motley to the view," and as all this was at its worst after his great novels--with which we are chiefly concerned--were written, I intend to pass very lightly over the story of his decline.