I knew the whole of this _pléiade_, who entertained the world with their wit and poetry for over half a century--some as friends and supporters, others as enemies and adversaries. Neither the benefits I have received from the former, nor the harm the latter sought to do me, shall influence in the slightest degree the judgments I shall pass on them. The first, in supporting me, have not caused me to climb higher by one step; the second, in trying to hinder me, have not kept me back one step. Through all the friendships, hatreds, jealousies of a life that has been harassed in its minor details, but ever calm and serene in its progress, I reached the position God had assigned me; I attained it without the aid of intrigues or cliques, and advanced only by my own endeavours. I have reached the summit which every man mounts half-way through life, and I ask for nothing, I desire nothing, I covet nothing. I have many friendships, I have not a single enmity. If, at the starting-point of my life, God had said to me, "Young man, what do you desire?" I should not have dared to demand from His infinite greatness that which He has condescended to grant me out of His fatherly goodness. So I will say all I have to say of the men I have named, according as they have appeared to me on my path through life: if I conceal anything, it will be the evil I know about them. Why should I be unjust to them? Not one among them possessed a single honour or good fortune in exchange for which I ever had any desire to barter my reputation or my purse. Yesterday I read the following words, written by an unknown hand on the foundation stone of a house which I had caused to be built for me, and which, until I or someone else can inhabit it, as yet shelters only sparrows and swallows:-- "O Dumas! tu n'as pas su jouir, et pourtant tu regretteras! E. L." I wrote underneath:-- "Niais!... si tu es un homme. Menteuse!... si tu es une femme. A. D." But I took good care to obliterate the sentence. Let us return to my contemporaries, and add to the list of famous names that led me to these reflections. Among musical composers, Rossini, Meyerbeer, Auber, Donizetti, Bellini, Liszt, Thalberg. Among dramatic artists, Talma, Lafont, Mars, Duchesnois, Georges, Leverd, Frédérick (Lemaître), Dorval, Potier, Monrose père, Déjazet, Smithson, Lablache, Macready, Karatikin, Miss Faucit, Schroeder-Devrient, la Malibran, la Hungher. I have had the honour to know several kings and princes,--they will have their place,--but my kings in the realms of art come before all, my princes in imagination have first place. To each sovereign his due honour. When I came out of my office, or rather from the bookshop where I had bought _Jean Sbogar_, I made haste to the place des Italiens. My waggon load of furniture was waiting at the door; it took but an hour to settle my household arrangements, and at the end of that time all was finished.