So I set to work very earnestly to make a name sufficient to sell my books, in order that I should no longer have to pay half the cost of printing them. And, moreover, that name, short and humble though it was, had already begun to be known in the land. Vatout had read my _Ode au général Foy_ and my _Nouvelles contemporaines_ (for it will be realised that the sale of only four copies had given a wide field to my generosity in the matter of presentation copies), and one day he sent me three or four lithographs, asking me to take one, and compose some lines to go under it. This requires explanation. Vatout published the _Galerie du Palais-Royal._ It was a sumptuously printed work and appeared under the patronage of the Duc d'Orléans. It was a lithographic reproduction of all the pictures in the gallery of the Palais-Royal, with notices, information or lines composed in their honour by all the literary men of the day. It would therefore seem that I was included among these literary personages, since Vatout asked me for some lines. My reasoning thus was more in the nature of sophistry than a dilemma; but, as I had no one with whom to discuss the matter, it presented itself to me as a dilemma and became an encouragement to me. Oh! there was nothing I needed then more than encouragement from all sides. I selected a print depicting a Roman shepherd lad, after a picture by Montvoisin. The boy was lying down asleep in the shade of a clump of vines. I do not reproduce the verses I made on this subject for their merit, but rather as an interesting study of my progress in poetical diction:-- "Il est une heure plus brûlante Où le char du soleil, au zénith arrêté, Suspend sa course dévorante, Et verse des torrents de flamme et de clarté. Alors, un ciel d'airain pèse au loin sur la terre, Les monts sont désertés, la plaine est solitaire, L'oiseau n'a plus de voix pour chanter ses amours, Et, sur la rive desséchée, La fleur implore en vain, immobile et penchée, Le ruisseau tari dans son cours. Il est une place au bocage Où, s'arrondissant en berceaux, Le lierre et la vigne sauvage Se prolongent en verts arceaux. C'est là qu'étendu sous l'ombrage, Un berger du prochain village Trouve un sommeil réparateur; Et près de lui son chien fidèle Veille, attentive sentinelle, Sur les troupeaux et le pasteur. Tu dors! jeune fils des montagnes, Et mon œil, aux débris épars autour de toi, Reconnaît ces vastes campagnes, Où florissait le peuple roi! Tu dors! et, des mortels ignorant le délire, Nul souvenir de gloire à ton cœur ne vient dire Que tes membres lasses ont trouvé le repos Sur la poussière d'un empire Et sur la cendre des héros.