Thus, a good many years ago, M. Capus, then a comparatively unknown journalist, already possessed those qualities which have made him by far the most popular playwright of to-day: a wonderful tolerance, a wonderful bonhomie, and a wonderful and incomparable talent at finding a way of carrying the treasure of faith in human goodness safely through perilous circumstances! As a consequence of these qualities M. Capus has been called an “optimist.” We are always and always hearing of the “optimism” of M. Capus; but if I may be permitted to differ from the vast majority of his admirers, I would suggest that, so far from being an optimist, M. Capus is, from the ideal point of view, a cynic. True, an amiable cynic. He regards mankind with a smile—not of mockery, because there is nothing unkind in it; a smile of raillery at the idealist’s effort to take the mote out of his brother’s eye and to afflict himself too seriously in his endeavour to get rid of the beam out of his own eye. From the point of view of M. Capus, motes and beams, big faults as well as little ones, belong to human nature. It is a pity, but it cannot be helped. “C’est la vie”—and so let us make the best of it. And it might be worse! Mankind might be cruel, whereas the average man, the average woman, is kind—the hearts of average men and women are in the right place. Thus, let mankind not be judged too harshly. Since we are what we are, it is inevitable we should commit follies. But let us see to it that our hearts _are_ in the right place, and when the moment arrives we shall know how to make atonement for those follies and pass on undisgraced. “Amusez-vous bien, soyez gais; mais soyez bons.” Such might be M. Capus’ message to mankind; and that message, indeed, he has delivered from the stage. For amongst French playwrights who bring home to us vividly, by means of illustration, French ways of feeling and methods of judgment that are not English methods, M. Alfred Capus stands out as the efficient interpreter of the typical personage recognised by general consent in France as “l’homme qui est foncièrement bon.”