This original and true bibliomaniac, for Nodier’s Theodore is merely a degenerate bibliophile, was celebrated at the time of the Restoration. He was a lawyer named Boulard, who, instead of admiring an imposing row of books in his cabinet, like his fellows, only took pleasure in arranging them on the shelves, or in piling them up in his closets. His library was scattered everywhere in this strange study, which overflowed with cheap literature from auction sales. Finally, there was such an invasion of books that Boulard, becoming the owner of the house in which he lived, expelled all his tenants in turn, and took possession himself of floor after floor for the storage of his books. After this he bought six other houses which he turned into depositories for books. One day, when Nodier asked him for a certain book, Boulard, going from one house to another, struck the stacks, the walls, the ramparts, of books with his cane, saying in triumphant irony, “It is either here or there.” Boulard, growing ill, and no longer able to go out, had the books brought to his bed. He handled them, asked their price, and held them up with admiring affection. As his memory became more and more impaired, he would buy the same book three or four times over. His family, worried at his growing mania, and not desiring to oppose the fervor of his wishes, which were turning violently to certain fixed ideas, conceived the plan of showing him a great part of his own books, which he no longer recognized, as if they were new acquisitions. This gave him a joyous surprise at every moment, and Boulard, having thus delightfully reviewed all his past life, went to sleep forever, over a book, in 1825. The remembrance of his death doubtless inspired Nodier with the half-sad, half-amusing ending of his Bibliomaniac. Boulard was the type of bibliomaniac whose progressive malady would be the most interesting to study. What was Nodier’s object, then, in searching here and there for materials with which to sketch an imaginary figure, when the notary was at hand? Nodier always followed the plan of taking his imagination as a guide; but imagination has also its moods and caprices, and it is a mistake for an author to be so fanciful that he ceases to follow the simple and fertile lead of nature.