As the actual Bohemians from Pétrus Borel and Théophile Gautier to Baudelaire and Murger play their part in the world of fact, so the fictitious Bohemians from Raphael de Valentin and D'Arthez down to Rodolphe, Marcel, and Schaunard play theirs in the world of fiction. They are all part of that pageant which, though it took eighteen years to pass and declined in bravery towards its close, may conveniently be called the pageant of 1830. To disentangle the Bohemian contingent from its accompaniment of press and bustle is my aim in this book, which was suggested, I may frankly say, by some meditations on a second reading of Murger's "Scènes de la Vie de Bohème," a work of perennial delight that deserves a better acquaintance in England. In spite of the vivid light thrown by Murger on the life which he is describing, his stories are apt to be misleading unless read in the light of certain knowledge--knowledge which he could presume in his contemporaries and which it is the aim of this book, with all humility, to revive. Murger's little volume, after it has produced its first flush of pleasure and amusement, raises many disconcerting questions to a thoughtful reader. The scene it paints, for instance, is remarkably different from the two sides of literary life depicted in Balzac's "Illusions Perdues." Neither the brotherhood of the Rue des Quatre Vents nor the fast set into which Lousteau introduces Lucien are connected by an obvious link with Rodolphe and his friends. Then there is the question whether Rastignac in his days at the squalid Maison Vauquer was in any sense a Bohemian. Or, again, it may be asked how far fiction agrees with fact. Did Murger himself lead the same kind of life as a Schaunard or Marcel, and if he did, was the same to be said of other writers and artists, of Théophile Gautier or Gérard de Nerval? How did Bohemia arise, and how far was it, as Murger asserts, a necessary stage in the artistic life? These are some of the obvious inquiries to which it has been my part to attempt an answer, and I would crave the reader's indulgence if, at the outset, I seem to shrink from plunging at once into _la vie de Bohème_. The external details of a way of life cannot be seen in a true light if the social conditions and, still more, the state of mind of which it was an expression are not first made clear. For that reason a little "fringe of history" makes its appearance and leads to a short consideration of what French writers have called _le mal romantique_. Nevertheless, I have tried to keep the main subject always in view, and not to be led away into discussing aspects of the Romantic period which are not relevant. This is not, I claim with all deference, a concoction of all the old legends and Romantic love affairs. George Sand, for instance, and Alfred de Musset only poke their heads in; Alfred de Vigny and Marie Dorval, Sainte-Beuve and Madame Hugo play no part. Bohemia alone is our concern, a theme which is