She was treasure-trove of Camille Rogier's, a beautiful woman, and titular mistress of the Bohemian encampment. They were all jealous of Rogier's good fortune, for, since he was twenty-five, they considered him a patriarch, and Théo could not understand how Cydalise could put up with such an old man. She lived quite happily in the Impasse, making the afternoon tea, sitting as a model, and inflaming all their hearts. Théo's passion was of a frantic heat. He besieged Cydalise with long and violent apostrophes, swearing to kill the senile tyrant who kept her in his power, threats for which Rogier, ever smiling, did not care a button. Poor Cydalise, she was a butterfly whose day was short. To Rogier's great grief consumption seized her. For some weeks he enlivened her sick-bed by singing her songs and drawing pictures for her amusement; but the day came when her ears no longer heard and her lovely eyes were closed. Gérard, Gautier, Roger de Beauvoir, and Ourliac went to her funeral, and Bohemia lost its official mistress. Yet there were others. Gérard draws a picture of Gautier, on a Gothic stool, reading his verses while Cydalise or Lorry or Victorine swung herself carelessly in the hammock of Sarah _la blonde_, and Arsène Houssaye at the end of "Vingt Ans" recalls them in the lines: _Judith oublie Arthur, Franz, Rogier et le reste,_ _En donnant à son cœur la solitude agreste;_ _Rosine à Chantilly caresse un jeune enfant_ _Plus joli qu'un Amour et plus joueur qu'un faon._ * * * * * _Ninon au Jockey Club vend chacun de ses jours;_ _Charlotte danse encore--et dansera toujours._ _Alice?--il faut la plaindre et prier Dieu pour elle,_ _Elle est dans les chiffons, la pauvre Chanterelle;_ _Armande?--Un prince russe épris de sa beauté_ _Travaille à lui refaire une virginité._ _Olympe?--un mauvais livre ouvert à chaque page--_ _Ce matin je l'ai vue en galant équipage...._