THE pageant of 1830 has passed, and our gaze has been directed to its Bohemian ingredients with the purpose of noting the particular marks and qualities which distinguished Bohemia, and how their particular manifestations were conditioned and varied by the progress of the years. Looking out of the window of the present, we have been unable at any moment to call a halt, lest we should lose a comprehensive view of the main development. Now that this view has been gained it will do no harm to send the procession once more before the mind's eye, that we may fix at leisure any less important details which may seem in themselves attractive. One of the most happy qualities of the Bohemian nature is its capacity for amusing itself. Real boredom and lackadaisical idleness do not come into the list of its shortcomings. The passionate Romantics, indeed, fashionably suffered from "spleen" and "ennui," they proclaimed a "coeur usÉ comme l'escalier d'une fille de joie," but the Bohemian, so far as he indulged in these peculiarities, was amusing himself. To him "spleen" and "ennui" were part of the game which he embraced with enthusiasm and in which he desired to excel; yet they were parts to which, as a general rule, he did not pay too much attention, preferring the more positive and assertive sides of Romanticism. Neither Gautier nor GÉrard de Nerval nor Rodolphe nor Schaunard presents himself to the imagination as suffering from boredom. An unfailing capacity for amusing oneself and finding amusement in one's fellow-men is an essential Bohemian trait. The preceding chapters have not been wholly devoid of indications as to the way in which these talents were exercised by the Bohemian clans, but it was necessary to insist rather on the diversions which characterized the particular spirit of each brotherhood than on the general opportunities which they all enjoyed with slight variation. The field is now open without restriction, and it will not be amiss to take a glimpse here and there at the Bohemian enjoying his leisure, if only to add a few vivid touches that will enliven the background of the picture. The work of Bohemia can always be taken for granted; artistic endeavour, whether actively or indolently pursued, varies but little in external feature; the change, the colour, the tragedy and comedy are only to be found within the artist's mind; but the amusement of Bohemia, so far from being hidden, courts publicity. It takes its colour, too, so largely from the changing world around that there is great pictorial value in its easily observable vicissitudes. For that reason I devote this chapter to the subject of its title without further apology, but only with the caution that here the accidents rather than the essentials of Bohemia are regarded. The privilege of amusement is open to everybody, but to see what Bohemia made of its privileges in that respect is, perhaps, to quicken it for the imagination by an extra spark.

Precisians might say that dress hardly comes under the head of amusements and that on certain views it is more properly included in the category of necessities or of nuisances. Yet there is no doubt that for all women—and for more men than would admit it—to be well dressed is an enjoyment, a term only differing from amusement by a smaller suggestion of possible frivolity. It is quite a sufficient warrant, at all events, for giving dress a small part in this chapter; besides, the costume of any individual or society is both a sure indicator of qualities and an apt focus for judgment. In England, the very home of illustrated books and papers, it is not necessary to say much in evoking the costume of a past age, so that the subject may be treated quite shortly, especially as regards the men of Bohemia, whose dress was too often a deplorable tragedy. When Marcel went to Musette's party with "Mathusalem" buttoned up to the neck over a blue shirt dotted with the figures of a boar-hunt he was, as Murger says, "dressed in the worst taste possible." In such a case there is no more to be said; his appearance would vary little from age to age. To the Bohemian in his lean days, certainly, it would be an insult to impute enjoyment of his tattered wardrobe. Those who most enjoyed dressing, without a doubt, were the Bohemian generation who cheered "Hernani" with such frenzy, for they made their pourpoints, felt sombreros, Robespierre waistcoats, and Phrygian caps effective details in the general Romantic demonstration and, as such, matters of intense pleasure. But these extravagances have already caught our attention; they were part of that frantic desire for novelty and colour which was a symptom of le mal romantique; their proper complement was that rage for fancy-dress balls which broke out shortly after 1830 and laid every nationality and period under contribution for picturesque costumes. So far as the men are concerned, it need only be pointed out that the general dress of the time—against which Bohemia stood out at first and into which it gradually faded—was that of tight pantaloons with straps, long coats with full skirts and accentuated waists, full cravats, lavish jewellery, and high hats in a bewildering variety of shapes, cylindrical, conical, inverted conical, curly, straight, with broad brims and with scarce a brim at all—the civilian uniform, in fact, of our own late Georgian and early Victorian era. It was a dress that only a few could wear with distinction; on the rest it wrinkled and puffed in inevitable ugliness. A Roger de Beauvoir could look immaculately moulded, but one has only to glance at the caricatures of TraviÉs, Monnier, Daumier, and Gavarni to see how unequivocally hideous were the clothes of an average man. To be out at elbows in this exacting fashion was indeed to be a sorry sight, and one can well imagine poor Lucien de RubemprÉ to have been in his provincial attire fair game for the sneers of Rastignac and de Marsay. Still, even the Bohemian had a new suit at times, and it lights the memory of ArsÈne Houssaye, Camille Rogier, Murger, Champfleury, and the rest to recall that it was not for comfortable lounge suits and flannels that they got into debt, but for correct suits of "tails," flowery waistcoats, top-hats, and patent leather boots. It gives a quaint touch of decorum to the picture of their wildest excesses.

Women entered Bohemia as guests rather than as inhabitants, and to the fair visitors conformity to fashion was anything but a trifle. To deck themselves fittingly was their constant amusement, and one in which they took good care that their swains should be sharers. The female dress of the time is well known to us from early pictures of Queen Victoria and the paintings of Winterhalter; there are few, too, who at one time or another have not seen some of Gavarni's beautiful fashion plates. The Empire style had entirely disappeared, and the accent was in 1830 laid chiefly on the waist. The shoulders were sloping and wide, the sleeves so voluminous that by 1836 they were like miniature balloons, the skirt very wide and full, ending above the ankles. The waist and head were made to seem very small in proportion, so that two loaves placed one on top of the other would have made a very good caricature of a woman's figure at any time during the golden age of Bohemia. The hair was elaborately done to frame a pretty face daintily under a large poke-bonnet. It was pre-eminently the day of "fragile" women: nothing in their costume seemed made for hard wear. Cydalise or Victorine, as she swung in the hammock among the gallants of the Impasse du DoyennÉ, would have kicked a little cross-laced foot out from ethereal folds of flowered muslin, and gathered a gauzy scarf enticingly round bare shoulders. Fashions were indeed expensive for a fond lover's pocket, but at least he was never at a loss what to buy for his mistress, so many were the little accessories to the Graces' toilet. He was never wrong, for instance, in offering a piece of gay ribbon, for there were bows everywhere, on the bosom, on the sleeves, and, with long dazzling streamers, round the waist. There was no end to their variety and combination of colours, brilliant and pale; even the crudest Scottish tartans were not considered amiss, as a certain dress in the London Museum will show the incredulous. If ribbon was too paltry, a man in a really generous mood would present a cashmere shawl, an expensive and much appreciated luxury. The manipulation of shawls on frail, rounded little persons, who, in England at least, still fainted at will and indulged in the vapours, was a matter of some art. Balzac, in one of his short stories, asserts that a femme du monde could be distinguished from the actress or the grisette by the handling of her cachemire alone. There was only one great change in woman's dress between the earlier and later days of Bohemia, and that was in the sleeves, which dwindled suddenly as if the balloons had been pricked, and became either closely fitting or almost disappeared into two little frilly bands. In fact, during the forties, before skirts began to be exaggerated on horse-hair paddings and verge upon the crinoline, female costume was as nearly natural as it can be if corsets be granted. Nothing can be more charming than the appearance of the Queen of the Belgians in her portrait by Winterhalter which hangs in the gallery at Versailles. She wears a red velvet dress, cut simply as to the corsage, with the skirt reaching the ground in full, stately folds: there is no extravagance of bows and frills, only a little lace at the bosom and sleeves. So, if we would picture Mimi or Musette, as they were dressed for that memorable day at Fontenay-aux-Roses, in the new muslin frocks made by their own hands, we must imagine dainty little women, looking as if a breath would blow them away, their pretty cheeks showing between two bewitching clusters of ringlets, straw bonnets with not too large brims upon their heads, tied with a coquettish ribbon, gowns of flowered muslin, light, simple, and flowing, and scarfs pinned round their sloping shoulders or held in place by mittened hands. Gavarin drew them to the life time and time again, and they were considerably more attractive than any would-be BohÉmiennes of our time in their rough, untidy tweeds or amorphous "rational" dress.

From the amusement of clothing the body it is an easy transition to that of refreshing it. Eating and drinking, like dress, may from a certain point of view come under the head of necessities, but indulgence in good cheer when possible is a habit of young people of which a Bohemian was by no means contemptuous. A word, therefore, about his particular haunts among the thousand cafÉs and restaurants of Paris will not be out of season. After 1830 the great houses in the Palais Royal had fallen out of fashion, and the four leading restaurants of Paris were on the boulevard. Bohemians, it is true, were not often to be found within them, but in the golden age, when Bohemia was nearer to the dandies and viveurs, it would at least have been possible that in a moment of extravagance some Bohemian friend should have accompanied Roger de Beauvoir into the CafÉ de Paris, the CafÉ Riche, the CafÉ Hardy, or the CafÉ Anglais. The CafÉ de Paris was opposite Tortoni's, which stood at the end of the Rue Taitbout. Besides being the home of the aristocratic petit cercle, it was renowned for its witty conversation and its general air of luxury. Since it was favoured by the aspirants to smartness, as well as the perfect examples, its society was less select than that of the CafÉ Riche, at the corner of the Rue Lepeletier, or the CafÉ Anglais, which still remains in its old position. There was a quiet solidity about the CafÉ Anglais, in particular, which gave it a peculiar air of distinction, though its company was gay enough at supper-time. It was especially famous for its roast meat and its grills, though in these matters the CafÉ Hardy, at the corner of the Rue Laffitte, ran it close. Hardy was an English cook who invented the dÉjeuner À la fourchette, and popularized it by setting up the first silver grill in Paris. Customers chose their own cutlet or steak and saw it cooked before their eyes. At all these four the prices were very high, and with regard to two of them it was said: "On doit Être riche pour dÎner au CafÉ Hardy, et hardi pour dÎner au CafÉ Riche." However, the chief haunt for Bohemians with money to spend was the Rocher de Cancale, where it was easier to be uproarious without offending the proprieties. This famous restaurant still stands in the dirty, provincial Rue Montorgueil, in the midst of small shops whose wares overflow on to the pavement. The stately ornamentation of dark painted wood is still visible on its upper stories, but the specimens of edibles in its ground-floor windows tell too plainly to what depths it has sunk. It is no longer a possible home for Rastignac and his boon companions, nor would it tempt ArsÈne Houssaye to entertain there the brethren of la BohÈme galante, for it merely plies the trade of the convenient marchand de vin in a rather squalid quarter. The Rocher de Cancale had declined already during the later days of Bohemia, and in Murger's day they repaired on jours de liesse to the CafÉ de l'OdÉon, Hill's Tavern in the Boulevard des Capucines, or the Cabaret Dinochan at the corner of the Rue de Navarin. The first of these was, in particular, the haunt of Baudelaire and his friends, where the unfortunate HÉgÉsippe Moreau made his brief acquaintance with the main stream of Bohemia towards the end of his days, which had been mainly passed in a backwater. Hill's Tavern was one of the many chop-houses in the English style that flourished in Louis Philippe's Paris—only the Petit Lucas, a charming place for a quiet dinner, remains to-day—to cater for the down-at-elbows Englishmen, jockeys, and trainers, of whom there was always a certain number. At supper-time, however, it was invaded by Bohemia, and was often so full that its doors had to be closed. One of its peculiarities was that its private rooms were named after Shakespeare, Byron, and other great poets. The CafÉ Dinochan, according to Delvau,[30] was the ground on which a great many small papers of the day were started. Monselet, Nadar, FauchÉry, and Champfleury were among its customers, and Murger died in debt to its proprietor for twelve hundred francs, for it was said of this worthy creditor: "On dÎne trÈs-bien chez lui quand on a quarante sous dans une poche—et dix francs dans l'autre." Yet the full apparatus of a restaurant was not necessary to the gaiety of Bohemian suppers, for in scanty days they made just as merry in the shops of one or two bakeries on rolls and warm milk. The Boulangerie Cretaine in the Quartier Latin was famous for its milk rolls and for the brilliant conversation of Privat d'Anglemont, who, though it was against his principle to get into debt, ran up a bill there for halfpenny rolls of six hundred francs. The other famous baker was the pÂtissier Pitou, by the Porte Montmartre, where a crowd of Bohemians used to congregate after the midnight closing of the cafÉs. In the back shop was a table running round three sides of the square, and at this "piano," as it was called, the quaint figure of Guichardet presided. Guichardet, whose "nez vermeil et digne" was celebrated in one of Banville's triolets, was a Bohemian of the type of Balzac's Comte de la PalfÉrine, one who had voluntarily dropped out of the race of life while preserving all his dignity and pride. He passed his days in amiable vagabondage, but preserved "a perfume of exquisite politeness and witty impertinence which made him the most delightful companion in the world." So says Delvau, according to whom he was the only man left in France who really knew how to say "Femme charmante!"

So far I have mainly mentioned the haunts of Bohemians with the means and inclination for a certain amount of self-indulgence. But in Bohemia occasions preponderated when indulgence in anything beyond bare necessities was an impossibility. The left bank swarmed with cheap refuges for those who had hearty appetites and only a few pence. There was Viot's for the poorest of the poor; Dagneaux's or Magny's in the Rue Contrescarpe-Dauphine—rather superior houses where it was possible to procure a semblance of good cheer; and the Cabaret of MÈre Cadet outside the BarriÈre Montparnasse, where Schaunard had his first meeting with Colline over the stewed rabbit with two heads. This last had a garden which ran along the Montparnasse cemetery, and under the shade of its dusty shrubs not only literary Bohemians but nearly all the young actors and actresses of the ThÉÂtre Montparnasse and the ThÉÂtre du Luxembourg made their scanty meals. You might as well have asked for sphinx there as chicken, says Delvau, the staple dishes being stewed rabbit and choucroute garnie. To give a longer catalogue of such places would be neither instructive nor amusing, and their types are easily enough found in the Paris of to-day. There are two, however, that call for special mention, for fiction has carried their fame beyond the days of their material existence. No reader of Balzac's "Illusions Perdues" can have forgotten the description of the cheap eating-house at the corner of the Place de la Sorbonne and the Rue Neuve de Richelieu, with the small panes of glass of its front window, its comforting announcement of pain À discrÉtion, its long tables like those of a monastic refectory, its varieties of cow's flesh and veal, and the hurried air of its diners, who came there to eat and not to loiter. This famous house, where a dinner of three dishes with a carafon of wine or a bottle of beer cost ninepence, where Lucien de RubemprÉ met Lousteau and made the acquaintance of d'Arthez and his virtuous friends, was the restaurant of Flicoteaux, no product of Balzac's imagination, but a name known to all the strugglers for fame and fortune. It was a sure ground on which to observe Bohemia, not indeed in its greatest indigence, but on the days when there was at least no margin. Thackeray mentions it in his "Paris Sketch-Book," and there is a passage in Lytton Bulwer's "France" which vividly gives the impression produced by Flicoteaux on an English eye:

Flicoteaux has long been swept away, and buildings of the Sorbonne now occupy its site. Gone, too, these many years, is the CafÉ Momus, which stood in a back street by the old church of Saint-Germain l'Auxerrois, the hostelry celebrated by so many exploits of Murger's four heroes in "ScÈnes de la Vie de BohÈme." It was here that Schaunard and Colline collected Rodolphe for the Bohemian brotherhood, and it became their home, not so much for meals, though it was the scene of their reckless Christmas Eve supper which introduced the saviour Barbemuche, but rather for the lighter consommations over which, by the French custom, they could spend unlimited hours—a precious privilege when a cold garret was the only alternative. There was nothing fictitious about the CafÉ Momus; it was a real establishment serving some respectable shopkeepers of the quarter, when by some mischance, from the good M. Momus' point of view, it attracted the Bohemian horde of Murger, Champfleury, Nadar, Schann, Wallon, and many of the other "Buveurs d'Eau." Even on Murger's testimony, they must be admitted to have abused their privileges without shedding any very great glory in return, and we may take as fairly true the list of grievances which was drawn up by the proprietor against Rodolphe and his friends, from which it appears that they spent the whole day there from morning to midnight, making a desert round them with their strident voices and extravagant conversation; that Rodolphe carried off all the papers in the morning and complained if their bands were broken, and that by shouting every quarter of an hour for Le Castor, a journal of the hat trade edited by Rodolphe, the companions had forced a subscription on the proprietor; that Colline and Rodolphe played tric-trac all day, refusing to give up the table to other people; that Marcel set up his easel in the cafÉ, and even went so far as to invite models of both sexes; that Schaunard had expressed his intention of bringing his piano there, and that PhÉmie TeinturiÈre never wore a bonnet when she came to meet him; that, not content with ordering very little, the four friends presumed to make their own coffee on the premises; and that the waiter, corrupted by their influence, had seen fit to address an amatory poem to the dame du comptoir. Murger puts a touch of exaggeration into this complaint, but it is to be feared, nevertheless, that no trifling dossier of misdemeanours could have been compiled against the originals of Rodolphe, Marcel, and the rest. We have it on Delvau's authority, at all events, that the profit of their custom was quite disproportionate to its assiduity, when he tells of their stratagem for obtaining asylum at small cost. The smallest possible order was a demi-tasse, which consisted of a small cup of coffee, four lumps of sugar, and a thimbleful of cognac; this cost five sous, a sum of importance in Bohemia. The practice, therefore, was that a certain student, Joannis Guigard, who was of the band, went in first, ordered a demi-tasse, and went upstairs to consume it. Murger would then arrive, ask if Guigard were upstairs, and run up. The rest followed in succession with the same question till the cÉnacle was complete and in a position to have a sip of coffee and some hours of warmth for nothing. After a short while Momus grew tired of these troublesome customers and formally gave them notice to quit. They accepted the intimation, but vowed revenge. Accordingly, a few days later, one of the band turned up with six wet-nurses in his train, while another brought six funeral mutes. The rest of the band then arrived, and the Bohemian spokesman, probably Schann, delivered a flowery discourse upon the affinity of life and death, with allusions to their guests' professions. He wound up by telling the mutes to bury the CafÉ Momus and take the nurses as a reward. To make matters worse, he directed that the milk and beer which had been ordered should be warmed as a mixture. The mutes and nurses, furious at being thus deceived and insulted, broke into angry expostulations, and, aided by the jests of the Bohemians, the proceedings ended in a tremendous disturbance. Schann and two others were arrested, and the next day Momus sold his business.

The extent to which Bohemia, at its different phases, shared in the various pastimes of Paris cannot be determined with any accuracy, so much depended on individual taste and individual wealth. It is certain, however, that after 1837 gambling was not a Bohemian distraction, for in that year the public gaming-houses were closed. Before that time they were such a popular institution that the early Bohemia cannot be conceived to have entirely eschewed it. At the beginning of "La Peau de Chagrin" Balzac draws a powerful picture of the wretched crowd that haunted the Palais Royal, where Raphael de Valentin lost his last gold coin at a single coup. There were no less than four gaming-houses in the Palais Royal, Nos. 9, 113, 124, and 129, where the minimum stake was two francs for roulette and five francs for trente-et-un. Besides the Palais Royal, there were Paphos, Frascati, and the select Cercle des Étrangers. The popularity of gambling can be judged from the fact that the Treasury profited annually by it to the extent of five and a half million francs. Yet there is no record that the truly artistic members of Bohemia, like Gautier or Houssaye, so wasted time or money, while Murger and his friends were spared the temptation. In music, too, Bohemia played no very great part, in spite of the devotion of Champfleury, Barbara, and Schann to Beethoven's quartets. There was plenty of fine music to be heard in Paris during the time: Habeneck was introducing Beethoven's symphonies, Berlioz was revolutionizing orchestration, while Liszt, Chopin, Paganini, Vieuxtemps, and de BÉriot were among the soloists. Certainly those Bohemians of the golden age who had access to the salons of the Princess Belgiojoso or Madame de Girardin must often have heard these great artists, but it is not to be supposed that they were great supporters of concerts, unless it were of the Concerts Musard. These concerts, which won great fame through the personality of Musard, the conductor, began in 1833 in the Salle Saint-HonorÉ;[31] their programmes were excellent and the prices low enough to attract the least well off. Musard had a genius for making pot-pourris of operatic tunes and for introducing new effects, especially into dance music. His electric style of conducting made the Bals Musard far more popular than the great balls at the OpÉra. He contrived a wonderful quadrille, for instance, out of "Les Huguenots," during which red lights were lit, tocsins pealed, tom-toms boomed, screams resounded, and the whole illusion of a massacre was thrillingly kept up. He also composed a contre-danse in the finale of which he broke a chair, and his triumph was a certain galop in which he discharged a pistol. This was thoroughly in keeping with the Romantic spirit, and after its first performance he was publicly chaired round the hall by the excited dancers. So far as pure music was concerned, however, it appealed most to Parisians in the form of opera. Meyerbeer's "Robert le Diable" and "Les Huguenots" produced frenzies of enthusiasm: no Romantic, consequently no Bohemian of Gautier's day, could afford not to have listened to them. Rossini's great vogue began at the same time, while Donizetti and Auber shared the honours of light opera till Offenbach appeared to carry all before him. Musical Bohemia was well educated, if not in composition, at least in execution, when it was possible to hear Duprez, Rubini, Lablache, Tamburini, Grisi, Mario, Persiani, and Pauline Viardot-Garcia. The ballet, too, with Carlotta Grisi, Taglioni, and Fanny Elssler, was an additional attraction at the OpÉra. The devotion of la BohÈme galante to the corps de ballet has appeared in an earlier chapter, and it was a devotion shared by most masculine society. Murger's Bohemia flourished after the greatest operatic enthusiasms, which its more classically inclined members probably despised; but their exchequers were not of the sort to allow for tickets at the grand opera, though they turned up in force at the light operas of the ThÉÂtre Bobino. At this little theatre, more properly called the ThÉÂtre du Luxembourg, there was a continuous uproar made by Bohemians and students. When this grew too unbearable the manager would appear in his dressing-gown and protest that the police would arrive if the respectable inhabitants of the quarter were disturbed; whereupon the whole audience struck up as one man GrÉtry's air "OÙ peut-on Être mieux qu'au sein de la famille?" accompanied by the wheezy orchestra and conducted by the manager himself. At such a scene Schaunard and Marcel must often have assisted.

Nevertheless, in the eyes of Bohemia, the glory of the opera paled entirely before that of the drama. There was not one Bohemian with any literary talent who did not try to write a play—nay, many plays—tragedies in alexandrines, comedies, or vaudevilles; and when they were not writing plays they were haunting the theatres as dramatic critics, selling their articles simply for the sake of a free entry, unless, like Lucien's immoral set, they added the profits of blackmail. From the second cÉnacle to the end of Murger's Bohemia there was no end so generally pursued as dramatic composition. Bouchardy and Augustus Mackeat were dramatists, so were Ourliac, ArsÈne Houssaye, and GÉrard de Nerval; Gautier was a dramatic critic; Murger and Champfleury failed as vaudevillists; and it is quite likely that Rodolphe's magnificent drama, "Le Vengeur," had its counterpart in reality. The "poÈte ÉchevelÉ" and the humble conteur alike turned their eyes continuously towards the stage, besieging luckless managers without cease. The reason of this was partly, as may be supposed, that a successful play, then as to-day, gave far quicker and more splendid pecuniary returns for labour than any other form of literary composition. A concrete instance of that is the case of Murger himself, who was set on his legs entirely by the sudden vogue of the dramatized "ScÈnes de la Vie de BohÈme." But there was another reason at least as strong, far deeper, and more honourable. The stage, as I have already pointed out, was the battlefield of the Romantic struggle. "Hernani" brought home the new truths to the public far more vividly than any novel or poem could have done; every night they were declaimed before compelled attention. It is not surprising, then, that the stage played so great a part in the amusements of Bohemia. It was, with one other, the chief of their pastimes. For them to listen to "Chatterton," the "Tour de Nesle," or "Antony" was not only a distraction, it was a frantic excitement which made their blood seethe almost painfully and sent geysers of hot eloquence from their lips as they munched the hot rolls of the Boulangerie Cretaine. These young enthusiasts were not stinted of good fare. Mademoiselle Mars, Marie Dorval, Rachel and Judith appeared at the FranÇais during these eighteen years; at the Folies-Dramatique FrÉdÉric LemaÎtre created with enormous success the part of Robert Macaire; while at the Funambules Gaspard Deburau was winning eternal fame as the incomparable Pierrot. There were a host of other theatres besides, the VariÉtÉs, Porte Saint-Martin, OdÉon, not to mention smaller ones, managed for the most part by men of taste, supplied with plays by men with some pretension to talent, and criticized by unsparing critics, from Jules Janin downwards, who knew what they wanted and did not hesitate to speak when they did not get it. In the stage Bohemia found not only amusement and inspiration but part of its livelihood: it lived next door to that special world composed of actors and actresses. Yet, though Bohemians went to supper with Mademoiselle Mars, Dumas was very much at home with Marie Dorval, Roger de Beauvoir played pranks with Bache, and Rodolphe had a love affair with Mademoiselle Sidonie, the two worlds were definitely separated. In fact, the life of dramatic artists, whatsoever Bohemian flavouring it may have, has always had a mysterious taste of its own, incapable of mixture with any other blend of artistic life, so that, interesting as it may have been in Paris during these years, its omission from these pages has been intentional.

Bal MasquÉ À l'OpÉra
Bal MasquÉ À l'OpÉra

The one other amusement—a pure pastime involving no material profit—which was particularly popular in Bohemia was dancing. In this respect Bohemia was no exception from the rest of Parisian society, for in all classes there was an inextinguishable passion for the dance. But the Bohemian, obeying only his own laws of social propriety, was in a more favourable position for taking full advantage of all public opportunities for this exercise and of all the agrÉments in the way of casual intercourse with both sexes which it implied. All the year round there were public balls given in Paris, at which the Bohemian was in his element, giving rein to his inventive humour, his high spirits, and his gift of seductive gallantry. During the first few years after 1830, the golden age of Bohemia, the balls at the OpÉra were the most frequented, especially in the days of the carnival. There masks and dominoes covered dancers of every rank in society, for even the femme du monde slipped in unbeknown to her husband. This scene of utmost gaiety and brilliance, of which Balzac gives a picture at the opening of "Splendeurs et MisÈres des Courtisanes," was closely rivalled by the ball at the VariÉtÉs, at which a still more feverish excitement reigned. Or if the Bohemian preferred to make sure of a grisette as a partner he went to the Prado, the site of which was opposite the Palais de Justice, where, under Pilodo, the famous conductor, he could join Louise la Balocheuse, Angelina l'Anglaise, or Ernestine Confortable in the giddy whirl. The waltz was recognized at this period, but the quadrille easily held the place of honour, especially as it lent itself more freely to individual invention, such as Ourliac's magnificent variation depicting the grandeur and fall of Napoleon. It was through this licence in the figures of the quadrille that the chahut and the cancan were introduced by the rakish set among the viveurs which included Charles de la Battut, Alton-Shee, Monnier, and the famous Chicard—a leather-merchant who made a name by his grotesque costumes and wild dances, the term chicard, which degenerated into chic, becoming a general denomination for his imitators. I have not been able to arrive at the difference between the chahut and the cancan, but both were originally primitive dances indulged in by the lowest classes, quaint, but in all probability perfectly decent. The rage for extravagance during the early thirties changed them into formidable pantomimes of violence, if not always of indecency, which every complete reveller rendered with his own individual touch. Heine, in the course of one of his articles in the Augsburg Gazette, said of the cancan:

"It must be regarded simply as a pantomime of Robert Macairedom. Anybody who has a general idea of the latter will understand those indescribable dances, expressions of persiflage in dance, which not only mock sexual relations, but civic relations too, all, in fact, that is good and beautiful, every kind of enthusiasm, patriotism, uprightness, faith, family feeling, heroism, divinity."