the story of the publication of "Tartarin de Tarascon" [1] by
Daudet himself in his "Trente Ans de Paris." It began to appear in the
_Petit Moniteur universel_, but did not appeal to the readers of this
popular newspaper.

[Footnote 1: The other books of the "Tartarin" series are inferior to
"Tartarin de Tarascon" (1872). "Tartarin sur les Alpes" (1885) relates the
adventures of the hero while climbing the great mountains of Switzerland
in order to prove that he is worthy of remaming P.C.A. (_President du Club
Alpin de Tarascon._) In "La Defense de Tarascon" (1886, only a dozen pages
long) we have a characteristic picture of the city preparing to resist the
German invasion. "Port-Tarascon" (1890) is the last and poorest of the
series. Tartarin leads his compatriots in a colonizing expedition to the
South Seas, and then brings them home again. Finally, in self-inflicted
exile, "across the bridge" in Beaucaire (cf. note to _13_ 28), the great
man dies.]

Publication was interrupted after some ten installments, and the work was
carried to the _Figaro_, by whose more aristocratic clientele literary
irony was not unappreciated. The hero was first called _Chapatin_, then
_Barbarin_ (cf. note to _56_ 12), and finally _Tartarin_. "Tartarin de
Tarascon" is a _galejado, une plaisanterie, un eclat de rire_. Continuing
Daudet says: "Only one who was raised in southern France, or knows it
thoroughly, can appreciate how frequently the Tartarin type is to be met
there, and how under the generous sun of Tarascon, which warms and
electrifies, the natural drollery of mind and imagination is led astray
into monstrous exaggerations, in form and dimension as various as bottle
gourds."

Daudet, like our Dickens, succeeded in producing characters invested with
such reality that in the minds of readers they become veritable beings. Of
all his creations Tartarin is the most widely known, and the world's
conception of a French southerner is derived from the portrait of this
hero.

As is usual in the works of Daudet, the character of Tartarin is not
wholly fictitious. The home of the cap-hunters was really not Tarascon,
but a village five or six leagues away on the other side of the Rhone. It
was from this village, and in company with the prototype of Tartarin, that
Daudet set out for Africa in 1861, chiefly to recover his health and
incidentally to hunt lions. The novel is a souvenir of the author's
sojourn in the home of the real Tartarin a