ways the
same fare--"un bifteck et des oeufs sur le plat." ...

On one occasion Vivier turned up. He was the natural enemy of Sax, for
Sax, by his system of keys, brought effective horn-playing within the
reach of ordinary performers, which lessened the immense superiority of
Vivier over horn-players in general. Vivier, however, was troubled by no
considerations of that kind. The Saxhorn, moreover, did not possess the
timbre of the horn.

I had already met this remarkable engineer, musician, diplomatist and
professor of mystification, in London, when he was complaining with
facetious bitterness that Mr. Frederic Gye had not sent him a box for
one of Angiolina Bosio's touching performances of "La Traviata."

He had written to the manager explaining that he was ready to shed
tears, and that he possessed a pocket handkerchief, but wanted something
more. "J'ai un mouchoir, mais pas de loge," he said. Yet his letter was
left without a reply. After waiting a day or two, and still receiving no
answer, Vivier engaged the dirtiest crossing-sweeper he could find, made
him put on a little extra mud, and sent him with a letter to Mr. Gye
demanding "the return of his correspondence." The courteous manager of
the Royal Italian Opera could scarcely have known that, besides being
one of the finest musicians and quite the finest horn player of his day,
Eugene Vivier was the most charming of men, and the spoiled child of
nearly every Court in Europe. Speaking to me once of the Emperor
Napoleon, he said, in answer to a question I had put to him as to
Napoleon III's characteristics: "He is the most gentlemanly Emperor I
know."

"What can I do for you?" said this gentlemanly Emperor one day, when
Vivier had gone to see him at the Tuileries.

"Come out on the balcony with me, sire," replied the genial cynic. "Some
of my creditors are sure to be passing, and it will do me good to be
seen in conversation with your Majesty."

Besides speaking to him familiarly within view of his creditors, the
Emperor Napoleon III conferred on Vivier several well-paid sinecures. He
appointed him "Inspector of Mines," which, from conscientious motives,
knowing very little of mining, Vivier never inspected; and he was once
accused by a facetious journal of having received the post of "Librarian
to the Forest of Fontainebleau," with its multitudinous leaves.

There were only two other Emperors at that time in Europe, and to one of
them, the Emperor of Aust