ct-lived men who for the most part formed the company. Lemaitre
felt ill at ease there, and conceived the idea that the _societaires_
did not respect him enough. The actors of the Comedie Francaise are of
two bodies--the first and controlling one in the councils of the theatre
being composed of men who are participators in the profits of the house
as well as recipients of salaries. They are an extremely dignified body
of artists, with the utmost reverence for the proprieties of life. For
these _societaires_ Lemaitre entertained a profound dislike, and loved
to sneer at them and ridicule their dignity. One day these artists were
giving a grand dinner to some manager when a knock was heard at the door
of the banquet-hall. "Who is there?" cried several voices.--"A man,"
answered Lemaitre outside, "who wishes to have some converse with you,
and tell you once for all what he has on his heart." So saying, he
entered, threw off his cloak, and appeared before the company dressed
simply in a shirt-collar and a pair of stockings.

Lemaitre returned to the Porte Saint-Martin, and soon after created the
role of Don Caesar de Bazan, a part in which he was indescribably
delightful, and of which he was the real author. The play, written by
Dumanoir and Dennery, was roundly condemned by the critics for its
weakness, but the actor created prodigious effects, and the piece
obtained a great success. In the _Ragpicker of Paris_, a sort of honest
Robert Macaire, written by Felix Pyat for Lemaitre, this extraordinary
actor went through another transformation not less striking than some
which had preceded it. He engaged the lamplighter of the theatre to wear
the ragpicker's costume for three weeks, so that it might be suitably
dirty. He went every day into the low cabarets of the Rue Mouffetard,
where ragpickers congregated in great numbers (and still do), in order
to study from nature the peculiarities of the race. One day, as he was
chatting with his models, familiarizing himself with their characters
and manners, he was recognized by one of them, who immediately
communicated his discovery to his companions. The report spread up and
down the Rue Mouffetard like wild-fire. In a few minutes two or three
hundred ragpickers had assembled about the door of the cabaret, and as
many as could get in crowded about the wonderful actor whom they had
seen from their perch in the gallery of the theatre. They pressed him to
drink with them; they poured ou