ndary saints on the
gilded canvases of mediaeval art. The radiant youth and beauty may be no
more truthful to nature than the gilded background, but the fact of the
impression sought to be conveyed is not on that account to be
disbelieved.

Baudelaire, Gautier writes, was born in the Rue Hautefeuille, in one of
those old houses with a pepper-pot turret at the corner which have
disappeared from the city under the advancing improvement of straight
lines and clear openings. His father, a gentleman of learning, retained
all the eighteenth-century courtesy and distinction of manner, which,
like the pepper-pot turret, has also disappeared under the advance of
Republican enlightenment. An absent-minded, reserved child, Baudelaire
attracted no especial attention during his school days. When they were
over, his predilection for a literary vocation became known. From this
his parents sought to divert him by sending him to travel. He voyaged
through the Indian Ocean, visiting the great islands: Madagascar,
Ceylon, Mauritius, Bourbon. Had there been a chance for irresolution in
the mind of the youth, this voyage destroyed it forever. His
imagination, essentially exotic, succumbed to the passionate charm of a
new, strange, and splendidly glowing form of nature; the stars, the
skies, the gigantic vegetation, the color, the perfumes, the
dark-skinned figures in white draperies, formed for him at that time a
heaven, for which his senses unceasingly yearned afterwards amid the
charms and enchantments of civilization, in the world's capital of
pleasure and luxury. Returning to Paris, of age and master of his
fortune, he established himself in his independence, openly adopting his
chosen career.

He and Theophile Gautier met for the first time in 1849, in the Hotel
Pimodau, where were held the meetings of the Hashish Club. Here in the
great Louis XIV. saloon, with its wood-work relieved with dull gold; its
corbeled ceiling, painted after the manner of Lesueur and Poussin, with
satyrs pursuing nymphs through reeds and foliage; its great red and
white spotted marble mantel, with gilded elephant harnessed like the
elephant of Porus in Lebrun's picture, bearing an enameled clock with
blue ciphers; its antique chairs and sofas, covered with faded tapestry
representing hunting scenes, holding the reclining figures of the
members of the club; women celebrated in the world of beauty, men in the
world of letters, meeting not only for the enjoyme