es where the drawing is clogged with color, or
pictures finished under the stress of some imaginary woe, in which he
gave his whole attention to the drawing, and left the color to take
care of itself. He is a constant disappointment to his friends and the
public; yet Hoffmann would have worshiped him for his daring
experiments in the realms of art. When Bridau is wholly himself he is
admirable, and as praise is sweet to him, his disgust is great when
one praises the failures in which he alone discovers all that is
lacking in the eyes of the public. He is whimsical to the last degree.
His friends have seen him destroy a finished picture because, in his
eyes, it looked too smooth. "It is overdone," he would say; "it is
niggling work."

With his eccentric, yet lofty nature, with a nervous organization and
all that it entails of torment and delight, the craving for perfection
becomes morbid. Intellectually he is akin to Sterne, though he is not
a literary worker. There is an indescribable piquancy about his
epigrams and sallies of thought. He is eloquent, he knows how to love,
but the uncertainty that appears in his execution is a part of the
very nature of the man. The brotherhood loved him for the very
qualities which the philistine would style defects.

Last among the living comes Fulgence Ridal. No writer of our times
possesses more of the exuberant spirit of pure comedy than this poet,
careless of fame, who will fling his more commonplace productions to
theatrical managers, and keep the most charming scenes in the seraglio
of his brain for himself and his friends. Of the public he asks just
sufficient to secure his independence, and then declines to do
anything more. Indolent and prolific as Rossini, compelled, like great
poet-comedians, like Moliere and Rabelais, to see both sides of
everything, and all that is to be said both for and against, he is a
sceptic, ready to laugh at all things. Fulgence Ridal is a great
practical philosopher. His worldly wisdom, his genius for observation,
his contempt for fame ("fuss," as he calls it) have not seared a kind
heart. He is as energetic on behalf of another as he is careless where
his own interests are concerned; and if he bestirs himself, it is for
a friend. Living up to his Rabelaisian mask, he is no enemy to good
cheer, though he never goes out of his way to find it; he is
melancholy and gay. His friends dubbed him the "Dog of the Regiment."
You could have no better port