y's descent upon Nantes,
these bills were pasted outside the Theatre Feydau and elsewhere
about the town, and had attracted--being still sufficiently unusual
announcements at the time--considerable attention. He had entrusted the
matter to one of the company's latest recruits, an intelligent young man
named Basque, sending him on ahead of the company for the purpose.

You may see for yourself one of these playbills in the Carnavalet
Museum. It details the players by their stage names only, with the
exception of M. Binet and his daughter, and leaving out of account that
he who plays Trivelin in one piece appears as Tabarin in another, it
makes the company appear to be at least half as numerous again as it
really was. It announces that they will open with "Les Fourberies de
Scaramouche," to be followed by five other plays of which it gives the
titles, and by others not named, which shall also be added should the
patronage to be received in the distinguished and enlightened city of
Nantes encourage the Binet Troupe to prolong its sojourn at the Theatre
Feydau. It lays great stress upon the fact that this is a company of
improvisers in the old Italian manner, the like of which has not been
seen in France for half a century, and it exhorts the public of Nantes
not to miss this opportunity of witnessing these distinguished mimes who
are reviving for them the glories of the Comedie de l'Art. Their visit
to Nantes--the announcement proceeds--is preliminary to their visit to
Paris, where they intend to throw down the glove to the actors of the
Comedie Francaise, and to show the world how superior is the art of the
improviser to that of the actor who depends upon an author for what he
shall say, and who consequently says always the same thing every time
that he plays in the same piece.

It is an audacious bill, and its audacity had scared M. Binet out of
the little sense left him by the Burgundy which in these days he could
afford to abuse. He had offered the most vehement opposition. Part of
this Andre-Louis had swept aside; part he had disregarded.

"I admit that it is audacious," said Scaramouche. "But at your time of
life you should have learnt that in this world nothing succeeds like
audacity."

"I forbid it; I absolutely forbid it," M. Binet insisted.

"I knew you would. Just as I know that you'll be very grateful to me
presently for not obeying you."

"You are inviting a catastrophe."

"I am inviting fortune. The w