ess; and all Monsieur Goosequill's troubles come out of the
fact that he endeavors to marry the humpback to the Columbine, who
prefers to marry the harlequin. And so the notary's quill sets fire to
the inkstand: the table is bewitched and treads on his corns; and
indeed he suffers terribly and turns somersaults of agony. Peace
arrives at last through the humpback giving up his suit; the curtain
falls on Columbine and harlequin bowing and backing, hand in hand;
gran'pere and the babies are all three fast asleep; but the
bright-eyed boy in his mother's lap asks with unabated interest,
"Pou'quoi fait-on ca?"

In the Boulevard Beaumarchais, close by the old Place of the Bastile,
stands the grandest of the theatres habitually visited by the
blousard. Its most constant patrons are the furniture-makers of the
Faubourg St. Antoine, who bring to the theatre a decided perfume of
mahogany and rosewood, and suggest the varnish of newness which the
place would otherwise sadly lack. The quarter in which it stands is
not a specially suspicious one by day, but at night it is ill
calculated to inspire confidence. There are villainous-looking,
slouching wretches about, who eye you curiously and not too amiably.
The theatre has had its day of splendor, but is now a frowzy-looking
concern--very roomy, somewhat suggesting the Old Bowery Theatre, but
lacking its cheerful aspect. The audience is without exception of the
blousard class: the patrons of the Old Bowery, even in its latest
years, were almost millionaires in comparison. The highest-priced
seats (excepting the proscenium-boxes, which are never occupied) cost
forty sous. You can sit in the gallery for five sous if you like the
company of the Paris gamin. At the entrance of the theatre there is a
placard which reads thus: "By paying twenty-five centimes one enters
immediately without making queue." The ticket-seller is a
prosperous-looking old woman of fifty or there-about, who wears a
beribboned cap and side-curls, and has a mouth which tells of years
spent in the authoritative position she occupies. She is stern to a
terrible degree with the average blousard who approaches the round
hole whereat she reigns; but to us, who indulge in the extravagance of
paying the extra five sous for the privilege of entering without
taking our place in the queue at the door, she relaxes visibly.

The curtain rises at seven o'clock, here as at all the theatres where
the blousard pays his money, and