w of Henry Murger? I wrote this chapter of my
Memoirs during his life. I should have suppressed it, did I feel the
least drop of bitterness mingled with the recollection of the acts of
petty ingratitude of this charming writer. But my object in writing this
work is less to satisfy sterile revenge than to exhibit to you a corner
of literary life in Paris in the nineteenth century.

In 1850 Henry Murger published a book in which the manners and customs
of people who live by their wits were painted in colors scarcely likely
to fascinate healthy imaginations. He declared to the world that the
novitiate of our future great authors was nothing but one incessant hunt
after a half-dollar and a mutton-chop. The world was told by others that
Henry Murger had learned to paint this existence by actual experience.
There were, however, in his book some excellent flashes of fancy and
youth; besides, the public then had grown tired of interminable
adventures and novels in fifty volumes. So Henry Murger's first work,
"La Vie de Boheme," was very popular; but it did not swell his purse or
improve his wardrobe. He was introduced to me, and I shall never forget
the low bow he made me. I was afraid for one moment that his bald head
would fall between his legs. This precocious baldness gave to his
delicate and sad face a singular physiognomy. He looked not so much like
a young old man as like an old young man. Henry Murger's warmest desire
was to write in the celebrated and influential "Revue des Deux Mondes,"
which we all abuse so violently when we have reason to complain of it,
and which has but to make a sign to us and we instantly fall into its
arms. I was then on the best terms with the "Revue des Deux Mondes."
Monsieur Castil-Blaze, being from the same neighborhood with me, had
obtained a place for me in the "Revue," which belonged to his
son-in-law, Monsieur Buloz. I promised Henry Murger to speak a good word
for him. A favorable opportunity of doing so occurred a few days
afterwards.

"I do not know what is to become of us," said Monsieur Buloz to me; "our
old contributors are dying, and no new ones make their appearance."

"They appear, but you refuse to see them. There is Henry Murger, for
instance; he has just written an amusing book, which is the most
successful of the season."

"Henry Murger! And is it you, Count Armand de Pontmartin, the literary
nobleman, the aristocratic writer, who wear (as the world avers) a white
crava