ough he now and then made little alterations
after these conversations. I am not insinuating that the great composer
acted upon their suggestions, but I should not at all wonder if he had
done so."

Alexandre Dumas, in whose honour, it will be remembered, the dinner was
given, had an excellent memory, and some years afterwards profited by
the experiment. I tell the story as it was given to us subsequently by
his son. Only a few friends and Alexandre the younger were present at
the first of the final rehearsals of "The Three Musketeers," at the
Ambigu Comique. They were not dress rehearsals proper, because there
were no costumes, and the scenery merely consisted of a cloth and some
wings. Behind one of the latter they had noticed, during the first six
tableaux, the shining helmet of a fireman who was listening very
attentively. The author had noticed him too. About the middle of the
seventh tableau the helmet suddenly vanished, and the father remarked
upon it to his son. When the act was finished, Dumas went in search of
the pompier, who did not know him. "What made you go away?" he asked
him. "Because it did not amuse me half as much as the others," was the
answer. "That was enough for my father," said the younger Dumas. "There
and then he went to Beraud's room, took off his coat, waistcoat, and
braces, unfastened the collar of his shirt--it was the only way he could
work--and sent for the prompt copy of the seventh tableau, which he tore
up and flung into the fire, to the consternation of Beraud. 'What are
you doing?' he exclaimed. 'You see what I am doing; I am destroying the
seventh tableau. It does not amuse the pompier. I know what it wants.'
And an hour and a half later, at the termination of the rehearsal, the
actors were given a fresh seventh tableau to study."

I have come back by a roundabout way to the author of "Monte-Christo,"
because, tout chemin avec moi mene a Dumas; I repeat, he constitutes one
of the happiest of my recollections. After the lapse of many years, I
willingly admit that I would have cheerfully foregone the acquaintance
of all the other celebrities, perhaps David d'Angers excepted, for that
of Dumas pere.

After the lapse of many years, the elder Dumas still represents to me
all the good qualities of the French nation and few of their bad ones.
It was absolutely impossible to be dull in his society, but it must not
be thought that these contagious animal spirits only showed themselves
pe