imony
of their admiration for his talent, and for his having first recited to
them and dedicated to Toulouse his fine poem of Franconnette.

Jasmin handed over to the municipality the manuscript of his poem in a
volume beautifully bound. The Mayor, in eloquent language, accepted the
work, and acknowledged the fervent thanks of the citizens of Toulouse.

As at Bordeaux, Jasmin was feted and entertained by the most
distinguished people of the city. At one of the numerous banquets at
which he was present, he replied to the speech of the chairman by an
impromptu in honour of those who had so splendidly entertained him. But,
as he had already said: "Impromptus may be good money of the heart, but
they are often the worst money of the head."{3}

On the day following the entertainment, Jasmin was invited to a "grand
banquet" given by the coiffeurs of Toulouse, where they presented him
with "a crown of immortelles and jasmines," and to them also he recited
another of his impromptus.{4}

Franconnette was shortly after published, and the poem was received with
almost as much applause by the public as it had been by the citizens
of Toulouse. Sainte-beuve, the prince of French critics, said of the
work:--

"In all his compositions Jasmin has a natural, touching idea; it is a
history, either of his invention, or taken from some local tradition.
With his facility as an improvisatore, aided by the patois in which he
writes,... when he puts his dramatis personae into action, he endeavours
to depict their thoughts, all their simple yet lively conversation, and
to clothe them in words the most artless, simple, and transparent,
and in a language true, eloquent, and sober: never forget this latter
characteristic of Jasmin's works."{5}

M. de Lavergne says of Franconnette, that, of all Jasmin's work, it is
the one in which he aimed at being most entirely popular, and that it
is at the same time the most noble and the most chastened. He might
also have added the most chivalrous. "There is something essentially
knightly," says Miss Preston, "in Pascal's cast of character, and it
is singular that at the supreme crisis of his fate he assumes, as if
unconsciously, the very phraseology of chivalry.

"Some squire (donzel) should follow me to death. It is altogether
natural and becoming in the high-minded smith."

M. Charles Nodier--Jasmin's old friend--was equally complimentary in his
praises of Franconnette. When a copy of the poem was se