the fat priest ([page 53]) and his hirsute companion, admirable in the spontaneity of expression with which the fleeting impression of a moment has been set down on paper. Equally vivid is the impression conveyed by the hurried sketch of an old woman ([page 22]) made at the stage door of a theatre. The boulevards of Paris are excellent places from which to study the comedy of life: and as an example of the peculiar flavour of Frank Reynolds' humour, it would be hardly possible to better the irresistible sketch from life, furtively made whilst sitting amongst the audience at a café chantant, which, with a nice sense of the absurd, is labelled in the sketch-book "Having the Time of her Life."
Montmartre, as might be expected, yielded excellent "copy," to employ a journalistic phrase. In the cafés and cabarets artistiques were made some of the portraits from life already referred to. But though portraits of actual individuals, the models from which they were made are in every case so characteristic, so closely in keeping with their surroundings, that they serve nevertheless as types, and the drawings in consequence make as direct an appeal to the stranger as to one who might happen to be familiar with the originals of them. In the famous Cabaret des Quat'-z-Arts was drawn the exquisite pen-and-ink portrait on [page 32], previously alluded to, of "Georgette de Bertigny": under which name, for the purposes of the sketch, the identity of a figure at one time very familiar to habitués of the Quat'-z-Arts is concealed. As comment upon the depth of feeling which the drawing reveals, one may read the pen picture which accompanied it:
Then Georgette de Bertigny steps out through the haze, and stands, a tragic little figure, on the platform by the piano. Her hair and eyes are ebon black; her face, thin lipped and pale, is like a mask of ivory. There is no life whatever in it. She stands there like a tragedy in miniature, her hands behind her back, unseeing, motionless. Then, to a low, monotonously modulated melody, she sings a song of utter misery and passion, and, as she sings, her eyes and face light up. The mask of ivory gleams as though there were living light behind it, and the sweet, low voice stirs us as but few singers can. The music ceases. And the light behind the ivory goes out again as Georgette bows her thanks for our enthusiasm.
LE 'IGH KICK.
At the Moulin Rouge.
From "Paris and Some Parisians"
It is trite to remark that comedy is akin to tragedy, and it is in the natural order of things that an artist of so keen a perception of the comedy of life should be able to strike with such truth and precision the note of pathos or of tragedy.
A SPEECH AGAINST THE GOVERNMENT.
From "Paris and Some Parisians"
The "Lapin Agile," a strange little café in that "other Montmartre" which the tourist knoweth not, yielded abundance of material to Frank Reynolds' pencil. Needless to say, the curious may search all Paris and find no such sign as that of "The Sprightly Rabbit," but it is not impossible that some may recognise, under his disguise, "Felix," the ruffianly but accomplished host, who was the model for the sketch upon [page 43], one of the happiest examples in the present volume of the artist's skill in portraiture, as well as of his rare technique in pen-and-ink. Equally happy is the sketch which depicts "'Chacun' with his 'Chacune'" at the Moulin de la Galette ([page 13]), in which the pose of the figures and the expression upon their faces exhibit, if one may put it so, the very perfection of naturalness. For a study of expression, again, it would be difficult, or indeed impossible, to better the further of the two figures in the drawing of "Le 'Igh Kick," made one night at the Moulin Rouge. As to pose, could there be anything more exactly right than the attitude of the gentleman "with bright-blue goggle eyes, and a dress-shirt front in accordion pleats," who, on the occasion when his portrait was made, had been to the races and backed a winner, and was delivering "a long and extremely incoherent speech."