"Write what you please, monsieur," said Hugo; "but you must remember that there are already two acceptances before yours."
"No matter, monsieur; I wish to take my place. For, bless me! who knows? I may be the one to bring out your play in spite of its having been already accepted twice!"
And he wrote under Harel's acceptance—
"Received by the Porte-Saint-Martin theatre, 16 July 1829."
Supported by this twofold acceptance, Marion Delorme was presented to the Théâtre-Français and was received with unanimous applause. I recollect that as we were leaving the reading, full of enthusiasm over what we had all heard, Émile Deschamps pointed to a bill which announced the evening's play and, shrugging his shoulders, exclaimed compassionately, at the sight of Racine's chef-d-œuvre—
"And they are going to play Britannicus!..."
None of us to-day, not even Émile Deschamps, would confess to having given utterance to the above mot. I am certain that we should all have said it in 1829, and more than one who has since paid his visit to the thirty-nine Academicians envied him the phrase at the moment.
The play was distributed, and immediately after its reception began to be rehearsed. Mademoiselle Mars played Marion; Firmin, Didier; Joanny, Nangis; Menjaud, Saverny, etc. But, one morning, the dreadful news spread abroad that the play had been stopped by the Censor! The same thing had happened to Henri III.; the Censor always stopped everything; it was his business, and then the sentence could afterwards be relaxed, if the work justified its existence, or the author clamoured loudly enough. I had remonstrated and Henri III. had escaped safe and sound out of his claws, thanks to M. de Martignac, who had come to my aid. So Hugo applied to M. de Martignac. But well-meaning, cultured and even literary as was this model of ministers past, present and future, he confessed himself powerless. It was a question that did not merely affect a Valois but a Bourbon; not merely a predecessor but the grandfather of Charles X. No one but Charles X. could pronounce judgment on this family question. Hugo decided to ask an audience of Charles X. and it was granted him. In those days persons who approached the kings of France had to wear court dress à la française and a sword. Hugo raised great objections at having to submit to this disguise; but Taylor undertook to collect the necessary articles of apparel. He set great store by Marion Delorme, and to gain permission to produce it he would have dressed up Hugo as a Turk or a Chinaman. The day of the audience came and Hugo went to Saint-Cloud, where he found the antechamber crowded. Among those in attendance were Madame du Cayla, who had just put the finishing touch to the Polignac ministry; and Michaud of the Académie, who was going to Palestine. Michaud was Reader to the king. He was covered with as much gold braid as the coats of four generals all put together! Nevertheless, he was a man of much genius. Hugo was busily talking to him when the two doors opened and His Royal Highness Monseigneur the Dauphin was announced. Hugo had never seen the being for whom he had wished the Arc de triomphe to be raised, except at a distance:—
"Que le géant de notre gloire
Pût y passer sans se baisser!"
He saw what looked like a monkey, yet without a monkey's grace; a kind of mummy, with its face perpetually contorted with neuralgia, crossing the hall, responding to all the bows and greetings and homage with a deep growl, from which you could not make out one single word clearly. And that was the conqueror of the Trocadero! the pacificator of Spain! He took no more notice of Madame du Cayla than of the rest. Perhaps, if some courtier had whispered to him that a great poet was present, he might have stopped to see what sort of an animal a poet was. No courtier informed Monseigneur le Dauphin and he passed without stopping. Soon afterwards, King Charles X. passed through with as gracious and smiling a presence as his son's was grotesque and ill-tempered. He greeted Madame du Cayla with a word, shook hands with Michaud and Victor, bowed to others and entered his audience-chamber. A moment later, Madame la Comtesse du Cayla was summoned. Without troubling himself concerning the length of time she had been waiting, or whether she had come before the other visitors, the last king of the line of chivalrous kings sent for her first, because she was a woman. Madame du Cayla remained nearly an hour with the king. This was not too long wherein to give birth to a ministry which itself a year later was to give birth to the Revolution of July. Then, when Madame du Cayla withdrew, the poet was called. Charles X. first recollected that he was the successor of François I. and then that he was the descendant of Louis XIV. The poet went in, and we will let him relate what took place at that remarkable interview in his own words:—