"Yes, say what you like, it is not good taste, especially coming from such a young man as Hernani."
"Monsieur," Lassailly replied, "he had a right to say so. Cards were invented—they were invented in the time of Charles VI.; Monsieur l'Académicien, if you are not aware of that fact, I acquaint you with it. Hurrah for the old ace of spades! Bravo, Firmin! Bravo, Hugo! Ah!"
You can understand how hopeless it was to attempt to reply to people who attacked and defended in this fashion.
Hernani met with great success, although it was more strongly contested than Henri III. It is simple enough to find the reason for this: beauties of form and style are least readily appreciated by the vulgar mind, and these were Hugo's particular charms. On the other hand, these beautiful touches, being purely artistic, made a great impression on us, and on me in particular.
Hernani received all the tributes customary to triumph: it was outrageously attacked, and defended with equal violence; it was parodied with a clever astuteness directed against the traditionary dramatic customs, under the title of Arnali, ou la Contrainte par Cor (Arnali, or Constraint by Acclamation), a French work translated from the Gothic. And with regard to parodies,—let us make note of a historical fact, the date of which might else be lost in the mists of time, if we did not jot it down here.
The story—for such it is—of Cabrion and of M. Pipelet goes back to the month of March 1829. This is what happened, and it caused so much uneasiness to the porters of Paris that they have remained a melancholy race ever since!
Henri III., foreordained to meet with a great success, or at any rate to make a sensation, had also to have its parody; to facilitate the execution of this important work, I had sent my manuscript in advance to de Leuven and Rousseau; then, at their request, I had worked with them at the piece to the best of my ability, and we called it Le Roi Dagobert et sa Cour. But the Censorship regarded this title as lacking in respect to the descendant of Dagobert. The descendant of Dagobert, that worthy company which bears, for arms, scissors sable upon a field argent, meant His Majesty Charles X. It confused descendant with successor, but gentlemen on committees of examination are known to be above the consideration of such a mere trifle as that. So we altered the title to that of La Cour du roi Pétaud, to which the Censorship raised no objection. Just as if nobody were descended from le roi Pétaud!
So the parody of Henri III. et sa Cour was played at the Vaudeville under this title. It parodied the play, scene for scene. Now, at the conclusion of the fourth act, the farewell scene between Saint-Mégrin and his servant was parodied by one between the hero of the parody (unfortunately I have forgotten his name) and his porter. In this extremely tender, touching and sentimental scene, the hero asks the porter for a lock of his hair to the tune of Dormez donc; mes chères amours! which was all the rage just then, and most appropriate to the situation. On the night of the performance everybody went away singing the refrain and the words of the song. Three or four days afterwards, a party of us were dining at Véfours, including de Leuven, Eugène Sue, Desforges, Desmares, Rousseau, several others and myself. At the end of the dinner, which had been exceedingly lively, we sang the famous refrain in chorus:—
"Portier, je veux
De tes cheveux!"
Eugène Sue and Desmares decided to carry into effect this flight of our imagination and, as they entered the house, No. 8 rue de la Chaussée-d'Antin, where Eugène Sue knew the name of the concierge, they asked the good man if his name were not M. Pipelet. He answered in the affirmative. Then, in the name of a Polish princess who had seen him and fallen desperately in love with him, they asked, with many entreaties, for a lock of his hair, and, to get rid of them, the poor Pipelet ended by giving it them. He was a lost man, after he had committed such a weakness! That same evening three other requests were addressed to him on behalf of a Russian princess, a German baroness and an Italian marchioness; and, every time the request was put to him, an invisible choir sang under the great doorway—