“Of sincerity?”
“Ah, yes, indeed.”
“You see, then, that your play may serve as a lesson.”
Balzac’s last play, “Le Faiseur,” was produced for the first time at the Gymnase, a year after his death, under the title of “Mercadet.” Its success was immediate, and its hundredth performance was the occasion of an article by Albéric Second in “Le Constitutionnel,” 18 June, 1852, which is at once so graceful and fantastic that its reproduction here cannot fail to afford some pleasure to the readers of the “Comédie Humaine:”—
The hundredth performance of “Mercadet” was given the other evening at the Gymnase-Dramatique. “Mercadet” is, it will be remembered, the posthumous piece of M. de Balzac, which at the time of its production excited such great curiosity. Without any previous agreement, but none the less certain of meeting, a dozen of us, all passionate admirers of the illustrious deceased, found ourselves, that evening, intermingled with the line which from six o’clock in the evening had been undulating from the Boulevard Bonne Nouvelle to the door of the theatre. We had all assisted ten months before at the first representation of the play, and we piously reassembled at this jubilee of glory and genius in the same manner as we had gone the year before, and in the same manner that each year we shall go, on the 18th of August, to wreathe with immortelles the tomb of the great writer.
M. de Balzac was not one of those who inspire lukewarm affection, and they who have had the honor of knowing him preserve his memory religiously in their hearts. That life of his, full of struggles incessantly renewed, the hourly and truceless combat which he waged, sum up so completely the existence of the literary men of the nineteenth century that it is impossible for us to consider his grand and mournful figure otherwise than as the personification of an entire class. It is for this reason that God, who is sovereignly just, will accord to him hereafter a glory as great and incontestable as his life was tormented and sad. It is for this reason that it behooves us, who are the humble sacristans of the temple in which he was the radiant high priest, to see that his altars are ever adorned with fresh flowers and that the incense ceaselessly burns in the censers.
When we entered the theatre, it was, with the exception of a few boxes and a number of orchestra stalls which had been sold in advance, entirely filled. My seat was next to that of a gentleman apparently about forty-five years old. His bearing was exceedingly aristocratic; he was dressed with the most exquisite elegance, and his buttonhole bloomed with a rosette in which were intermingled in harmonious confusion all the orders of Europe and every shade of the rainbow. My neighbor was carelessly turning the pages of the “Entr’acte,” and I took great pleasure in studying his well-poised head; wondering the while whether I had not met him somewhere before, and what his name might be. When he had finished reading he rose, turned his back to the stage, drew an opera-glass from his pocket, and began to examine the house; an E and an R, surmounted by a count’s coronet, were engraved in letters of gold on the case which he placed on his seat. From time to time he bowed and waved his hand. My eyes mechanically followed the direction of his own, and I was not a little surprised at noticing that his smiles and salutations were addressed exclusively to the unoccupied boxes. When he passed all the boxes in review he turned his attention to the orchestra stalls, and the strange phenomenon was repeated. His opera-glass, flitting from stall to stall, stopped only at the empty ones; he would then bow, or make an almost imperceptible sign with the ends of his delicately gloved fingers. Dominated by that detestable pride which causes us to consider as insane all those whose actions or remarks are unintelligible to us, I murmured to myself, He is crazy. Then, as though he wished to remove the slightest doubt which I might have retained on this point, my neighbor bent over toward the seat at his left, and appeared to exchange a few words with an imaginary spectator. This seat was one of those which had been let in advance, and it was probable that its tenant, who was still absent, was interested only in the great play. I have omitted to state that the performance began with a little vaudeville.
At this moment one of my friends entered the orchestra, passed before me, shook my hand, and called me by name. My neighbor immediately turned around, gazed attentively at me for a moment or two, and then said,—
“Why, my dear fellow countryman,—for you are from La Charente, I believe,—I am delighted to see you.”
“To whom have I the honor of speaking?” I asked, in great surprise.