“My only recreation was reading plays and acting them in a footwarmer by means of little dolls. I was the most ignorant of the Brothers’ class. In spite of all I became errand boy and lithographer.
“In 1853 I made my début as a comic singer in the Théâtre des Familles, established in an old prison.
“Some time afterwards I tired of shining in the carnaval fêtes of the period and returned to Havre as a chorus-singer, under the direction of M. Defossez.
“I sang in choruses and made floats. Some years later I returned to the same theatre and gave some performances.
“But in spite of this success Paris has seen me almost barefooted, ill, and homeless; my food gathered from the scraps found under the umbrellas round the Fontaine des Innocents. My mother was poor and could not help me, and for my own part I would not tell her of my distress, wishing to spare her tears. By dint of struggles and of [p094] work I distinguished myself as an actor at Nancy, Limoges, Bordeaux, Toulouse, Havre, Rouen, Besançon, Geneva, Nantes, Paris, &c.
“I have acted with Henry Monnier, my master, Scrivaneck, Vieuxtemps, Hoffman, Darcier, and Renard. Circumstances have forced me to give performances in every description of city and small town. I have played in stables and theatres, in barns, and in the Rothschilds’ drawing-rooms; I have travelled on foot, by railway, and in carts. I journeyed through one part of France with some acrobats, with whom I saw it through many colours and on the road I collected some instructive and still unpublished notes, of which I am the sole owner.
“My travelling diaries are all my fortune. Afterwards I went to the café concert with the remnant of my voice, and was successively engaged in various large cities. I know some parts of Holland and Germany, a little of Switzerland and Prussia, a great deal of Belgium, and something of Italy and Spain. But I know Bohemia best of all.
“Like the late Bilboquet, I have tampered with every banque except the Banque de France, but this does not prevent me from living a quiet, unobtrusive life; my only wish is that no one should annoy me (this is very difficult to get), to live a long time and to die without pain.
“I add for the edification of the reader that my sons bear my name, an item which my father forgot to bestow upon me (he was so heedless).”