“Oh, in that case, you can have as many as you like.”
“How, as many as I like? Why, your room must be made of india-rubber.”
“No, sir, I merely mean to say that of fifty stalls I have at my disposal, you can take as many as you please.”
“Very good, madam, I now understand,” Dantan continued, laughingly; “then, if I can have as many as I please, have the goodness to keep me sixty.”
The lady, much embarrassed to solve this problem, sent for me, and I easily arranged the affair by converting the first pit row into stalls.
The reason why the sculptor required so many seats was as follows:
Dantan, junior, has an enormous number of friends, and the original idea had occurred to him of inviting a certain number of them to Robert-Houdin’s performance, and for that purpose he had engaged these sixty seats.
I have mentioned this incident, because it both proves the renown my theatre enjoyed at that time, and reminds me of the commencement of one of the most agreeable acquaintances I ever made in my life. From this moment I became, and have always remained, one of the intimate friends of the celebrated sculptor.
Before knowing him personally, like the majority of his admirers, I was unacquainted with his serious works, but when I was admitted to his studio, I could appreciate the full extent of his talent.
Dantan has in this room, arranged on enormous shelves, the most perfect collection of busts of contemporary celebrities. I do not think a single illustrious person of the age is missing. Each is properly classified and arranged as in a museum; monarchs and statesmen, less numerous than the others, are collected on one shelf; then come authors, musicians, singers, composers, physicians, warriors, dramatic artists—in a word great men of every description and country. But the most interesting thing in the gallery is that every bust is accompanied by its caricature, so that, after admiring the original, you laugh heartily at noticing all the comic details of the other.