If this is not a good French story, we should like to know what it is?
Again we shift our vision to a belle maison (pretty house) in a back quarter of London—newly furnished—a little cockneyish in taste, and with all the new books of the day, piled helter-skelter upon the library-table. The owner is a tall, laughing-faced, good natured, not over-bred man, who has traveled to Constantinople and Egypt—to say nothing of an adventurous trip to the top of Mont Blanc.
His history is written by the letter-writers in this way: Poor, and clever, he wrote verses, and essays, and sold them for what he could get; and some say filled and extracted teeth, to "make the ends meet." It is certain that he once walked the Hospitals of Paris, and that he knows the habits of the grisettes of the Quarter by the Pantheon.
A certain Lord happening upon him, and fancying his laughter-loving look, and waggish eye, cultivated his acquaintance, and proposed to him a trip to the East as his friend, courier, and what-not. Our hero assented—went with him as far as Trieste—quarreled with My Lord—parted from him—pushed his way by "hook and by crook" as far as Cheops—and returned to London with not a penny in his pocket.
Writing brought dull pay (as it always does), and the traveler thought of talking instead. He advertised to tell his story in a lecture-room, with songs, and mimicry thrown in to enliven it. The people went slowly at first: finally, they talked of the talking traveler, and all the world went; and the adventurer found his purse filling, and his fortune made.
He bought the belle maison we spoke of; and this summer past set off for Mont Blanc, and ascended it—not for the fun of the thing, but for the fun of telling it.
We suppose our readers will have recognized the man we have in our eye: to wit—ALBERT SMITH.
And that—says Lecomte—is the way they do things in England!