A boy wearing an apron entered and spoke to him in low tones.
“Ah! very good!” said Lamartine, “it is my luncheon. Will you share it with me, Hugo?”
“Thanks, I have already lunched.”
“I haven’t and I am dying of hunger. At least come and look on at the feast; I will let you go, afterwards.”
He showed me into a room that gave on to an interior court-yard. A gentle faced young man who was writing at a table rose and was about to withdraw. He was the young workman whom Louis Blanc had had attached to the Provisional Government.
“Stay where you are, Albert,” said Lamartine, “I have nothing of a private nature to say to Victor Hugo.”
We saluted each other, M. Albert and I.
The little waiter showed Lamartine a table upon which were some mutton cutlets in an earthenware dish, some bread, a bottle of wine and a glass. The whole came from a wine-shop in the neighbourhood.
“Well,” exclaimed Lamartine, “what about a knife and fork?”
“I thought you had knives and forks here,” returned the boy. “I had trouble enough to bring the luncheon, and if I have got to go and fetch knives and forks—”