brother-artists, who, at the present moment holds a place, as the
saying is, "in the sun," and who suggested the rather bitter
reflections by which this sketch of his life is introduced,
--reflections that are applicable to many other individuals of the
tribe of artists.

In 1832, Fougeres lived in the rue de Navarin, on the fourth floor of
one of those tall, narrow houses which resemble the obelisk of Luxor,
and possess an alley, a dark little stairway with dangerous turnings,
three windows only on each floor, and, within the building, a
courtyard, or, to speak more correctly, a square pit or well. Above
the three or four rooms occupied by Grassou of Fougeres was his
studio, looking over to Montmartre. This studio was painted in
brick-color, for a background; the floor was tinted brown and well
frotted; each chair was furnished with a bit of carpet bound round the
edges; the sofa, simple enough, was clean as that in the bedroom of
some worthy bourgeoise. All these things denoted the tidy ways of a
small mind and the thrift of a poor man. A bureau was there, in which
to put away the studio implements, a table for breakfast, a sideboard,
a secretary; in short, all the articles necessary to a painter, neatly
arranged and very clean. The stove participated in this Dutch
cleanliness, which was all the more visible because the pure and
little changing light from the north flooded with its cold clear beams
the vast apartment. Fougeres, being merely a genre painter, does not
need the immense machinery and outfit which ruin historical painters;
he has never recognized within himself sufficient faculty to attempt
high-art, and he therefore clings to easel painting.

At the beginning of the month of December of that year, a season at
which the bourgeois of Paris conceive, periodically, the burlesque