(Last page written in pencil.)--It is my wish that when I am dead, I may
be wrapped in a simple linen cloth, placed in a rough unplaned coffin,
and buried under the apple-tree, on the road that leads to my paternal
mansion. I desire that my brother and other relatives may be apprised of
my death at once, and that they shall not disturb my grave by
the wayside.

No stone, no name, is to mark my grave.




ÉMILE AUGIER

(1820-1889)


As an observer of society, a satirist, and a painter of types and
characters of modern life, Émile Augier ranks among the greatest French
dramatists of this century. Critics consider him in the line of direct
descent from Molière and Beaumarchais. His collected works ('Theatre
Complet') number twenty-seven plays, of which nine are in verse. Eight
of these were written with a literary partner. Three are now called
classics: 'Le Gendre de M. Poirier' (M. Poirier's Son-in-Law),
'L'Aventurière' (The Adventuress), and 'Fils de Giboyer' (Giboyer's
Boy). 'Le Gendre de M. Poirier' was written with Jules Sandeau, but the
admirers of Augier have proved by internal evidence that his share in
its composition was the greater. It is a comedy of manners based on the
old antagonism between vulgar ignorant energy and ability on the one
side, and lazy empty birth and breeding on the other; embodied in