theatrical sketches. M. Halévy's liking for the men and women of the
stage is deep; and wide is his knowledge of their changing moods. The
young Criquette and the old Karikari and the aged Dancing-master--he
knows them all thoroughly, and he likes them heartily, and he
sympathizes with them cordially. Indeed, nowhere can one find more
kindly portraits of the kindly player-folk than in the writings of this
half-author of "Froufrou"; it is as though the successful dramatist felt
ever grateful towards the partners of his toil, the companions of his
struggles. He is not blind to their manifold weaknesses, nor is he the
dupe of their easy emotionalism, but he is tolerant of their failings,
and towards them, at least, his irony is never mordant.

Irony is one of M. Halévy's chief characteristics, perhaps the chiefest.
It is gentle when he deals with the people of the stage--far gentler
then than when he is dealing with the people of Society, with
fashionable folk, with the aristocracy of wealth. When he is telling us
of the young loves of millionaires and of million-heiresses, his touch
may seem caressing, but for all its softness the velvet paw has claws
none the less. It is amusing to note how often M. Halévy has chosen to
tell the tale of love among the very rich. The heroine of _The Abbé
Constantin_ is immensely wealthy, as we all know, and immensely wealthy
are the heroines of _Princesse_, of _A Grand Marriage,_ and of _In the
Express_.[A] Sometimes the heroes and the heroines are not only
immensely wealthy, they are also of the loftiest birth; such, for
instance, are the young couple whose acquaintance we make in the pages
of _Only a Waltz_.

[Footnote A: Perhaps the present writer will be forgiven if he wishes to
record here that _In the Express (Par le Rapide)_ was published in Paris
only towards the end of 1892, while a tale not wholly unlike it, _In the