The landscapes he painted were very fresh and pleasing, delicately
coloured, with lots of air in them, and a dreamy, suggestive
sentiment. His brother sculptors declared that his statuettes were
modelled with exceeding dash and directness; they were certainly
fanciful and amusing. I remember one that I used to like
immensely--Titania driving to a tryst with Bottom, her chariot a lily,
daisies for wheels, and for steeds a pair of mettlesome field-mice. I
doubt if he ever got a commission for a complete house; but the
staircases he designed, the fire-places, and other bits of buildings,
everybody thought original and graceful. The tunes he wrote were
lively and catching, the words never stupid, sometimes even strikingly
happy, epigrammatic; and he sang them delightfully, in a robust,
hearty baritone. He coached the youth of France, for their
examinations, in Latin and Greek, in history, mathematics, general
literature--in goodness knows what not; and his pupils failed so
rarely that, when one did, the circumstance became a nine days'
wonder. The world beyond the Students' Quarter had never heard of him,
but there he was a celebrity and a favourite; and, strangely enough
for a man with so many strings to his bow, he contrived to pick up a
sufficient living.

He was a splendid creature to look at, tall, stalwart, full-blooded,
with a ruddy open-air complexion; a fine bold brow and nose; brown
eyes, humorous, intelligent, kindly, that always brightened
flatteringly when they met you; and a vast quantity of bluish-grey
hair and beard. In his dress he affected (very wisely, for they became
him excellently) velvet jackets, flannel shirts, loosely-knotted ties,
and wide-brimmed soft felt hats. Marching down the Boulevard St.
Michel, his broad shoulders well thrown back, his head erect, chin
high in air, his whole person radiating health, power, contentment,