others," M. About says, "have wept crocodile tears for the
collaborators, the victims of his glory and his talent. But it is
difficult to lament over the survivors (1884). The master neither
took their money--for they are rich, nor their fame--for they are
celebrated, nor their merit--for they had and still have plenty.
And they never bewailed their fate: the reverse! The proudest
congratulate themselves on having been at so good a school; and M.
Auguste Maquet, the chief of them, speaks with real reverence and
affection of his great friend." And M. About writes "as one who had
taken the master red-handed, and in the act of collaboration."
Dumas has a curious note on collaboration in his "Souvenirs
Dramatiques." Of the two men at work together, "one is always the
dupe, and HE is the man of talent."

There is no biography of Dumas, but the small change of a biography
exists in abundance. There are the many volumes of his "Memoires,"
there are all the tomes he wrote on his travels and adventures in
Africa, Spain, Italy, Russia; the book he wrote on his beasts; the
romance of Ange Pitou, partly autobiographical; and there are plenty
of little studies by people who knew him. As to his "Memoires," as
to all he wrote about himself, of course his imagination entered
into the narrative. Like Scott, when he had a good story he liked
to dress it up with a cocked hat and a sword. Did he perform all
those astonishing and innumerable feats of strength, skill, courage,
address, in revolutions, in voyages, in love, in war, in cookery?
The narrative need not be taken "at the foot of the letter"; great
as was his force and his courage, his fancy was greater still.
There is no room for a biography of him here. His descent was noble
on one side, with or without the bend sinister, which he said he
would never have disclaimed, had it been his, but which he did not