given at the Comédie Italienne. It attracted crowds; and Sedaine, the
composer, vexed to see it preferred to his comic operas, wrote a couplet
against it, exhibiting more spleen than poetical merit. The attack,
however, together with the refusal of a small pension which he had
claimed from the Italian Comedy, to whose treasury he had brought
millions of francs, irritated Piis, the vaudevilliste then in vogue, the
Scribe of his day. In conjunction with Barré and a few actors, he opened
a theatre in the Rue de Chartres. The enterprise was crowned with
complete success, and an able company was soon assembled. Mr. Hervey has
collected some droll anecdotes of the actors who flourished under this
management, although they lose part of their point by translation.
Chapelle, a short stout man, "with eyes that were continually opening
and shutting, thick black eyebrows, a mouth always half open, and a pair
of legs resembling in shape the feet of an elephant," was remarkable for
his credulity, and his comrades took particular delight in mystifying
him. "Seveste, who had just returned from fulfilling an engagement at
Rouen, told the unfortunate dupe that, during his stay in that town, he
had succeeded in taming a carp so perfectly, that it followed him about
like a dog; adding, that he was much grieved at having lost it. 'How did
that happen?' said Chapelle, greatly interested. 'Why,' replied Seveste,
'one evening I took it to my dressing-room at the theatre; as I was
going home after the performance, a terrible storm came on, and my poor
carp, in trying to leap a gutter, fell in and was drowned.'--'How very
unlucky!' cried Chapelle; 'I always thought a carp could swim like a
fish!' As he grew older, however, Chapelle, weary of being continually
hoaxed, made up his mind to believe nothing, and carried his scepticism
so far as to reply to a friend's anxious inquiries after his health,
'Ask somebody else that question, my fine fellow; you can't take _me_ in
now.'" Another of the company, Carpentier, drank away his memory, forgot
his old parts, and could learn no new ones. For a long time he did not