magnificent constitution, an unclouded self-confidence, a kind, generous heart, and brilliant social, dramatic, and literary successes. "Hercules bon enfant," Maxime Du Camp called him, adding:—
"Like a giant who knows his strength and fears to take advantage of it, he was gentle. I have never seen in him—I will not say a sign of anger—but not even a movement of impatience. If ever a man was lovable, in the original sense of the word, that is 'made to be loved,' Dumas was that man.... He had so much wit himself that every one who was with him believed they had it too."
He seems to have created, as it were, an atmosphere of esprit which was breathed by all who came within its influence.
Roger de Beauvoir, the author of "L'Ecolier de Cluny," one day visited the great man's rooms in his absence, and was shown into the kitchen instead of the study. Wishing to "leave his card," he picked up his friend's account-book, and wrote this quatrain on one of the pages:—
"Sur ce carnet, Dumas écrit,
Jour par jour, tout ce qu'il dépense,
Il n'y pourrait mettre, je pense
Tout ce qu'il dépense d'esprit!"[1]
Many of the best stories told of Dumas naturally
- ↑ "In this book Dumas has writ
All that he spends from day to day;
'Twould never hold, I dare to say,
His great expenditure of wit!"
