was giving a masterly analysis of what most of us felt, and that his exclamation was worth columns of newspaper criticism.
Criticism has rights that none dare to dispute; if some complain of it, others profit by it. It is a real power, one of the greatest of the day. When a young girl appears for the first time, full of fear rather than hope; when the public, who seldom find out anything for themselves, allow her to play, entirely unsupported, tragedies they have given up going to see, and when the artist, alone, unknown, but faithful to her ideal, reveals her talent courageously, without thinking who is there, nor who is listening to her: then those critics who force the public to come against their prejudices and wishes, play a noble part. Why undo, therefore, now, the good that has been done? Why seek to stifle and discourage the talent you have endeavoured to foster? It is not fair, and we, the public, protest. The young artist belongs no longer to you; it is no longer she personally which is in question, but the art she is reviving—immortal, glorious delight of all humanity. Do not you feel that in reading your criticisms, this child, to whom immeasureable gratitude is due, this child who is not sure of herself, and who, in spite of her precocious genius, is not invulnerable to the shafts aimed against her, this young girl, who plays Hermione, and who understands and interprets Racine as we have seen, her understand and interpret it, may be wounded to tears: for this reason, and for this alone, it seems that, however small one's influence may be, one ought to protest and defend her as much as possible, and, above all, one ought to abstain from destroying the divine spark in the heart of this child, the heavenly seed which must sooner or later bear fruit.
The author of this eloquent remonstrance was Alfred de Musset, the poet, then in the zenith of his talent and fame.
One evening in the following month of May, the susceptible poet met the young actress leaving the Français, where she had been acting Tancrède to a large and enthusiastic audience. She invited him, with some other friends who accompanied her, to come to supper. A curious account of this supper, written to Madame Jaubert, his marraine, is published in de Musset's Posthumous Works:—
