Page:The Bohemians of the Latin Quarter.djvu/15

clined the proposal, and they parted—soon to meet again, however, to set to work upon the contemplated play.

The piece was produced at the Variétés towards the end of 1849, and met with phenomenal success. From that moment Murger’s career was assured. He at once took a position amongst contemporary writers and left the Latin Quarter, though still continuing to draw models for the characters of several of his subsequent works from the associates of his youth. He continued to work steadily for several years, the best part of the last of these being mainly spent at Marlotte in the Forest of Fontainebleau, where he had a little cottage. Seized with a sudden illness during a visit to Paris in January, 1861, he was removed to Dubois Hospital, where he expired a few days later.

It is questionable after all whether Murger was at heart a Bohemian. He has, indeed, been reproached that after having swam vigorously away from the Raft of the Medusa, on which so many of his comrades were starving, he opened a fusillade of irony upon them, a task that he might well have left to others. His dress was decent, his manners those of a man of the world, and his conversation, if witty, not overladen with aristic and literary slang. He felt, indeed, that his early life and work told against him in certain quarters, and that there were people who cannot understand that one can cross a muddy street without getting splashed, or that there are pavements in the Latin Quarter. This recalls an anecdote. One day he had only two sous in his pocket and had not breakfasted. But he had to call on an editor, and in order to look smart decided upon having his hoots cleaned. The boot-black set to work and was just finishing the first boot when it began to rain. “It would be useless extravagance to go on,” said Murger, handing him one sou and walking off.

Murger possessed a curious and attentive mind, and, as