Page:The Bohemians of the Latin Quarter.djvu/275

face to face with a Briton coiled up in an attitude which made him resemble Hamlet meditating on human nothingness. Schaunard was about to explain the reason of his presence, when a sudden volley of shrill cries cut short his speech. These horrid and ear-piercing sounds proceeded from a parrot hung cut on the balcony of the story below.

“Oh! that beast! that beast!” exclaimed the Englishman, with a bound on his arm-chair; it will kill me.”

Thereupon the bird began to repeat its vocabulary, much more extensive than that of ordinary Pollies; and Schaunard stood stupefied when he heard the animal, prompted by a female voice, reciting the speech of Theramenes with all the professional intonations.

This parrot was the favorite of an actress who was then a great favorite herself, and very much the rage—in her own boudoir. She was one of those women who, no one knows why, are quoted at fancy prices on the ’Change of dissipation, and whose names are inscribed on the bills-of-fare of young noblemen’s suppers, where they form the living dessert. It gives a Christian standing now-a-days to be seen with one of these Pagans, who often have nothing of antiquity about them except their age. When they are handsome, there is no such great harm after all; the worst one risks is to sleep on straw in return for making them sleep on rosewood. But when their beauty is bought by the ounce at the perfumer’s, and will not stand three drops of water on a rag; when their wit consists in a couplet of a farce, and their talent lies in the hand of the claqueur, it is hard indeed to understand how respectable men with good names, ordinary sense, and decent coats, can let themselves be carried away by a commonplace passion for these most mercenary creatures.

The actress in question was one of these belles of the day. She called herself Dolores, and professed to he a