Page:The Bohemians of the Latin Quarter.djvu/30

had the coolness to invent the story that Wallon was a somnambulist, that he had fancied he was putting his boot where he was in the habit of placing it every evening, and that it was very lucky that he had not gone further or he would have thrown himself out of the window thinking he was jumping into bed.

“‘Did I do that?’ asked Wallon, still unbooted and heavy with sleep.

“‘Yes,’ we replied in chorus. Tabar then added that somnambulism never failed to punish hyperphysical philosophers for their hyperphysical philosophy. Then addressing Wallon he even persuaded him that he had been talking to his boot, calling it ‘old fellow,’ and making it partake of refreshments after excusing himself for having made it so heated on the asphalt of the quays. Half satisfied with our explanation, or seeing that they could only get paradoxical excuses from us, the invaders resignedly retraced their steps downstairs.”

At that time not only in the Latin Quarter but throughout Paris, people hardly went to a café except to drink coffee. Beer was only known as a strange and accidental beverage. As to liquors of a supposedly appetizing character, they were but rarely seen, and were looked upon as potions only good for constitutions debilitated by a sojourn in Africa. Punch and mulled wine were drunk in the latter part of the evening. The pipe now replaced by the cigarette was in high esteem; the students even made it an accessory to their costume, and when it was not in their mouths, they wore it in their buttonhole.

The Café Momus was not the only haunt favored by the Bohemians. Schanne says: “We went preferentially to the Rotonde, at the western corner of the Rue Hautefeuille and the Rue de l’École de Médecine. When I say ‘we,’ I mean Murger and all those who willingly grouped them-