`I hope,' he
would coo to me, `my friend Watts-Dunton, who'--and here he would turn
and make a little bow to Watts-Dunton--`is himself a scholar, will
bear me out when I say'--or `I hardly know,' he would flute to his old
friend, `whether Mr. Beerbohm'--here a bow to me--`will agree with me
in my opinion of' some delicate point in Greek prosody or some
incident in an old French romance I had never heard of.
On one occasion, just before the removal of the mutton, Watts-Dunton
had been asking me about an English translation that had been made of
M. Rostand's `Cyrano de Bergerac.' He then took my information as the
match to ignite the Swinburnian tinder. `Well, Algernon, it seems that
"Cyrano de Bergerac"'--but this first spark was enough: instantly
Swinburne was praising the works of Cyrano de Bergerac. Of M. Rostand
he may have heard, but him he forgot. Indeed I never heard Swinburne
mention a single contemporary writer. His mind ranged and revelled
always in the illustrious or obscure past. To him the writings of
Cyrano de Bergerac were as fresh as paint--as fresh as to me, alas,
was the news of their survival. Of course, of course, you have read
"L'Histoire Comique des ?tats et des Empires de la Lune"?' I admitted,
by gesture and facial expression, that I had not.
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