he must allow himself to be adored!” This elicited a few “Oh! ohs! ” while the ladies slightly raised their fans. Lucy, in her stage-box, laughed so noisily that Caroline Héquet entreated her to be quiet. From this moment the piece was saved, and was even a great success. This carnival of the gods, Olympus dragged through the mud, religion and poetry alike scoffed at, struck the public as extremely witty. A fever of irreverence took possession of this intellectual first night audience; ancient legends were trodden under foot, and antique images were broken. Jupiter had a fine head, Mars was highly successful. Royalty became a farce, and the army a jest. When Jupiter, desperately smitten all of a sudden by the charms of a little laundress, broke into a wild cancan, and Simone, who played the part of the laundress, raised her foot on a level with the nose of the master of the gods, calling him, in such a funny manner, “My fat old boy!” a peal of mad laughter shook the house. While the others danced, Phœbus treated Minerva to some hot wine, and Neptune sat surrounded by some seven or eight women, who stuffed him with cakes. The audience snatched at the faintest allusions, obscenities were discovered where none were intended, and the most inoffensive words were invested with a totally different meaning by the exclamations of the occupants of the stalls. It was long since the theatre-going public had wallowed in such disgusting foolery, and it took its fill. The action of the piece, however, advanced in spite of all this by-play. Vulcan, dressed in the latest style, only all in yellow, and with yellow gloves and a glass in his eye, was there in pursuit of Venus, who at last arrived, dressed as a fish-woman, a handkerchief thrown over her head, her breasts protruding, and covered with huge gold ornaments. Nana was so white, and so plump, and so natural in this part of a person strong in the hips and the gift of the gab, that she at once gained the entire audience. Rose Mignon, a delicious baby, with a baby bonnet on her head, and in short muslin skirts, was quite forgotten, although she had just sung Diana’s woes in a charming voice. The other, the big girl with her arms akimbo, who clucked like a hen, was so full of life and the power of woman, that the audience became fairly intoxicated.
After this no exception was taken at anything that Nana did. She was allowed to pose badly, to move badly, to sing every note false, and forget her part. She had only to turn to the audience and smile, to be treated with wild applause. Each time she gave her peculiar movement of the hips the occupants of the stalls brightened up, and the enthusiasm rose from gallery to gallery up to the very roof, so that when she led the dance her triumph was complete. She was in her element as, with arms akimbo, she dragged Venus through the mire. The music, too, seemed written for her voice of the gutter—a music of reed-pipes, a sort of reminiscence of a return from the fair of Saint Cloud,k with the sneezes of the clarionetsl and the gambols of the flutes. Two concerted pieces were again encored. The waltz of the overture, that waltz with the saucy rhythm, returned and whirled the gods round and round. Juno, as a farmer’s wife, caught Jupiter flirting with the washerwoman, and spanked him. Diana surprising Venus in the act of arranging a meeting with Mars, hastened to inform Vulcan of the time and place, when the latter exclaimed—“I have my plan.” The remainder of the act did not seem very clear. The gods’ inquiry terminated in a final gallopade, after which Jupiter, in a great perspiration, all out of breath, and having lost his crown, proclaimed that the little women of the earth were delicious, and that the men alone were in the wrong. The curtain fell, and above the applause rose some voices shouting loudly, “All! All!” Then the curtain rose again, and the actors and actresses reappeared hand-in-hand. In their midst were Nana and Rose Mignon, bowing side by side. The applause was repeated, the claque surpassed their former efforts, and then the house