Every man has his own romance; mine clustered
exclusively about the practice of the arts, the life of
Latin Quarter students, and the world of Paris as
depicted by that grimy wizard, the author of the
COMEDIE HUMAINE. I was not disappointed--I could not
have been; for I did not see the facts, I brought them
with me ready-made. Z. Marcas lived next door to me in
my ungainly, ill-smelling hotel of the Rue Racine; I
dined at my villainous restaurant with Lousteau and
with Rastignac: if a curricle nearly ran me down at a
street-crossing, Maxime de Trailles would be the
driver. I dined, I say, at a poor restaurant and lived
in a poor hotel; and this was not from need, but
sentiment. My father gave me a profuse allowance, and
I might have lived (had I chosen) in the Quartier de
l'Etoile and driven to my studies daily. Had I done
so, the glamour must have fled: I should still have
been but Loudon Dodd; whereas now I was a Latin Quarter
student, Murger's successor, living in flesh and blood
the life of one of those romances I had loved to read,
to re-read, and to dream over, among the woods of
Muskegon.
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