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In his youth he had a penchant for poetry, and his poem on the flight, or expulsion, of the French from Russia was complimented by the Government. His muse dealt with ephemeral themes, but his bons mots are current among his countrymen to this day. A novel sort of plagiarism was the fashion of the time.
Voltaire says, "Les bons mots sont toujours redits." A similar occasion has here produced a similar conduct.
I believe if the tramp of the last angel were sounding, the Parisians would be divided into two sets: one would be singing the Marseillaise, and parading the red flag; the other would be shrugging their shoulders and saying, 'Bah! as if le Bon Dieu would have the bad taste to injure Paris the Seat of the Graces, the School of the Arts, the Fountain of Reason, the Eye of the World; and so be found by the destroying angel caressing poodles and making bons mots about les femmes."
In scenes of gaiety he never broke into the regard that was due to the presence of equal, or superior characters, tho' inferior actors played them; he filled the stage, not by elbowing and crossing it before others, or disconcerting their action, but by surpassing them in true and masterly touches of nature; he never laughed at his own jest, unless the point of his raillery upon another required it; he had a particular talent in giving life to bons mots and repartees; the wit of the poet seemed always to come from him extempore, and sharpened into more wit from his brilliant manner of delivering it; he had himself a good share of it, or what is equal to it, so lively a pleasantness of humour, that when either of these fell into his hands upon the stage, he wantoned with them to the highest delight of his auditors.
Congreve had a certain soundness of mind; of capacity, in the sense intended by Landor, he had little. Judging him by his wit, he performed some happy thrusts, and taking it for genuine, it is a surface wit, neither rising from a depth nor flowing from a spring. 'On voit qu'il se travaille e dire de bons mots.
They spoke of the theatre, and the last bons mots about their cherès amies the last liasons the last passions They spoke of Gabrielle her husband was killed last week 'So foolish of him, since one of Alice's 'friends' among the Ministers could easily have got him a soft job, and one must always help one's friends! Alice adored Gabrielle.
"You do not think, Monsieur Huet, that there is wit in these /jeux de mots/: perhaps you do not admire wit at all?" "Yes, I admire wit as I do the wind. When it shakes the trees it is fine; when it cools the wave it is refreshing; when it steals over flowers it is enchanting: but when, Monsieur Hamilton, it whistles through the key-hole it is unpleasant."
In the original, "Font chatoyer les mots." "Et quelquefois les morts," dit Monsieur de Clagny. "Ah! Literally: "And sometimes the dead." "What can he mean?" asked Madame de Clagny, puzzled by this vile pun. "I seem to be walking in the dark," replied the Mayoress. "The jest would be lost in an explanation," remarked Gatien.
He was the sublimation of Yankee wit as Lowell was of Yankee humor and human nature, and he made of witticism a study; polished, refined, and prepared his "bons mots", and, at the best moment, led the conversation round to the point at which it was opportune to fire them off.
Miss Asterisk was pretty enough to please any man's eye, but not with the beauty of which artists rave; well informed enough to be companion to a well-informed man, but certainly not witty enough to supply bons mots to the clubs. Miss Asterisk was one of those women of whom a husband might be proud, yet with whom a husband would feel safe from being talked about.
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