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The winning of the Derby gives a new fillip to the monarchy itself. A Victor Hugo in London is a thought a faire rire. A Goethe at the court of Victoria, or directing Drury Lane Theatre, is of a comic-opera incongruity. Our neighbours across the border have a national celebration of Burns' birthday they think as much of him as of the Battle of Bannockburn.
Such was this "Young Chevalier" when France took it into her head to make a pawn of him in the political chess-game with England. As a man he was beneath contempt; as a "King" well, he was a Roi pour rire; but at least the Royal House he represented might be made a useful weapon against the arrogant Hanoverian who sat on his father's throne.
"Thank you!" he said warmly "That'll be an immense relief to my mind." "You mustn't think she'll convert me," said Delia, quickly. "Why, she's a Suffragist!" Delia shrugged her shoulders. "Pour rire!" "Let's leave the horrid subject alone shall we?" Delia assented; and they set out, just as the winter sun of a bright and brilliant afternoon was beginning to drop towards its setting.
We toasted Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, and then we sang for an hour. M. Brault was the leading composer of Tahiti. He was the creator of Tahitian melodies, as Kappelmeister Berger was of Hawaiian. For our delectation Brault sang ten of his songs between toasts. I liked best "Le Bon Roi Pomare," the words of one of the many stanzas being: Il était un excellent roi Dont on ne dit rien dans l'histoire, Qui ne connaissait qu'une Loi: Celle de chanter, rire, et boire. Fervent disciple de Bacchus Il glorifiait sa puissance, Puis, sacrifiait
If I had been a yapping miniature lap-dog, with teeth only pour faire rire, I could not have been treated with greater disdain by the crowd. I glanced hastily round to see if Sir Samuel had not taken alarm; but, sitting beside his wife in the big crystal cage, he seemed blissfully unconscious of danger to his splendid Aigle.
'Epargnez la tête, he shouted, 'elle est encore bonne pour faire rire le public'; upon which, according to one account, there were exclamations from the crowd which had gathered round of 'Ah! le bon seigneur! The sequel is known to everyone: how Voltaire rushed back, dishevelled and agonised, into Sully's dining-room, how he poured out his story in an agitated flood of words, and how that high-born company, with whom he had been living up to that moment on terms of the closest intimacy, now only displayed the signs of a frigid indifference.
Mark Twain has had to pay in full the penalty of comic greatness. The world is loth to accept a popular character at any rating other than its own. Whosoever sets himself the task of amusing the world must realize the almost insuperable difficulty of inducing the world to regard him as a serious thinker. Says Moliere "C'est une etrange entreprise que celle de faire rire les honnetes gens."
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