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Updated: June 19, 2025
One day Beaumarchais received a letter from the Duke de Villequier, asking of him as a favor to give up for that evening his trellised box in behalf of some ladies of the court, who desired to see "Figaro" without being seen. Beaumarchais answered: "My lord duke, I have no respect for ladies who desire to see a performance which they consider improper, and who wish to see it under cover.
Whatever may be its defects, it unquestionably exemplifies the character of the nation, so faithfully pourtrayed by Beaumarchais, in the following lines of the vaudeville which concludes the Mariage de Figaro: "Si l'on opprime, il peste, il crie, Il s'agite en cent facons, Tout finit par des chansons." bis. Paris, February 17, 1802.
The Count listened quite calmly, and when Beaumarchais finished speaking, answered: "M. de Beaumarchais, you could not come at a more favourable time, for I have spent a good night, my digestion is in good order, and I never felt better than I do to-day. If you had made such a proposition to me yesterday I would have thrown you out of the window."
Gay-Lussac the chemist, Laplace the astronomer, Larrey the surgeon, de Suze the advocate, are here, and with them are Talma, Bellini, Rubini; de Balzac, Beaumarchais, Beranger; Moliere and Lafontaine, and scores of other men whose names and whose worthy labors are as familiar in the remote by-places of civilization as are the historic deeds of the kings and princes that sleep in the marble vaults of St.
It was soon apparent that Beaumarchais' words and the wishes of the public opinion were stronger than the words and the wishes of the king and of his highest officers. The king himself felt it and acknowledged it soon; he shrugged his shoulders compassionately when the chancellor of the seal, adhering still to his opposition, would by no means consent to the performance of the drama.
Beaumarchais took advantage of the success of the reading to boldly ask the keeper of the seals for permission to play the piece; he was supported by public curiosity, and by the unreflecting enthusiasm of a court anxious to amuse itself; the game appeared to have been won, the day for its representation, at the Menus-Plaisirs Theatre, was fixed, an interdiction on the part of the king only excited the ill-humor and intensified the desires of the public.
The enraged lover flew to Beaumarchais, and reproached him bitterly with his treachery; the latter sought to deny the charge, but the duke, losing all self-possession, threw the letters in his face, calling him a base liar. At this insult, Beaumarchais, who, whatever his enemies may say of him, was certainly not deficient in courage, demanded instant satisfaction.
Hence comes the need for the kindly race of barbers, a race dear to literature. Their shops were the earliest clubs, their conversation was all the ancient world knew in the way of society journals. Horace, George Eliot, Beaumarchais, Cervantes, and Scott have appreciated the barber, and celebrated his characteristics.
Nor are Colman and Jonson alone in their tribulations. Sheridan was hissed, and so were Goldsmith and Fielding and Coleridge and Godwin and Beaumarchais and About and Victor Hugo and Scribe and Sardou, and many another, including Charles Lamb, who cheerfully hissed his own Mr.
The unfortunate men of this community are kept in pitiable terror lest they commit an anachronism, and if, after a careful reconnoissance of the slippery ground, they tremblingly venture an anecdote of Selwyn or Hood, or Beaumarchais, they are invariably driven back in confusion by the inquiry, if they remember this or that bon mot uttered at the court of Aurungzebe or of one of the early Incas!
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