Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: IV. THE TRAIL OF THE MUSKETEERS AND OTHERS The Personal Alexandre Dumas—The "Novel Manufactory" —From yillers-Cotterets to Paris—Early Paris Homes—The Chateau of Monte Cristo—Dumas's Death at Dieppe—The City of the Valois—The Streets of the Musketeers. WTT A recent letter to the present Pilgrim, discussing I certain Paris associations and memories, an Ameri- can novelist spoke of a residence he had once occupied for many months in the Rue de Tournon. As a short cut to the identification of the general neighbourhood he wrote: "You know, it was just round the corner from the places where Aramis and Company used to hang out." It would have been difficult to have found a line of description more illuminating. For amazing as it may at first glance seem, the trail of "Aramis et Cie.", as Mr. Booth Tarkington rather oddly called them, a trail of the seventeenth century, is far easier to follow than the trails of the men and women of fiction who lived in the Paris of 1830, or even of 1860. But before taking up the subject of the city of the astonishing and delightful Messieurs Athos, Porthos, Aramis, and d'Artagnan of "Les Trois Mous- quetaires," "Vingt Ans Apres," and "Le Vicomte de Bragelonne," there should be a consideration of theParis and the personality of their equally astonishing though not always equally delightful creator. Perhaps the best way to understand Alexandra Dumas the Elder is to pick out from the thousand and one stories told of him those that seem least likely to be true. Add to these twenty or thirty of the best witticisms at his expense, including those of the son who at once adored and deplored him, and season the impression with a glance at a dozen of the cartoons depicting his thick lips and woolly pate. Finally throw in a bit of Monte Cristo, a suggest...