“... the Cross!’; or that the photographer Nadar was shortsighted to the point of blindness; or that Ernest Renan recoiled from the English word ‘comfort’ in 1859 with ‘I am forced to use this barbarous word to express an idea quite un-French’; or that after Thermidor, busts of Marat and Le Peletier were transferred, presumably from the high altar ...”

“... Caroline said of him that he ‘had absolutely no head for figures’. He used his lawyer friend Ernest Duplan, and later his Lévy stablemate George Sand (who told him straightforwardly that he was naïf in business matters). He rejected the idea of an exclusivity contract, unlike Sand, Zola, Dumas père or Loti. He was unique in refusing any illustration ...”