As he grew old, Dumas _père_ became almost timid in his attitude toward the son, whose disapproval had frequently found expression in advice and warning. But Dumas could not settle down, and he could not become careful. Neither of these things was in his nature, and there was consequently always some little undercurrent of friction between them. To the end of his days his money was anybody's who liked to come and ask for it, and nothing but the final clouding of his intellectual capacity could reduce his optimism. Then, it is true, he fell into a state of sustained depression. The idea that his reputation would not last haunted him.
In 1870, when Dumas was already very ill, his son, anxious that he should not be in Paris during its investment by the Germans, took him to a house he had at Puys, near Dieppe. Here the great man rapidly sank, and, except at meal-times, passed his time in a state of heavy sleep, until a sudden attack of apoplexy finally seized him. He never rallied after it, and died upon the day the Prussian soldiers took possession of Dieppe.
Many stories are rife of Dumas the prodigal. Some doubtless are true, many are not. Those which he fathers himself, we might well accept as being true. Surely he himself should know.
The following incident which happened in the last days of his life certainly has the ring of truth about it.
When in his last illness he left Paris for his son's country house near Dieppe, he had but twenty francs, the total fortune of the man who had earned millions.
On arriving at Puys, Dumas placed the coin on his bedroom chimneypiece, and there it remained all through his illness.
One day he was seated in his chair near the window, chatting with his son, when his eye fell on the gold piece.
A recollection of the past crossed his mind.
"Fifty years ago, when I went to Paris," he said, "I had a louis. Why have people accused me of prodigality? I have always kept that louis. See--there it is."
And he showed his son the coin, smiling feebly as he did so.
Among those of the world's great names in literature contemporary with Dumas, but who knew Paris ere he first descended upon it to try his fortune in its arena of letters, were Lamartine, who already, in 1820, had charmed his public with his "Meditations;" Hugo, who could claim but twenty years himself, but who had already sung his "Odes et Ballades," and Chateaubriand.