He was consummate, too, in the midst of his hundred workmen at the saw-mill, as he directed them by a nod of the head, by a wave of the hand, giving his orders in a tone of voice at once gentle and firm, kindly yet full of power. He had just finished his imitation of Shakespeare's _Romeo and Juliet._ There were some fine lines in that piece of work, well conceived, some great thoughts vigorously handled; but, in the main, it was a mediocre production. He had started it two years too late, and had not attempted anything fresh at a time when to be original was one of the conditions of success.
I told Soulié frankly that I had come to ask him to write a drama with me; but, as neither of us felt at all strong enough to attempt anything in the way of original creation, we decided to take a subject from Walter Scott. Walter Scott was all the rage; his _Kenilworth Castle_ had just been played with great success at the Porte-Saint-Martin, and a version of _Quentin Durward_ was to be acted at the Théâtre-Français. Talma was allotted the part of Louis XI., and he had intended it to follow his Tiberius. What a glorious thing it would have been for the drama for Talma to have personated a character from Walter Scott! We settled upon _Old Mortality._ There were two characters in _Old Mortality_--John Balfour of Burley and Bothwell--that completely fascinated Soulié.
When our subject was chosen, we set to work with great zest; but in vain did we put our heads together, the plan did not go well. To put it baldly, we each of us had too much individuality, and we were continually knocking against each other's angles. At the end of two or three months of fruitless labour, after five or six useless meetings, we had made no headway at all, and were scarcely farther advanced than at our first meeting. But I had gained enormously by my struggle with this rough champion; I felt all kinds of new forces springing up in me, and, like a blind man whose sight has been restored, each day, little by little, my range of vision seemed to widen.
Meantime, I was practising how to handle dramatic poetry by translating Schiller's _Fiesque_ into verse. I undertook the task in order to teach myself, and not in hope of payment; and, although it was not to bring me in a penny, and we stood in the greatest need of work that would pay me, I had the courage to finish it from end to end.