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Show DUMAS WAS AN 'ANIMAL John Bigelow Describes a Meeting With Him in 1864. New York, Dec 9. A new and pic-, pic-, turesrjue view of Alexander Dumas is given In the nddress of John Bige-lew, Bige-lew, the veteran diplomat, to the American Am-erican Academy of Arts and letters, which is holding Its. annual session hero this week. It was white Mr. Blgclow was representing tho United States in Paris in 1S64 that he met the great French novelist. "In response to nn Invitation from Dumas," sajs Mr. Blgelow, ' I drove to his cottage and saw a large, picturesque pic-turesque looking man standing bareheaded bare-headed and book in hand at the cottage cot-tage gate. He had curlv hair aud an ' enormous throat, and his retreating forehead showed his strong animal nature In full forco. Ho won no era-tut, era-tut, but was otherwlso scrupulously neat and had a school boy's alertness. His cottage was well furnished, but It must have been very different from the castle which ho occupied in h3 more prosperous days, when his Income In-come was $150,000 a year. "He told mo that ho had been Informed In-formed that If he would go to Amor- : ka and write a story it would have A great sale there. Immediately I thought of tho critical contest which was going on in my country at that time over the race problem. It occurred oc-curred to me that Alexander Dumas, I with his negro blood, had done more than any other African to vindicate the intellectual possibilities of that race I wanted him to write his personal per-sonal observations of tho historic effort, ef-fort, but ho insisted on a four-volume romance to be sold by subscription. "He showed nie tho manuscript of his novel, "St, Felice," which he was then writing. There was cot an erasure eras-ure or correction on it, 'I neer correct cor-rect my writings,' he said. 'If I l,e-gln l,e-gln to re-read my manuscripts I always al-ways end by throwing them Into the fire.' 'Dumaa had no reflective character. He was a typical member of the African Af-rican race In this, whenever lie reflected re-flected he became confused Just like Dur own American negroes "At our dinner that day we had a carp, a leg of mutton and shellfish with tomato sauce. Dumas ate like an animal, breathing 8tontoi1ously He drank champagne, claret and Burgundy Bur-gundy and ho Boon sank Into a state of somnolency. I felt like the guest of honor at La Foutain feast of animals. ani-mals. "Before I left' he made me understand under-stand that he desired the United States government to enlist his pen in its services, but 03 a friend warned warn-ed me that he would borrow money from any one I gave hlrn letters of introduction to. I never offered him aDy inducements." |