Murger had no talent
for painting. One day, after he had been guilty of some pictures which
are said to be--for they are still in existence--enough to make the hair
of a connoisseur of painting stand on end, Pierre Bisson said to him,
"Throw away the pencil, Murger; you will never make a painter." Murger
accepted the decree without appeal. He felt that painting was not _in
him_.[B] He took up the pen and wrote poetry. There is nothing equal to
the foolhardiness of youth. It grapples with the most difficult
subjects, and _knows_ it can master them. As all of Murger's friends
were painters, except his father and mother, and they were illiterate,
his insane prose seemed as fine poetry as was ever written, because it
turned somersets on feet. Nobody noticed whether it was on five or six
or fifteen feet. His father, however, had heard what a dangerous disease
of the purse poetry was, and forbade his son from trying to catch
it,--vowing, that, if he heard again of its continued pursuit, he would
immediately make a tailor of him. Of course, the threat did not deter
Murger from the chase; but instead of pursuing it openly, he pursued it
by stealth.
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