Alexandre Dumas _fils_, in his preface to
_Heloise Paranquet_, condemns the duel as a dramatic expedient. "Not to
mention," he says, "the fact that it has been much over-done, we are
bound to recognize that Providence, in a fit of absence of mind,
sometimes suffers the rascal to kill the honest man. Let me recommend my
young colleagues," he proceeds, "never to end a piece which pretends to
reproduce a phase of real life, by an intervention of chance." The
recommendation came rather oddly from the dramatist who, in
_L'Etrangere_, had disposed of his "vibrion," the Duc de Septmonts, by
making Clarkson kill him in a duel. Perhaps he did not reckon
_L'Etrangere_ as pretending to reproduce a phase of real life. A duel
is, of course, perfectly admissible in a French or German play, simply
as part of a picture of manners. Its stupid inconclusiveness may be the
very point to be illustrated. It is only when represented as a moral
arbitrament that it becomes an anachronism.]
[Footnote 4: I am glad to see, from Mr.
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