From that first meeting dated the strong friendship between the trio, a
friendship that verged on worship on the side of the Goncourts, and on
tenderness on that of Gavarni. Two years later, on April 15, 1853, in
the series called _Messieurs du Feuilleton_ which he began in _Paris_,
the master draughtsman of the _lorette_ and the prodigal gave a
delicious sketch of Edmond and Jules de Goncourt. In his _Masques et
Visages_, M. Alidor Delzant, a bibliophile very learned in the
iconography of the Goncourts, declares these to be the best and most
faithful of all the portraits of the two brothers. We give a
reproduction of this fine lithograph. Seated in a box at the theatre in
profile to the right, an eye-glass in his eye, Jules, apparently intent
on the play, leans forward from beside Edmond, who sits in a meditative
attitude, his hands on his knees. M. Delzant compares these portraits
to those of Alfred and Tony Johannot by Jean Gigoux. And do they not
also recall another group of two literary brothers, older, it is true,
the delicate faces of Paul and Alfred de Musset in the delicious frame
of the Musée Carnavalet? Gavarni's drawing is a perfect master-piece of
expression and subtlety.
[Illustration: PORTRAIT OF EDMOND DE GONCOURT.