Note 65 — Chapter XV

Those performances were really most brilliant affairs, and an invitation to them was only less highly prized than that to the ball which always followed the play on November 15th, the Empress's fête-day.[65] The cost of each performance was estimated at between twenty and thirty thousand francs, according to the company performing. I am repeating the official statement, though inclined to think it somewhat exaggerated. Except the Opéra or Opéra-Comique, there was not then, nor is there now, a theatre in Paris whose nightly receipts, with "the greatest success," exceed seven or eight thousand francs. Allowing for an additional three thousand francs for railway travelling and sundry expenses, I fail to see how the remainder of the sum was disbursed, unless it was in douceurs to the performers. There is less doubt, however, about the expenses of the Château during this annual series of fêtes. It could not have been less than forty-five thousand francs per diem, and must have often risen to fifty thousand francs, exclusive of the cost of the theatrical performances, because the luxe displayed on these occasions was truly astonishing—I had almost said appalling.