Ravel is another droll dog, but quite in a different style from Levassor. The latter is all quickness, impetuosity, and _entrain_; Ravel is of a more passive style of comicality. At times he reminds us of two English actors, Buckstone of the Haymarket, and Wright, the Adelphi low comedian. He has something of Buckstone's odd monotony of manner, and, like him, often excites the laughter of an audience by his mere look or attitude. When Wright is not compelled to make a buffoon of himself in some stupid travestie, but is allowed fair scope for the display of his comic talents, which are really considerable, we prefer him to Ravel. He is a steady and improving performer. In _Paul Pry_, and some other stock pieces, his acting is quiet and excellent. Many of Ravel's characters have been taken by him in the English version. Ravel is seldom seen to greater advantage than as a soldier. He exactly renders the mingled simplicity and cunning of the conscript; the tricks of the barrack-room grafted upon clownish dulness. The piece called the _Tourlourou_--the French nickname for a recruit--founded on a novel of Paul de Kock's, was one of his triumphs, and another was _Le Caporal et la Payse_, Englished as "Seeing Wright." In short, he occupies a high position amongst the half-dozen drolls who, night after night, send home the audience of the Palais Royal brimful of mirthful reminiscences.
In this imperfect sketch of some of the leading French theatres and actors, we have taken little opportunity of censure. We could notice but a few, and have selected from the most worthy. In Paris, as elsewhere, _pumps_, to use a green-room term, are plentiful. But in the higher class of theatres they are in the minority; and moreover there is a neatness and _tact_ in the performance of French actors, which, in the less prominent characters, at least, goes some way to atone for the absence of decided talent. A French comedian may be tame, he may be incorrect in the conception of his part; he is rarely vulgar or ridiculous. We refer, of course, to the actors allowed to figure on the boards of the half-score good theatres in Paris. There is no lack of inferior ones, where the laugh is more often at the performer than at the performance. But most even of these will repay a visit, if not for the sake of the actors, for that of the audience. Despised by the fashionable and pleasure-seeking, they afford a rich field to the observant man. He must not, it is true, be squeamish, and fear to let the unsavoury reek of _tabac-de-caporal_, or the odours of potato brandy and logwood wine come betwixt the wind and his nobility. Neither must he dread contact with the mechanic's blouse, with the cotton gown of the grisette, or the velveteen vest of the _titi_ of the Boulevards; he must even make up his mind to see his neighbour, dispensing with his upper garment, exhibit his brawny arms in shirt sleeves of questionable purity. If he dare encounter these little imaginary contaminations, he will find entertainment in the humours of the Boulevard du Temple; in the pantomimes of the Funambules--once the scene of poor Debureau's triumphs--and in the ten-franc vaudevilles of the Petit Lazari.