'2 Fi'ed Morrovj Fling 



is finished'^ although it has been performed in an admirable 

 manner for French and German readers. ^ For the English 

 speaking people the work is yet to be done, and a brief survey 

 of the scholarly and brilliant productions of French and Ger- 

 man writers who within the last decade have treated some 

 phase of Mirabeau's life, will make apparent how great a gap 

 exists in our own historical literature. 



I have confined the survey to the last decade, for ten years 

 ago there did not exist, even in France, a satisfactory biog- 

 raphy of the great French orator. In making this statement, 

 I do not overlook the fact that as early as 1870 Reynald had 

 written his attractive sketch upon ' 'Mirabeau et la constituante. ' ' 

 But it was only a sketch and although composed in the most 

 sympathetic and yet judicial spirit, it lacks detail and emphasizes 

 but one period of Mirabeau's life. 



As early as 1849, over twenty years before Reynald's work 

 was published, there began to appear in Parisian journals arti- 

 cles upon Mirabeau from the pen of a certain Louis de Lomenie. 

 The young man had made the acquaintance of Lucas Montigny, 

 Mirabeau's adopted son, and a warm attachment was the re- 

 sult. As a mark of his friendship for the young writer Mont- 

 igny placed in his hands unpublished material relating to the 

 life of Mirabeau. This formed the basis of the articles men- 

 tioned and was the beginning of a life-long study of the Mira- 



^ "Cent ans apres les fun^railles triomphales que ses contemporains lui 

 ont faites, cette question demeure encore incertaine. Chargee, a poids 

 egal, de louanges et d'outrages, cette memoire flottante n'a pas encore 

 trouve son ^quilibre et pris son aplomb." Rousse, E.: Mirabeau, p. 218. 

 ' Reynald, H. : Mirabeau et la constituante, Paris, 1872. 



De Lomenie, L. : Les Mirabeau, 5 vols., Paris, 1879-1891. 



Stern, A.: Das Leben Mirabeaus, 2 vols., Berlin, 1889. 



Rousse, E. : Mirabeau, Paris, 1891. 



Mezi^res, A.: Vie de Mirabeau, Paris, 1892. 



Decrue, F. : Les id^es politiquos de Mirabeau. Revue historique, 1883. 



Gradnauer, G. : Mirabeaus Gedanken tiber die Erneuerung des franz- 



Osischen Staatswesens, Halle, 1889. 



46 



