Critic and novelist, born at St. Étienne, France; took to journalism early, and established a reputation by his lively dramatic criticisms in the Journal des Débats; his gift of ready composition betrayed him into a too prolific output of work, and it is doubtful if any of his many novels and articles will long survive his day and generation; they, however, brought him wealth and celebrity in his own lifetime; he succeeded in 1870 to Sainte-Beuve's chair in the French Academy (1804-1874).