I. Jaeqnes Arsene Francois Polyearpe, a French dramatist, born in Havre, Feb. 9, 1794, died in Paris, Sept, 7, 1854. He held an office in the ministry of the marine, which he lost after the revolution of 1830, as well as a pension granted him by Louis XVIII. In 1841 he was received a member of the French academy. His first tragedy, Louis IX. (1819), had great success from its adoption by the royalists as an offset against Casimir Dela-vigne's V'epres siciliennes. After retiring from office he devoted himself chiefly to the rapid production of vaudevilles and light pieces for the minor theatres. He also published Six mois en Russie, in prose and verse (1826); Marie de Brabant, a poem in six cantos; and L'Homme du monde, a melodramatic romance, afterward dramatized.

II. Marguerite Louise Virginie Chardon, a dramatist and novelist, wife of the preceding, born in Dijon, March 15, 1792. She collaborated largely in her husband's lighter works, and produced several successful comedies, the most popular of which was Marie, ou trois epoques (1836). Her Theatre complet (4 vols., 1848) comprises 20 plays. Her most popular novels have passed through many editions. She also cultivated painting, and in 1828 exhibited Une lecture de M. Ancelot, a picture which excited much attention from its portraits of nearly all the Parisian litterateurs.