Here is a spot of "Romance Sentimentale", the classic tale of a young man singing whilst his lady love plays the piano - except that they are frogs. It reminds me of the saying that you have to kiss a lot of frogs before one turns into a handsome prince. I have to say I rather like frogs and I am very sad that they no longer frequent the pond in the back garden. indeed, but with frogs. Such fun, and frogs are fairly musical, when they go a-wooing with their croaking serenades.
In several countries, frogs are thought of as good fortune, possibly because they shape-shift as they grow older in order to survive; first the spawn and the tadpole, and then the growth of lungs so that they can come out of the surface. This us almost certainly why they are also connected with magic and witchcraft, and their parts, especially their eyes, were often included in love potions by people of the Jewish faith.
That which I have selected for this set may not be the title, but it translates to "Animals dressed up", and for the want of anything else it can stay temporarily. They are definitely anthropomorphised, or portrayed doing things that are more normal for humans.
There seems to be two sets, based on the fact that sometimes the words "CHOCOLAT FELIX POTIN" are all the same size but much more spread out along the top of the card, and at other times they appear, as ours, to have a larger first letter ("C", "F", and "P") at the start of each word. I am not really sure how to denote this so I have gone for [CH] and [Ch] respectively, though the words are all in capitals. It is starting to appear that you can find the same card with either version.
Some also say "VOIR AU VERSO", which make it appear that there is a description on the back, but if you turn it over there is an advert. I have marked these with a *V*, and you can find the up and down style capitalization with and without it. So maybe there were three sets? Or four, if anyone has an all large capitals card which also says "VOIR AU VERSO"?
The cards that have been found so far are recorded by the title, but I have also added the animals, as this is not always apparent from the title. They are :
- Consultation savante [donkeys] - [Ch & Ch*V]
- En avante deux [bears] - [CH & Ch]
- La carpe et la brochet [fish] - [CH & Ch*V]
- Le dejeuner du lion [lion] - [CH & Ch]
- Le rat de ville et le rat du champs [rats, though we say the town mouse and the country mouse] - [CH & Ch & Ch*V]
- Le retour de la noce [pigs] - [Ch*V]
- Les Fins Diplomates [foxes] - [CH]
- Menage de tigres [tigers] - [Ch & Ch*V]
- Romance Sentimentale [frogs] - [CH & Ch]
- Une affaire d`honneur [rabbits] - [CH]