In 1847 he read "Boris Godunov" by Alexander Pushkin in French, and wanted to read all of Pushkin in the original language. He took as his Russian teacher Madame de Langrené, a Russian émigré who had once been the dame of honor of the Grand Duchess Marie, daughter of Tsar Nicholas I of Russia. By 1848 he was able to translate Pushkin's "The Queen of Spades" into French; it was published on 15 July 1849 in the "Revue des deux Mondes". He began to attend the literary salon of the Russian writers in Paris, the "Cercle des Arts" on rue Choiseul, to perfect his Russian. He translated two more Pushkin stories, "The Bohemians" and "The Hussar", as well as "Dead Souls" and "The Inspector General" by Nikolai Gogol. He also wrote several essays on Russian history and literature. In 1852, he published a scholarly article, "An Episode of the History of Russia; the False Dimitri", in the "Revue des Deux Mondes".