Édouard Manet, Woman Reading in a Café

Sans cafés et journaux, il serait difficile de voyager. Un journal, un endroit pour frotter durant la soirée les épaules avec d'autres nous permettent d'imiter les gestes familiers de l'homme que nous étions à la maison, qui, vu d'une distance, nous semblent tellement un étranger. (Albert Camus)

A painting of Manet that I admire for its perfect balance, Le Chemin de Fer - it's at the Washington National Gallery, I discovered it last time when I was there.

Manet, Degas, Pissaro, Renoir, Monet met regularly at Café Guerbois, during 1866-1869. Before these artists were ever known as Impressionists, they were referred to as the Batignolles Group, as they frequented a café on the rue de Batignolles.
(Val Clark, The Parisian Café: A Literary Companion)

(Manet)