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CHAPTER XXII.

HIGH ART IN THE QUARTIER LATIN.

“But, my dear fellow, what else could you have expected?  You took Mam’selle Josephine to the Opera Comique.  Eh bien! you might as well have taken an oyster up Mount Vesuvius.  Our fair friend was out of her element. Voila tout.”

“Confound her and her element!” I exclaimed with a groan.  “What the deuce is her element—­the Quartier Latin?”

“The Quartier Latin is to some extent her habitat—­but then Mam’selle Josephine belongs to a genus of which you, cher Monsieur Arbuthnot, are deplorably ignorant—­the genus grisette.  The grisette from a certain point of view is the chef-d’oeuvre of Parisian industry; the bouquet of Parisian civilization.  She is indigenous to the mansarde and the pave—­bears no transplantation—­flourishes in the premiere balconie, the suburban guingette, and the Salle Valentinois; but degenerates at a higher elevation.  To improve her is to spoil her.  In her white cap and muslin gown, the Parisian grisette is simply delicious.  In a smart bonnet, a Cashmere and a brougham, she is simply detestable.  Fine clothes vulgarize her.  Fine surroundings demoralize her.  Lodged on the sixth story, rich in the possession of a cuckoo-clock, a canary, half a dozen pots of mignonette, and some bits of cheap furniture in imitation mahogany, she has every virtue and every fault that is charming in woman—­childlike gaiety; coquetry; thoughtless generosity; the readiest laugh, the readiest tear, and the warmest heart in the world.  Transplant her to the Chaussee d’Antin, instil the taste for diamonds, truffles, and Veuve Clicquot, and you poison her whole nature.  She becomes false, cruel, greedy, prodigal of your money, parsimonious of her own—­a vampire—­a ghoul—­the hideous thing we call in polite parlance a Fille de Marbre."

Thus, with much gravity and emphasis, spoke Herr Franz Mueller, lying on his back upon a very ricketty sofa, and smoking like a steam-engine.  A cup of half-cold coffee, and a bottle of rum three parts emptied stood beside him on the floor.  These were the remains of his breakfast; for it was yet early in the morning of the day following my great misadventure at the Opera Comique, and I had sought him out at his lodgings in the Rue Clovis at an hour when the Quartier Latin was for the most part in bed.

“Josephine, at all events, is not of the stuff that Filles de Marbre are made of,” I said, smiling.

“Perhaps not—­mais, que voulez-vous? We are what we are.  A grisette makes a bad fine lady.  A fine lady would make a still worse grisette.  The Archbishopric of Paris is a most repectable and desirable preferment; but your humble servant, for instance, would hardly suit the place,”

“And the moral of this learned and perspicuous discourse?”