“Rubbish! yes, that may be, but my rubbish is dear to me,” said the Duc d’Herouville, laughing, during the silent pause which followed the poet’s pompous oration.

“Let me ask,” said Butscha, attacking Canalis, “does art, the sphere in which, according to you, genius is required to evolve itself, exist at all?  Is it not a splendid lie, a delusion, of the social man?  Do I want a landscape scene of Normandy in my bedroom when I can look out and see a better one done by God himself?  Our dreams make poems more glorious than Iliads.  For an insignificant sum of money I can find at Valogne, at Carentan, in Provence, at Arles, many a Venus as beautiful as those of Titian.  The police gazette publishes tales, differing somewhat from those of Walter Scott, but ending tragically with blood, not ink.  Happiness and virtue exist above and beyond both art and genius.”

“Bravo, Butscha!” cried Madame Latournelle.

“What did he say?” asked Canalis of La Briere, failing to gather from the eyes and attitude of Mademoiselle Mignon the usual signs of artless admiration.

The contemptuous indifference which Modeste had exhibited toward La Briere, and above all, her disrespectful speeches to her father, so depressed the young man that he made no answer to Canalis; his eyes, fixed sorrowfully on Modeste, were full of deep meditation.  The Duc d’Herouville took up Butscha’s argument and reproduced it with much intelligence, saying finally that the ecstasies of Saint-Theresa were far superior to the creations of Lord Byron.

“Oh, Monsieur le duc,” exclaimed Modeste, “hers was a purely personal poetry, whereas the genius of Lord Byron and Moliere benefit the world.”

“How do you square that opinion with those of Monsieur le baron?” cried Charles Mignon, quickly.  “Now you are insisting that genius must be useful, and benefit the world as though it were cotton,—­but perhaps you think logic as antediluvian as your poor old father.”

Butscha, La Briere, and Madame Latournelle exchanged glances that were more than half derisive, and drove Modeste to a pitch of irritation that kept her silent for a moment.

“Mademoiselle, do not mind them,” said Canalis, smiling upon her, “we are neither beaten, nor caught in a contradiction.  Every work of art, let it be in literature, music, painting, sculpture, or architecture, implies a positive social utility, equal to that of all other commercial products.  Art is pre-eminently commerce; presupposes it, in short.  An author pockets ten thousand francs for his book; the making of books means the manufactory of paper, a foundry, a printing-office, a bookseller,—­in other words, the employment of thousands of men.  The execution of a symphony of Beethoven or an opera by Rossini requires human arms and machinery and manufactures.  The cost of a monument is an almost brutal case in point.  In short, I may say that the works of genius have an extremely costly basis and are, necessarily, useful to the workingman.”