“Has the blow satisfied you?” asked Montfanon.  “And the unhappy man has talent,” he exclaimed, talking of Dorsenne as if the latter were not present, “and he has written ten pages on Rhodes which are worthy of Chateaubriand, and he has received from God the noblest gifts—­poetry, wit, the sense of history; and in what society does he delight!  But, come, once for all, explain to me the pleasure which a man of your genius can find in frequenting that international Bohemia, more or less gilded, in which there is not one being who has standing or a history.  I no longer allude to that scoundrel Hafner and his daughter, since you have for her, novelist that you are, the eyes of Monsieur Guerillot.  But that Countess Steno, who must be at least forty, who has a grown daughter, should she not remain quietly in her palace at Venice, respectably, bravely, instead of holding here that species of salon for transients, through which pass all the libertines of Europe, instead of having lover after lover, a Pole after a Russian, an American after a Pole?  And that Maitland, why did he not obey the only good sentiment with which his compatriots are inspired, the aversion to negro blood, an aversion which would prevent them from doing what he has done—­from marrying an octoroon?  If the young woman knows of it, it is terrible, and if she does not it is still more terrible.  And Madame Gorka, that honest creature, for I believe she is, and truly pious as well, who has not observed for the past two years that her husband was the Countess’s lover, and who does not see, moreover, that it is now Maitland’s turn.  And that poor Alba Steno, that child of twenty, whom they drag through these improper intrigues!  Why does not Florent Chapron put an end to the adultery of her sister’s husband?  I know him.  He once came to see me with regard to a monument he was raising in Saint-Louis in memory of his cousin.  He respects the dead, that pleased me.  But he is a dupe in this sinister comedy at which you are assisting, you, who know all, while your heart does not revolt.”

“Pardon, pardon!” interrupted Dorsenne, “it is not a question of that.  You wander on and you forget what you have just asked me....  What pleasure do I find in the human mosaic which I have detailed to you?  I will tell you, and we will not talk of the morals, if you please, when we are simply dealing with the intellect.  I do not pride myself on being a judge of human nature, sir leaguer; I like to watch and to study it, and among all the scenes it can present I know of none more suggestive, more peculiar, and more modern than this:  You are in a salon, at a dining-table, at a party like that to which I am going this morning.  You are with ten persons who all speak the same language, are dressed by the same tailor, have read the same morning paper, think the same thoughts and feel the same sentiments....  But these persons are like those I have just enumerated to you, creatures from very different points of the world and of history.