from 100,000 to 215,000, whereas
L'Oeuvre moved only from 55,000 to 71,000 in fourteen years. But a
Vulgarian can understand La Terre while L'Oeuvre would be absolutely
undecipherable to him.

Zola always knew his market; even knew it after Dreyfus had
intervened. Of the series called Les Trois Villes, Rome is the best
seller, 121,000; and it is as profound a vilification of the Eternal
City as was La Terre of the French peasants, as Pot-Bouille of the
French bourgeois. Indeed, all Zola reads like the frenzied attack of a
pessimist to whom his native land is a hideous nightmare and its
inhabitants criminals or mad folk. His influence on a younger
generation of writers, especially in America, has been baneful, and
he has done much with his exuberant, rhapsodical style to further the
moon-madness of socialism; of a belief in a coming earthly paradise,
where no one will labour (except the captive millionaires) and from
whose skies roasted pigeons will fall straightway into the mouths of
its foolish inhabitants.

Zola as a money-maker need not be considered now; his gains were
enormous; suffice to say that he was paid large sums for the serial
rights. Nana, in _Voltaire_, brought 20,000 francs; Pot-Bouille, in
_Gaulois_, 30,000 francs; Bonheur des Dames, La Joie de Vivre,
Germinal, L'Oeuvre, La Terre, in _Gil Blas_, each 20,000 francs;
L'Argent, in the same journal, 30,000 francs; Le Reve, in the _Revue
Illustree_, 25,000 francs; La Bete Humaine, in _Vie Populaire_, 25,000
francs; La Debacle, in the same, 30,000 francs, and Docteur Pascal in
_Revue Hebdomadaire_, 35,000 francs. That amounts to about 300,000
francs. Each novel cost from 20,000 to 25,000 francs for rights of
reproduction, and to all this must be added about 500,000 francs for
the theatrical works, making a total of 1,600,000 francs. And it was
in 1894 that these figures were compiled by Antoine Laporte in his
book on Naturalism, which contains a savage attack on Zolaism. Truly,
then, Zola may be fairly called one of the best sellers among all
authors, dead or living.

XVI

A STUDY OF DE MAUPASSANT

In 1881 Turgenieff gave Tolstoy a book by a young Frenchman, telling
him that he would find it amusing. This book was La Maison Tellier.
Tolstoy revolted at the theme, but could not deny the freshness and
power of the author. He found Maupassant "deficient in the moral
sense"; yet he was interes