u've forgotten the fishing-rods!" said he.

"Oh, yes; quite!" she answered, surprised and vexed at her
forgetfulness. "We ought to have bought them yesterday!"

The rods in question were very handy ones, the like of which could not
be purchased at Marseilles. They there owned near the sea a small
country house, where they purposed spending the summer. Monsieur
Rambaud looked at his watch. On their way to the railway station they
would still be able to buy the rods, and could tie them up with the
umbrellas. Then he led her from the place, tramping along, and taking
short cuts between the graves. The cemetery was empty; only the
imprint of their feet now remained on the snow. Jeanne, dead, lay
alone, facing Paris, for ever and for ever.

AFTERWARD

There can be no doubt in the mind of the judicial critic that in the
pages of "A Love Episode" the reader finds more of the poetical, more
of the delicately artistic, more of the subtle emanation of creative
and analytical genius, than in any other of Zola's works, with perhaps
one exception. The masterly series of which this book is a part
furnishes a well-stocked gallery of pictures by which posterity will
receive vivid and adequate impressions of life in France during a
certain period. There was a strain of Greek blood in Zola's veins. It
would almost seem that down through the ages with this blood there had
come to him a touch of that old Greek fatalism, or belief in destiny
or necessity. The Greek tragedies are pervaded and permeated, steeped
and dyed with this idea of relentless fate. It is called heredity, in
these modern days. Heredity plus environment,--in these we find the
keynote of the great productions of the leader of the "naturalistic"
school of fiction.

It has been said that art, in itself, should have no moral. It has
been further charged that the tendencies of some of Zola's works are
hurtful. But, in the books of this master, the aberrations of vice are
nowhere made attractive, or insidiously alluring. The shadow of
expiation, remorse, punishment, retribution is ever present, like a
death's-head at a feast. The day of reckoning comes, and bitterly do
the culprits realize that the tortuous game of vice is not worth the
candle. Casuistical theologians may attempt to explain away the
notions of punishment in the life to come, of retribution beyond the
grave. But the shallowest thinker will not deny the realities of
remors