ly, tearing off the thin laces of her corset that nestled around
her hips like a gliding snake. She went on tip-toe, barefooted, to see
once more that the door was closed; then, pale, serious, and without
speaking, with one movement she threw herself upon his breast with a
long shudder."

I notice here two things, gentlemen, an admirable picture, the product
of a talented hand, but an execrable picture from a moral point of
view. Yes, M. Flaubert knows how to embellish his paintings with all
the resources of art, but without the discretion of art. With him there
is no gauze, no veils, it is nature in all her nudity, in all her
crudity!

Still another quotation:

"They knew one another too well for any of those surprises of possession
that increase its joys a hundred-fold. She was as sick of him as he was
weary of her. Emma found again in adultery all the platitudes of
marriage."

The platitudes of marriage and the poetry of adultery! Sometimes it is
the pollution of marriage, sometimes the platitudes, but always the
poetry of adultery. These, gentlemen, are the situations which
M. Flaubert loves to paint, and which, unfortunately, he paints only too
well.

I have related three scenes: the scene with Rodolphe, and you have seen
the fall in the forest, the glorification of adultery, and this woman
whose beauty became greater with this poesy. I have spoken of the
religious transition, and you saw there a prayer imprinted with
adulterous language. I have spoken of the second fall, I have unrolled
before you the scenes which took place with Leon. I have shown you the
scene of the cab--suppressed--and I have shown you the picture of the
room and the bed. Now that we believe your convictions are formed, we
come to the last scene,--that of the punishment.

Numerous excisions have been made, it would appear, by the _Revue de
Paris_. Here are the terms in which M. Flaubert complains of it:

"Some consideration which I do not appreciate has led the _Revue de
Paris_ to suppress the number of December 1st. Its scruples being
revived on the occasion of the present number, it has seen fit to cut
out still more passages. In consequence, I wish to deny all
responsibility in the lines which follow; the reader is informed that he
sees only fragments and not the complete work."

Let us pass, then, over these fragments and come to the death. She
poisons herself. She poisons herself, why? Ah! it is a very little
thing, is death, s