stic
theories and practices of the real painter and the imaginary one.
Several of Claude's pictures are Manet's, slightly modified. For
instance, the former's painting, 'In the Open Air,' is almost a replica
of the latter's _Dejeuner sur l'Herbe_ ('A Lunch on the Grass'), shown
at the Salon of the Rejected in 1863. Again, many of the sayings put
into Claude's mouth in the novel are really sayings of Manet's. And
Claude's fate, at the end of the book, is virtually that of a moody
young fellow who long assisted Manet in his studio, preparing his
palette, cleaning his brushes, and so forth. This lad, whom Manet
painted in _L'Enfant aux Cerises_ ('The Boy with the Cherries'), had
artistic aspirations of his own and, being unable to justify them, ended
by hanging himself.

I had just a slight acquaintance with Manet, whose studio I first
visited early in my youth, and though the exigencies of life led me long
ago to cast aside all artistic ambition of my own, I have been for
more than thirty years on friendly terms with members of the French art
world. Thus it would be comparatively easy for me to identify a
large number of the characters and the incidents figuring in 'His
Masterpiece'; but I doubt if such identification would have any
particular interest for English readers. I will just mention that
Mahoudeau, the sculptor, is, in a measure, Solari, another friend of
M. Zola's boyhood and youth; that Fagerolles, in his main features,
is Gervex; and that Bongrand is a commingling of Courbet, Cabanel and
Gustave Flaubert. For instance, his so-called 'Village Wedding' is
suggested by Courbet's 'Funeral at Ornans'; his friendship for Claude is
Cabanel's friendship for Manet; whilst some of his mannerisms, such as
his dislike for the praise accorded to certain of his works, are simply
those of Flaubert, who (like Balzac in the case of _Eugenie Grandet_)
almost invariably lost his temper if one ventured to extol _Madame
Bovary_ in his presence. Courbet, by the way, so far as disposition
goes, crops up again in M. Zola's pages in the person of Champbouvard, a
sculptor, who, artistically, is a presentment of Clesinger.

I now come to a personage of a very different character, Pierre Sandoz,
clerk, journalist, and novelist; and Sandoz, it may be frankly admitted,
is simply M. Zola himself. Personal appearance, life, habits, opinions,
all are those of the novelist at a certain period of his career; and
for this reason, no doubt, ma