as not a
corner to be found recalling the graveyard nooks sung of in the ballads
of the romantic period, not one leafy turn quivering with mystery, not
a single large tomb speaking of pride and eternity. You were in the new
style of Paris cemetery, where everything is set out straight and duly
numbered--the cemetery of democratic times, where the dead seem to
slumber at the bottom of an office drawer, after filing past one by
one, as people do at a fete under the eyes of the police, so as to avoid
obstruction.

'Dash it!' muttered Bongrand, 'it isn't lively here.'

'Why not?' asked Sandoz. 'It's commodious; there is plenty of air. And
even although there is no sun, see what a pretty colour it all has.'

In fact, under the grey sky of that November morning, in the penetrating
quiver of the wind, the low tombs, laden with garlands and crowns of
beads, assumed soft tints of charming delicacy. There were some quite
white, and others all black, according to the colour of the beads. But
the contrast lost much of its force amid the pale green foliage of the
dwarfish trees. Poor families exhausted their affection for the dear
departed in decking those five-year grants; there were piles of crowns
and blooming flowers--freshly brought there on the recent Day of
the Dead. Only the cut flowers had as yet faded, between their paper
collars. Some crowns of yellow immortelles shone out like freshly
chiselled gold. But the beads predominated to such a degree that at
the first glance there seemed to be nothing else; they gushed forth
everywhere, hiding the inscriptions and covering the stones and
railings. There were beads forming hearts, beads in festoons and
medallions, beads framing either ornamental designs or objects under
glass, such as velvet pansies, wax hands entwined, satin bows, or, at
times, even photographs of women--yellow, faded, cheap photographs,
showing poor, ugly, touching faces that smiled awkwardly.

As the hearse proceeded along the Avenue du Rond Point, Sandoz, whose
last remark--since it was of an artistic nature--had brought him back to
Claude, resumed the conversation, saying:

'This is a cemetery which he would have understood, he who was so mad
on modern things. No doubt he suffered physically, wasted away by the
over-severe lesion that is so often akin to genius, "three grains too
little, or three grains too much, of some substance in the brain," as
he himself said when he reproached his parents for his